You can spend thousands of dollars on ads and SEO to get people to your website.

But the truth is, for most businesses, the majority of those people are going to leave without taking any action.

We call this a “bounce,” and it’s a critical metric for understanding your website's performance.

To get clear on the definition, a bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who land on your website and only visit one page before leaving.

For example

• A thousand people come to your site
• One hundred of them only look at the one page they landed on and then leave
• Your bounce rate for that group would be 10%

Bounce rates can differ across pages, but homepages normally account for 30-40% of all traffic, so if you have to pick one page to analyze, that's the best place to start.

Many factors influence this, like where the visitor came from, what ad or link they clicked, and how much context they have about your business. For our purposes, let’s use 50% as a benchmark. If your bounce rate is over 50%, it could be a sign that something is wrong. It means half of your potential customers are walking away before you even have a chance to talk to them.

So, what are the key things to focus on to decrease that bounce rate and get people more engaged? Let's dive in.

1. You Have a Two-Second Window

The first thing is speed.

You have about two seconds to load your content and start showing it to the person on the other end. If your site is slow and your copy or images don't load fast enough, people will leave immediately. It’s an instant sign that the experience will be frustrating, and it drives your bounce rate way up.

You can check this yourself with Google PageSpeed Insights. It's a free tool that will analyze your site and give you a score. Pay close attention to your mobile score, as that’s how the majority of people will interact with your website. If your score is in the red or your Core Web Vitals are failing, this is your lowest-hanging fruit for improvement.

What causes a slow site? The most common culprits are large, unoptimized images and a slow web hosting provider. Compressing your images and investing in better hosting are often the quickest ways to decrease your bounce rate.

2. Build Trust Instantly

Once your site loads quickly, you need to immediately show visitors things that are familiar or that build trust by association.

In those first few seconds, you want to answer the silent question in their mind: "Is this a real, trustworthy business?"

Don't hide your reviews on a separate page or bury your customer logos in the footer. Feature them prominently! Anything you can do to tell the visitor, "We are a real and professional company, and you're in good hands," is a huge win. You want them to feel that spending more time on your website won't be a waste.

Often, familiar images, badges, partner logos, and certifications are far more effective at conveying trust than written words. Visual cues are processed faster and can instantly create a sense of credibility.

3. Speak Directly to Them

Once you've loaded the page quickly and captured their attention with social proof, you need to talk directly to them. Your headline and opening copy are critical.

We were working with an education provider recently that was cautious about putting a direct headline on their homepage that spoke specifically to parents. But if you can do that, the end result is much stronger. The people coming to that website are most likely parents, so the messaging should resonate with them immediately.

Instead of a generic headline like, "We Are an Early Learning Center," try something that speaks to their core desire, like, "We Unlock Your Child's Full Potential." This connects on an emotional level and shows you understand their goals.

Copywriting is an art, but AI tools are getting pretty good at it. If you're unsure about your messaging, run your content through your favorite AI tool.

You can get quick, actionable feedback on how to improve your copy to be more direct and engaging.