Online Traffic ADHD – Tips to Beat the Bounce

If you want to succeed on the web, it’s important that you find a way to overcome the online ADHD an overwhelming majority of your visitors will have.

What is Online ADHD?

Online ADHD happens when people become so accustomed to the internet moving at warp speed that they begin to find it challenging to focus on one thing for too long. If your readers can’t be lassoed for more than 10-15 seconds, they’ll be worthless and you will have a high bounce rate (which also has the potential to hurt your site’s rankings with major search engines). You need to work a little harder in this day and age to grab someone’s attention and hold it for more than a nanosecond. Overcome that ADHD and you’ll improve your conversion rates.

What can you do to help thwart their bouncing off your page soon after they arrive?

Read on for some tips that could change EVERYTHING:

  1. Make sure the page loads fast. This means a clean design and for heaven’s sake….NO flash. If the site takes too long to load, you’ll lose them in a humingbird’s heartbeat.
  2. A great headline. If you’ve got a good headline, you’ll have a greater chance of visitors doing some reading to figure out what your page is about.
  3. A good first paragraph. If you don’t hook the in the first paragraph, chances are that you won’t hook them at all. Hint: They’ll be thinking: “What’s in it for me?”
  4. Vivid imagery. A photo or something pleasing to the eye should be above the fold. Work to appeal to your target demographic. A picture is definitely worth a thousand+ words. Don’t use a crummy font, either. Make sure your pages are easily readable to humans and search engines and pleasing to the human eye.
  5. Scannable content. Instead of one long block of text that will read like a monotone narration, break your text up into short paragraphs with plenty of bold subheadings. If you make reading your content look too much like work, you’ll lose people. If you make the copy scannable with interesting subheadings, people are more likely to read through to the end. Every paragraph should serve a purpose. Creating scanable content can make the content count with search engines as well. Leverage H1, H2, H3 tags and optimize your headings and body text with relevant keywords.
  6. Content that matters. Do you know what sort of visitors are landing on your pages? Read your web stats to make sure you’re catering to their precise needs. Hint: What keyword phrases are being searched on that brings these visitors to your site? And does your content provide high quality information that could compel people to buy? This is vital. Who cares how many read your article, blog post, or other piece of online content if they don’t get value from it? Perceived value can lead to success with visitors.
  7. Get them wanting more. At the end, lead people to another page. This takes creativity. If they click once, they aren’t a bounce. Then, on the next page, do the same again.

Here’s the thing:

The longer you keep visitors on your site, the greater the chance that they will convert from visitors to customers. Online ADHD is an affliction that affects many. There are a lot of websites out there that don’t do a great job of grabbing the attention of visitors. If you can grab their attention and show them that you’ve got what they came for, you’ll be better off than the massive list of websites out there with double digit bounce rates.

Need help crafting content that speaks to search engines and readers alike? Contact Dana Prince, SEO writer. I work with SEO companies, marketing consultants, internet marketers, and a number of online businesses who need content that engages both types of online audiences (SEO spiders and people).

How can I help you succeed online? Let’s talk.

6 Comments to “Online Traffic ADHD – Tips to Beat the Bounce”

  1. By Ashwin, Wednesday @ 2:16 pm

    Hey Dana,

    It took me quite some time to understand the importance of whitespace and the need to break paragraphs into readable chunks to allow for scanning 🙂

    And I have to work on Visual appeal too. I guess we can use the images from all those royalty free stock photo sites, and Flickr Creative Commons?

    Keep them posts coming 🙂

    Ash

  2. By Dana, Wednesday @ 2:20 pm

    Hey Ashwin,
    Different stock photo sites have varying rules. Some (like Morguefile) don’t require attribution. Sxc.hu users are typically ok with you using their images if you link back to their profile and notify them (but list their guidelines on each photo).
    Pictures definitely help capture visitor’s attention and if you optimise the tags on them, you can increase the SEO value of the page, too.

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