6 Reasons Why People Leave a Website - Easy Tips

To run a successful coaching and consulting website, online business, e-commerce website it's important to grab and keep the attention of visitors. But it's just as important to know why they leave a website. Based on data, this blog post gives you an overview about the 6 reasons why people leave websites. At the end, you can also find tips on what to do about them and how.

Here is an overview of the six reasons people leave a website:

1. Slow Loading Times

2. Bad Design and Boring Content

3. Poor Mobile Experience

4. Ads or Pop-ups That Get in the Way

5. Lack of Trust

6. Broken Links or Errors

Let`s discover more on why people might be leaving your website in detail.

1. Slow Loading Times:

It is annoying to viewers when a website takes forever to load. Google has found that 53% of mobile site views end if a page takes more than three seconds to load.

What can you do? Optimize your website.

How?  By making the size of the pictures and videos smaller so they are low in KB or MB, using browser caching, cutting down on unnecessary scripts, and other things.

What you can you do if you are not digital savy or don`t have extra budget to spend on this?

Step 1: Go to free websites such as Google PageSpeed Insights website or websitegrader.com by Hubspot to test the speed of your website and have a look at the recommendations.

Step 2: Identify the images, videos which take time to load. Either replace them with smaller sized images or find an image compressing website and compress them. The one I use is Image Compressor - FreeConvert.com. They are zillions of options as usual, this one is free and easy to use. (PS: As I am writing this, May 17, 2023, I am not affiliated with them and found them on Google after trying several other options.)

I will admit, my website still needs improvement on this, although it is getting better thanks to compressing the visuals and videos.

2. Bad Design and Boring Content

The way a website looks is a big part of how it attracts and keeps users' attention. Adobe did a study and found that 38% of people leave websites with bad layouts. HubSpot's survey found that 43% of people leave websites because the content is not relevant to them.

What can you do? Invest in a web design and content strategy that align with your brand or business and engage users.

How? Use whitespace effectively, choose a visually appealing colour scheme, and ensure readability with clear typography. Add compelling visuals, such as high-quality images or videos, to enhance the overall look and feel of your website. Remember to use ones low in size (e.g.: KB).

Regarding the content part, check your website data consistently and identify what type of content is most relevant for your visitors. Understand your visitors/ customers pain points and deliver solutions through engaging blog posts, videos, infographics, and downloadable resources and incorporate storytelling techniques.

Prioritize these types of content (what your visitors/customers) want vs what you think/hope/feel people will find interesting.

3. Poor Mobile Experience

Since most traffic comes from mobile devices, a good mobile experience makes a big difference. According to Google, 52% of users are less likely to engage with a company if they have a poor mobile experience.

What can you do? Implement responsive design principles to ensure your website adapts smoothly across different screen sizes.

How? Google has a free tool to test this.  Click to see Mobile-Friendly Test - Google Search Console.

Usually, the platform you`ve built your website on offers options to see how your website looks on different mobile devices. For example, I could test the mobile experience of my website on Kajabi, the CMS (Content Management System) I used, before I launched my website.

You can also search for free tools to view your website on mobile. mobiReady is one of the platforms you can check.

Think about how you can make your information easier for people to read on their phones. Here are a few things you can think about: How easy is it to see the buttons on your mobile website? Do the colors on the buttons stand out well enough? Are the letters big enough so that people can read them?

4. Ads or Pop-ups That Get in the Way

Pop-ups and ads that get in the way can quickly turn people away. According to a study, 82% of people would leave a website if it had annoying pop-ups that were hard to close.

What can you do? Have a balance between promoting your offerings and respecting your visitors' experience.

How? Use pop-ups only when they are relevant and won't bother people. Also, make sure they are easy to close. Think about other ways to get people involved, such as well-placed "call-to-action" buttons or slide-in forms.

 5. Lack of Trust

One of the keys to getting users to do something is to build trust. Blue Fountain Media's survey showed that 81% of people would leave a website that they didn't find trustworthy.

 What can you do? Enhance credibility by displaying trust signals.

How? If you have, use customer testimonials, security badges, and certifications. Engage with users through authentic, personalized content that demonstrates expertise.

6. Broken Links or Errors

Technical problems, such as broken links or errors, make it hard for users to do what they want to do.  Most people would not visit a website with this type of problems.

What can you do? Use tools to check your website for broken links on a regular basis.

How? As usual, the Internet has a lot to offer about this as well. For example, I used Semrush.com and www.deadlinkchecker.com. (PS: As I am writing this, May 17, 2023, I have no affiliation with them, and I found them on Google after trying several other choices.)

In conclusion, here are some beginner-friendly and useful tips to make sure your website stays current and interesting:

1. Make page load times as fast as possible by compressing photos and keeping an eye on site speed.
2. Make mobile performance a top priority by using responsive design.
3. When using pop-ups that don't bother people and make the pop-ups easy to close.
4. Make your site seem more trustworthy by adding recommendations, security measures, and personalized content.
5. Check and fix broken links regularly (pages that give an error -404- message when clicked) on a regular basis.
6. Focus on providing a good design, user experience and relevant content for the visitors of your website.

Thank you for choosing to read this content.  I hope this post helps you attract more online customers and get more engagement for your website and online business.

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References:

• New mobile page speed benchmarks - Think with Google
• 17 Website and UX Design Statistics That Make the Case for Smarter Web Design (hubspot.com)
• What Users Want Most from Mobile Sites Today (thinkwithgoogle.com)
• Why Your Visitors Hate Your Pop-Ups (+What You Can Do About It) (g2.com)
• The Resurgence Of Owned Media And How Businesses Can Leverage It (forbes.com)
• 13 impressive statistics on user experience | Inside Design Blog (invisionapp.com)