I don’t think bounce rate is the be-all end-all of statistics. Really, you have to consider your goals … and preferably measure them in your analytics package directly.

Raw visits can sometimes be a goal. If you want people to hear 1 idea and leave with it, it’s not so bad if they bounce. When you rant about Ms. Allison, maybe that’s what you want!

Thanks for the story.

I totally agree with what you said about homepages. While site architecture is still important, the design of each page counts so much more today (and from what I can tell, this is only going to get more prevalent as search continues to dominate web behavior).

I only recently implemented Google Analytics, so I don’t have my all-time bounce rate (I know, tsk, tsk). But I was appalled when I saw it after about 6 weeks with Analytics. Mine is much, much higher than yours and I really need to fix that.

(It might have to do with some of my titles. When I wrote “Breasts Aren’t Enough, Julia Allison,” I wasn’t fully prepared for the [hilarious] influx of traffic it would bring. I can imagine the searchers’ disappointment upon finding a marketing blog…)

But really – it’s not so much a general bounce rate that matters as much as the difference in bounce rate between your different pages and between your different sources of traffic.

To answer your question flat-out: 55.40% of all traffic since day 1 bounced.

As I’ve refined the information architecture and added content over time, that number has been on the decline. I’ll be able to give you a more informed answer once my new design comes out and I can compare new and old. Shh, this is the first time I’m mentioning it!

(Interesting anecdote: my bounce rate from Stumbleupon is 38% while my bounce rate from Digg is 96%)

That said, bounce-rates are not highly suggestive for blogs…still would like to see :)