Joe, that is amazing and the first I have heard of a bounce rate that low. Obviously, focusing on quality traffic has been a strategy for you which is really where I was going with my comments. As you might know, we still see a huge bounce rate on most dealer sites and I don't recommend throwing those out of the equation. I am only saying don't use total visitors as a measurement of success or a benchmark to predict lead volume.
For example, our data shows unique visitors rose 15% in September over the last month. However, auto shoppers (those who make it past the home page and perform some vehicle related activity) dropped 7% and total vehicle searches were down 10%. This all led to a total decline in leads being submitted by 20%. So a nice increase in unique traffic did not coincide with an increase in shoppers, vehicle searches or leads. We have seen the opposite to be true also; a drop in unique traffic, and increased leads.
I think a wiser plan is to look at how many people bounce off that home page, determine what the “most popular bounced key word†is and stop putting SEM or ad dollars where they have the least effect.
In other words, don’t ignore the home page bail-outs, and don’t stop looking at unique traffic numbers, but don’t assume there is positive correlation between traffic, shoppers and lads.
