A look at who has and who hasn’t gotten that kiss of death in climate communications
One of the more common woes mentioned by climate activists that suffer from bafflement over the tenacity of climate skepticism goes something like this: “if we could just communicate the urgency of climate change, everything would be better”. They think it’s just a matter of tweaking the message, rather than the message itself.
The other day, I wrote an article Another eco-journalist leaves Grist and noted the high bounce rate of the grist.org website, referencing a Mashable article that is the source of the phrase that is the headline. An article on Google Analytics says that:
If you could only choose one metric to look at, Bounce Rate might be your best choice.
I noted with interest the almost 2 to 1 disparity between the bounce rate at Grist and WUWT, and thought it worth exploring to see how bounce rate stacks up elsewhere in the climate blogo-media-sphere, thanks to a little inspiration from Josh. Some sites, like the Center for American Progress Climate Progress are served behind larger websites, so measuring their bounce rate isn’t possible. Below, in no particular order, is a table that lists many well known and some not so well known climate related websites and their bounce rate. The results are telling:
| Site | Proprietor | Type | Bounce Rate | Rank* |
| wattsupwiththat.com | Watts | skeptic | 40.90% | 9,345 |
| grist.org | varied | alarmist | 72.20% | 16,299 |
| skepticalscience.com | Cook | alarmist | 69.10% | 73,787 |
| realclimate.org | Schmidt | alarmist | 78.70% | 137,851 |
| climatedepot.com | Morano | skeptic | 67.80% | 47,880 |
| climaterealityproject.org | Gore | alarmist | 43.00% | 226,434 |
| bishop-hill.net | Montford | skeptic | 41.10% | 84,427 |
| climateaudit.org | McIntyre | skeptic | 63.20% | 76,583 |
| 350.org | McKibben | alarmist | 62.80% | 101,225 |
| thegwpf.org | Peiser | skeptic | 41.60% | 79,508 |
| planet3.org | Tobis | alarmist | 70.60% | 1,481,021 |
| rankexploits.com | Liljegren | lukewarmer | 53.70% | 238,563 |
| davidappell.blogspot.com | Appell | alarmist | 68.40% | 1,593,226 |
| ipcc.ch | U.N. | alarmist | 54.00% | 173,946 |
| globalwarming.org | C.E.I | skeptic | 59.50% | 916,180 |
| drroyspencer.com | Spencer | skeptic | 60.40% | 126,437 |
| joannenova.com.au | Nova | skeptic | 64.00% | 61,953 |
| theconversation.com | AU/UK gov | alarmist | 74.20% | 18,911 |
| climatecrocks.com | Sinclair | alarmist | 66.70% | 321,875 |
| principia-scientific.org | O’Sullivan | undefinable | 81.50% | 403,759 |
| forecastthefacts.org | Soros? | alarmist | 25.00% | 607,366 |
| judithcurry.com | Curry | lukewarmer | 57.60% | 85,517 |
| climate.gov | NOAA | alarmist | 83.70% | 140,025 |
All data above gathered as of 3/15/14 via Alexa.com, and each link is to the alexa.com results.
* Global Traffic Rank score, lower is better, for example Google is ranked as 1.
The most surprising thing to me was finding that NOAA’s climate.gov had a bounce rate of 83.70%, more than twice that of WUWT at 40.90%, and even higher than the “slayers” at principia-scientific. It’s pretty bad when a government website with a budget can’t outperform one of the wackiest climate related websites in existence in engaging their audience. Another surprising thing was that the oxymoronically named agenda driven attack website forecastthefacts had a bounce rate of only 25%. I think this is because there is so little information on their front page that anyone that gets sent there has to click on at least one link (such as about) to figure out who they are. their global ranking is even worse than the “principia/slayers”, suggesting that few are taking them seriously.
From the table, it seems that skeptical websites tend to be ranked generally as having more traffic and lower bounce rates than alarmist websites with some exceptions. Climateaudit tends to have a higher bounce rate due to its highly technical nature, and does Judy Curry’s shop.
According to an Inc.com article:
“As a rule of thumb, a 50 percent bounce rate is average. If you surpass 60 percent, you should be concerned. If you’re in excess of 80 percent, you’ve got a major problem.”
Clearly, a number global warming proponents and some skeptics aren’t very successful in getting their message across on the Internet, NOAA and “Slayers” in particular.
UPDATE: Some folks wanted to see the **daily time spent on each site in minute & seconds per day, so here is an updated table with that added: I had to make this table as an image since wordpress doesn’t play nice with table insertions wider than the available writing space. The highest and lowest values of daily time on site are highlighted.
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What is a ‘Bounce Rate’?
From the Google url
“Bounce Rate is the percentage of single-page visits (i.e. visits in which the person left your site from the entrance page without interacting with the page).
There are a number of factors that contribute to your bounce rate. For example, visitors might leave your site from the entrance page if there are site design or usability issues. Alternatively, visitors might also leave the site after viewing a single page if they’ve found the information they need on that one page, and had no need or interest in visiting other pages.”
From Wiki:
Bounce rate (sometimes confused with exit rate) is an Internet marketing term used in web traffic analysis. It represents the percentage of visitors who enter the site and “bounce” (leave the site) rather than continue viewing other pages within the same site.
Bounce rate is a measure of the effectiveness of a website in encouraging visitors to continue with their visit. It is expressed as a percentage and represents the proportion of visits that end on the first page of the website that the visitor sees
Added a link to this in the article. Thanks for pointing out the absence.
A high bounce rate is not necessarily the kiss of death. It depends what the general subject matter is. Think about online dictionaries, I maybe wrong but I assume they have a high bounce rate and a high bounce rate would be a ‘good’ thing? Now think about a hotel directory, a high bounce rate is a site killer indeed. Bounce rates are best compared to similar subject sites just as you have done above. Just my 2 cents.
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/2525491?hl=en
Maybe you just shout louder Anthony?
REPLY: I generally don’t use a megaphone like McKibben or all caps. I just try to tell it in a way I think most people can understand. – Anthony
If you get the ‘answer’ to your query right away, that is GOOD and Bounce Rate is 100%
REPLY: for one person, but not an aggregate experience. – Anthony
Looking at the Alexa site, I wonder how they obtain the education metrics.
One of the things that can affect bounce rates is how much fresh content there is every day to click on. If WUWT posted 1 article a week it would suffer far higher bounce rates. Climateaudit can go days before a new posting and can sometimes suffer. Sometimes I bounce from WUWT!
Bounce rate provides some info. It is not a good metric, however, because I search all my favourite sites several times a day, and if new articles have not been posted, I move on. This raises the bounce rate, but does not reflect lack of interest.
In which case, Leif, visit duration may be more important like when reading WUWT posts with 200 replies. Many metrics but bounce is a decent one.
Ahh…Just a thought but what about people like me who might look in on WUWT many times in a day (honest) but when see nothing new just just click right back out again……Apologies but that would serve to adversely bias the count?
Unless the very large numbers of viewers tend to “average” out the end result?
One could say I was addicted!
Jones
I almost never bounce from WUWT , for two main reasons, the information presented is concise and understandable, and once I start reading the comments I am wasting hours here… LOL
lsvalgaard says:
March 15, 2014 at 10:41 am
If you get the ‘answer’ to your query right away, that is GOOD and Bounce Rate is 100%
———————————————-
Assuming the answer is not very complicated, not arbitrarily split onto multiple pages, can actually fit onto one page, and that is the only reason you visit a site, yes.
Human behavior is complicated, kinda like a probability cloud, and these metrics are arbitrary.
I think you are reading too much into it ..there all kinds of things like bots to factor in.
. Anyway fallacy of consensus
.. What counts is being right, not your might.
In defense of noaa I have several links to data pages I check as needed. Flood projections rainfall freezing weather for construction locations. Some times multiple times per day. I seldom click through unless I need to bookmark another location.
One other thing to consider is the amount of time someone spends on a page. Maybe you have information pages that are excellently written and satisfy the user. On average they spend several minutes reading your great page then bounce. This may happen a lot right across your entire website. Placing related links within paragraphs and images reduces bounce.
WUWT might be able to reduce its bounce rate if it experimented with placing the Recent Posts above the Blog Stats. Just a thought and you can always revert?
Why I bounce (using the definition A. Watts linked to above).
1. I bounce at a climate science site that is linked to a thread I am reading if the page contains what is referred to in the original thread I am reading.
2. I bounce at a climate site if I never heard of it before and it doesn’t look like it adds anything to the dialog.
3. I bounce at a climate science site when I am just checking for updates and there appear to be no new ones.
4. I bounce at a climate science site if there is prima fascia name calling or frequent quotes / references about religious texts.
I never bounce at any climate science site when the philosophy of science or the history of the philosophy of science or the history of science is a fundamental part of the discussion. : ) I am addicted to those. From those discussions I get increased perspective on the non-science central to CAGW.
John
Jimbo:
With respect to Climate Audit, I agree. No new post and no well regarded commenter, both of which are visible n the entry page, then I leave. The same with RealClimate – though there I look for comments from a member of the team which tens to be few and far between in the echo chamber.
Web site architecture and content are the big determinant of the metrics. The actual organization of your front page can determine whether people will pause there, or go on to other pages. For example, Anthony uses a fairly simple WordPress theme where his articles are listed in chronological form, i.e., last published at the top. As long as he keeps fresh content at the top, his bounce rate should be pretty good as long as his material in interesting. Fortunately, Anthony seems to understand his intended audience.
Anthony could choose to have several articles “teased” on his front page, and you will see lots of blogs in that configuration. Also, newspapers and department stores will have architectures where the front page is to offer product specials or other items of interest, and then you have to use an extensive menu system to get to the product you want (or click on the picture itself).
I agree with Anthony that some of the skeptic web sites may suffer in the bounce rate because of the technical level of the content. Climate Audit, Dr Roy Spencer, and Climate Etc (Dr Curry) are examples. I don’t read Skeptical Science because of the low quality of articles, and I don’t read Real Climate because of their penchant for personal attacks. Al Gore’s site creators seem to know their business and their audience. Of course, you get political stuff there, not climate science.
As far as climate science is concerned, after you read WUWT, Climate Audit, Bishop Hill, JoNova, and Climate Etc, you pretty well have the subject of climate science and news covered.
Since it’s nearly impossible to not click the continue reading button on most posts, I can understand the good bounce score. Congratulations again, Anthony, on being the best.
I never would have guessed that David Appell’s web-site was in the top 1.6 million world-wide.
OK here it is in a kinda nutshell.
So well done WUWT in your ‘niche’ area.
Another interesting metric would be Time spent associated with Bounce rate. Presumably, if you spent time reading the content on line, the time spent would be greater than if you didn’t find content you were looking for. My searches sometimes list sites that don’t have what I’m looking for and I will bounce out within the first minute or so
Bounce rate, another unfortunate term. Can’t possibly have any meaning except on a first visit to a site. Repeat visits will be for specific information. First visit have a good look around if you like the site.