Dwell time
What is the dwell time?
Dwell time is the amount of time a user spends on a website. Together with the bounce rate, it provides an indication of how the quality of the content is to be evaluated. Here, the dwell time itself is divided into 2 categories:
- Time on site: Here, the time is measured how long the user stays in the overall domain, i.e. all pages together.
- Time on page: Here the time is measured how long the user stays on a single page
What is the importance of dwell time for search engine optimization and the ranking of a website?
This cannot be answered exactly, as the search engine operators, especially Google, do not make a clear statement on this topic.
Through years of experience, we assume that the search engines include the dwell time in their ranking system. And even if the dwell time is only a minor ranking factor, it is still important to optimize it. Because the higher the dwell time on the website, the more satisfied the visitors are. And that, after all, is what it's all about in the first place.
It is therefore enormously important to provide users
- an excellent content,
- intuitive navigation,
- a simplified usability,
- a fast pagespeed,
to deliver.
What can have a negative impact on dwell time?
Pagespeed (loading speed)
Pagespeed is the speed that the server needs to provide the user with the content of a web page. The longer it takes, the more the user bounce rate increases. Since pagespeed is a ranking factor, a good SEO strategy also includes optimizing the factors that influence pagespeed.
Unique Content
Unique content means providing the user with unique and informative content after a corresponding search query. If you have such content, the dwell time increases automatically, which in turn sends a signal to the search engines that this is high-quality content.
Usability
Usability refers to user-friendliness. Here, it is important to make the content accessible to the user as easily and comprehensibly as possible.
User experience is an extension of usability and looks at the overall context of experiences a user has on a website.
How do I measure dwell time on my website?
With the integration of the Google Analytics tool in the website, you can analyze a lot of useful information about user behavior. This also includes the dwell time.
What are good values for dwell time?
This varies from industry to industry. Naturally, social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter or Instagram have high dwell times with an average of 50 minutes. Away from these, an average of 2 minutes is considered a good value.
Conclusion: In order to increase the length of time a user stays on a website, a crafty SEO strategy required with the application of the aforementioned factors. Especially in e-commerce, a high dwell time is essential, as it increases conversion, i.e. the conversion of a user to a customer.
If you have a high bounce rate, we can help you as a SEO Agency in Munich help with this problem.
