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Panda - Reducing Bounce Rate by splitting up long articles

by Steadyon
4 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hi,

I would appreciate some assistance from the SEO experts here.

I think one of the factors of panda is bounce rate.

I came across an interesting article that suggested that splitting up long content articles into multiple pages can dramatically reduce bounce rate.

In other words, if you have an article that is 1850 words long, you can split this down into 3 articles with say, 700 words, 600 words and 550 words etc.

(Obviously you still make sure the split up articles have enough content on them to avoid being classed as thin-content).

You then create a table of content listing the 3 parts to the article.

The theory is that readers will click on parts 2 and 3 and so dramatically change the bounce rate on the site. i.e. the visitor didn't just come in, read one page and leave. They clicked around, even if just a little. This will change the bounce rate.

Any comments so far?

Secondly, would you use the rel="next" and rel="prev" tags in the html to show google that these 3 articles are connected?

Are there any benefits or downsides to doing this from an seo and ranking perspective?

Thanks,

Sam
#articles #bounce #long #rate #reducing #splitting
  • Profile picture of the author retsek
    Bounce rate isn't exactly a factor that Panda considers. It just so happens that low-quality pages almost always have a high bounce rate.

    High quality pages or pages which are useful to the reader CAN ALSO have a high bounce rate, especially for informational or reference content.

    That said, spliting up a large article into multiple pages might be a good idea ... especially if it's a broad topic. The user will have an easier time reading, and you'll gain from increase page views, high time on site and possibly more long tail traffic. Just be sure to craft good descriptive (and not repetitive) titles and ensure substantial content exists on each page.


    Secondly, would you use the rel="next" and rel="prev" tags in the html to show google that these 3 articles are connected?

    Are there any benefits or downsides to doing this from an seo and ranking perspective?
    Do NOT do this on article content. The pages in the series will get little to no visibility in the SEPRs.

    rel=next and rel=prev, is intended for navigation content that is serialized. For example, your content categories or product listings. Those situations benefit from having the link juice flow to the first page in the series. In fact, as far as Google and Bing will be concerned, they'll see the entire series of pages as one page.
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  • Profile picture of the author markowe
    Retsek seems to know more about the rel=next/prev tags than me, but if I can chime in on the "splitting up articles", definitely, I have reduced bounce rate that way. In fact I did it on my homepage (among some other changes) - displayed only part of the article and added a "read more" link to the rest of the article, and reduced my average bounce rate from 75% to 45%!!

    My site has a bit of authority though, so that didn't affect the ranking of the homepage in any negative way - actually it seemed to stabilise me in the no. 1 position .

    I think most people would agree that there is SOME consideration of bounce rate, probably in the Panda updates, although it would only be one factor, of course.
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  • Profile picture of the author Steadyon
    From what I have read recently it seems google tries to consolidate page rank to the first page in the sequence.

    Perhaps this will help with rankings a little?

    I also am led to think that splitting large articles gives a larger content footprint in terms of number of pages in the site.

    One can use different titles and meta descriptions if a large page is split and perhaps rank for slightly different keywords.

    Google say they will consolidate link juice etc if using rel="next" and rel="prev".

    So on the face of it no problem.

    But if you use rel="next" and rel="prev", then isn't the possibility of having different <title> tags nulified?

    If using rel="next" and rel="prev", will individual pages in the sequence rank or will google pretty much just rank page 1 in the series?
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    • Profile picture of the author retsek
      Originally Posted by Steadyon View Post

      If using rel="next" and rel="prev", will individual pages in the sequence rank or will google pretty much just rank page 1 in the series?
      No, I've tested this myself. Including rel=next and rel=prev on article pages in a series will retard the whole series' ability to rank for long tail keywords. The first page in the series will probably benefit from it though.

      So based on that:

      - If you're writing a 5,000 word article and it's all very closely related, then you can go ahead and use rel=next/rel=prev.

      - IF you're writing a 5,000 word and there are clearly defined sub-topics where you can branch off and go off other related keywords, then do not use rel=next/rel=prev.

      - If you have paged content ie. content archives or product listings, then you can go ahead and use rel=next/rel=prev so that the first page in the series benefits from the collective link juice of all the "paged" pages. Why would you want "Computer Electronics - Page 47 of 90" ranking for anything. You'd want to first page to rank for Computer Electronics.
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