Why Dwell Time Absolutely Matters for SEO

Dwell time can be considered a very useful metric for articles on social networking and at conferences. Dwell time is a measure of session duration or just how long a reader stays on your page. It is not a measure of click-through rate.

Some in the SEO community are unsure of their own dwell time. Poor dwell time can mean your page is unuseful, and Google and readers have found little or no value in your page.

Short paragraphs are one way of improving dwell time. You can also increase dwell time with high quality content including videos and custom visuals

Can someone list the days spent at the company in a hotel? Does Google use this feature? Are there any ranking factors involved here? Tell me the effect this will have on Google rankings for my business.

Average Dwell Time (Session Duration) on Websites

The average dwell period of a given business is estimated by Google to vary between 2-4 minutes. It generally takes visitors around a couple of minutes to look at websites and understand the designs.

You can see the introduction to the book on the right of this webpage. How can you navigate this book easily? Can it help readers to find information faster through tables of contents and bullet points?

User experience is a significant factor in reducing page dwell time — especially at the top of an article on this page — because users who are not impressed or satisfied by the above-fold UX process may never stay long for the product.

How is Dwell Time Calculated

The basic formula is:

Dwell Time = Total Time on Page - Initial Page Load Time

To break most businesses this posts down to write it down:

Total Time on Page: The total time spent on the page across all visits and sessions. This is from the moment the page starts loading to when the user leaves the page.
Initial Page Load Time: The time it takes for the page to initially load. Measured from the moment the user clicks or navigates to the page to when the page finishes loading (typically the onLoad event).
Dwell Time: The total time on the page minus the initial load time gives you the active dwell time spent on the page.

Some relevant other points:

The total time on a page is usually measured via page tagging. It is also called session duration. This allows you to track time spent across visits.
Page load time can be measured via browser, network, or synthetic monitoring tools. Real user monitoring will provide the most accurate page load time.
Bounce rate is also closely related. Bounces (single-page visits) have a dwell time of 0 seconds.
The average dwell time for a page or site is calculated by summing the dwell time for all visits and dividing it by the total number of visits.
Segmenting by marketing channels, demographics, or other factors can provide additional insight.
Removing outliers, like extremely short or long visits, can prevent skewing the average.

Let the reader, me know if you need any help implementing dwell time calculations! There are also many analytics tools that will calculate it automatically.

The average time and dwell time can be calculated for a page, site section, or entire website. This helps compare the average time and dwell time amount of engagement across different parts and elements of the site.

Why Dwell Time is not Bounce Rate

A bounce occurs when the person visits one page and leaves the website. Your bounce rate varies by page number divided by the total page number. Are there any bounces? These are not all SERPs(Search Engine Results Pages). Even though some people have logged in through a SERP link, it is not enough to create it for a future someone to come and log in through this SERP link.

Bounce Rate:

Measures the percentage of single page visits (bounces) to a site.
Calculated by dividing total bounces by total visits. High bounce rates generally indicate poor user engagement/experience.
Available in most web analytics platforms like Google Analytics. This is calculated by dividing the number of single page sessions vs total visits to your site.

Dwell Time:

Measures the time spent actively engaged on a specific page or site. Calculated by subtracting page load time from total time on page. Longer dwell time typically signals higher user engagement/satisfaction.
Requires implementation of page timers and load time tracking. Measures engagement across all pages, not just bounces. Can be analyzed at an individual page level.
Bounce rate is a website-wide engagement metric based on multi-page visits. Dwell time measures user experience for a specific page or section. Bounce rate identifies engagement issues getting users to another page. Dwell time digs deeper into engagement on a particular page.

So in combination, bounce rate and dwell time provide a more complete viewpoint of user engagement and search behavior on the pages of your site content. They complement each other in analysis.

Ensure the website is fast and clean

There are several important techniques that can be implemented to ensure web pages are fast-loading and clutter-free in order to optimize dwell time. First and foremost, all images on the post should be properly sized, compressed, and formatted to reduce file size and accelerate load speeds.

Additionally, minifying CSS, JavaScript, and HTML by removing unnecessary whitespace and characters streamline code for faster delivery. Enabling browser and server-side caching allows key assets to be locally stored rather than re-downloaded each visit. Lazy loading of deferred content that falls below the fold also improves initial load. Reducing unnecessary redirects, upgrading hosting plans, and removing bloat from excessive plugins or code can also speed up response times.

Beyond performance, a clean user experience also contributes to dwell time. The navigation and page flows should be simple and intuitive to use. Following accessibility guidelines improves parseability for screen readers and keyboard-only users.

One way to improve dwell time and average session duration is by increasing interaction on your website, or webpage. You can do this with quizzes or surveys to your page. Or they can be in the form of a landing page.

Good dwell time will increase organic traffic across your site as this equals increased usefulness of content and that increases the authority of your website.

Establishing clear visual hierarchies through fonts, contrast, and whitespace helps guide users to key content quickly. Prioritizing hero sections and above-the-fold content ensures users immediately see relevant information.

Continuously monitoring performance using diagnostics tools identifies areas for additional gains. With lightweight and simplified page designs combined with performance optimizations, sites can deliver engaging experiences that retain visitor attention, ultimately driving longer dwell time as a sign of user satisfaction.

What is good dwell time?

There is no universally ideal dwell time, as the metrics vary significantly based on the website type, page purpose, content length, industry benchmarks, and business goals.

While longer dwell times typically reflect higher engagement, the definition of "good" dwell time depends on context. For example, a detailed blog post may aim for over 2 minutes per page, while a simple landing page may aim for under 30 seconds.

Some general guidelines are:

blogs and articles over 2 minutes,
homepages 15-60 seconds,
landing pages in under 30 seconds,
product pages 1-3 minutes, and
informational content over 3 minutes.

The key is to optimize dwell time over a period of time toward higher engagement and conversions for each page rather than aiming for an absolute time spent on site. Comparing metrics to industry averages and analyzing user search behavior provides better context than judging based on dwell time alone. With thoughtful analysis, dwell time can provide valuable insights into content quality, site navigation, search, and overall user experience.

What Is Dwell Time? And why It Certainly Matters for SEO