Exit Metric - what's the definition?

[KAFKA_SINGULARI]

I am trying to find an exact (and intelligable) definition of the 'exit' metric in Adobe Analytics completed with an example.

When does a visitor of a web page 'cause' an exit.

[Andrey_Osadchuk]

Have you read this article in the documentation https://marketing.adobe.com/resources/help/en_US/reference/metrics_exits.html ?

Let us know if something is not clear.

[KAFKA_SINGULARI]

Hi Andrey,

Yepp, I've read it. And it is not clear.

The number of times a given value is captured as the last value in a visit. Exits can occur only once per visit.

What value is meant here? Please provide an example.

Thanks,

Robert

[Andrey_Osadchuk · Accepted solution]

Let's consider an scenario: a visitor came to the site and viewed 3 pages: Page A, Page B and Page C.

If you run the Page report with the Exits metric, you will see 0 next to Page A and Page B, and 1 next to Page C since it was the last the visitor visited during his Visit.

The same logic will work with other dimensions too. Does it help?

[KAFKA_SINGULARI]

So what happens when a visitors only views page A and then leaves the domain? Does he bounce or exit? (according to AA logic)

[KAFKA_SINGULARI]

You mean the last page before his exit?

[Andrey_Osadchuk]

Both.

P.S.: However, Bounce may not be counted if the visitor onpage interactions are tracked on that single page. You may want to read more about bounces in the documentation.

[Gigazelle]

Andrey is spot on here. Also, to clarify, if there's only a single page in a visit, that page is considered an entry and an exit. The only criteria for an exit is that it was the last value seen in a visit - if it's the only value, it's still the last value seen.

[KAFKA_SINGULARI]

Thanks Andrew and Gigazelle for your replies.

As I understood from Andrew

a visitor visits one page, has interactions on that page than leaves = exit

a visitor opens a page and leaves immediately after without any interaction = bounce

Correct?

[Gigazelle]

While correct, they're not mutually exclusive.

Exits and bounces are metrics - meaning they get a +1 whenever criteria is met. Exits get a +1 during every visit no matter what, as long as there was a variable value in that visit. Bounces get a +1 whenever a visit consists of a single hit.

Page on the other hand is a dimension. It is a place to categorize metrics in a meaningful way.

A visit can have both an exit and a bounce (and a plethora of other metrics) even in a single hit. As long as metrics meet the criteria to get a +1, a ton of metrics can belong to a single hit.

(Which, side note, is how all custom events work too. The only criteria for event1 to get a +1 is if event1 is in the events variable during the hit.)

[miked83542047]

So let's say a page has 500 visits, 350 entries, 210 bounces, and 330 exits (scaling down numbers I'm seeing for an actual page of mine). Would that be a 66% exit rate and 60% bounce rate, or would it be a 66% exit rate with 64% of those exits qualifying as a bounce?

Referring to this comment: Exits get a +1 during every visit no matter what, as long as there was a variable value in that visit. Bounces get a +1 whenever a visit consists of a single hit.

[Gigazelle]

The bounce rate for that page would be 210 / 350, or 60%. Adobe calculates bounce rate as 'bounces divided by entries'.

The exit rate for that page would be 330 / 500 or 66%. Adobe does not have an official formula for exit rate, but using 'exits divided by visits' would make the most sense.

[miked83542047]

What I'm trying to understand is if there are 210 bounces and 330 exits, that would make 540 visitors leaving the website from this page out of 500 visits. I was thinking that a bounce is a subset of total exits, since they both technically involve a visitor leaving the site, but are defined by how they got there.

Please help me understand what I'm missing here:

There are 500 visits to the page. Of those 500, 350 came to the page directly, which would mean 150 arrived via another page on the website. Of those 350 who came directly, 210 bounced immediately (60% bounce rate). There were 330 total exits, of which 210 were bounces, meaning the remainder (120) were visitors who left the site from the page after having arrived via another page on the website. This tells me then that 80% of customers who arrived to the page via another on the website exited the site (120/150), and of the total exits from the site, ~64% bounced (210/330). The difference in those who stayed on the page or navigated to another on the website is then the 140 who didn't bounce (350-210) and the 30 who didn't exit (150-120), totaling 170, which is the difference between exits and visits (500-330).

[JeebusWithThisA]

Seems from the discussion above, all bounces are exits, but not all exits are bounces.

Based on my reading of the thread, if 500 visited, 330 exited, and 210 bounced, that means:

1: 210 of the 330 who left via that page did not come in from another page on the site and did not meaningfully interact with the page.

2: 120 of the 330 who left via that page either meaningfully interacted or that page was the last page in a multi-page visit.

3: 170 moved on from that page to another page during their visit.

[miked83542047]

Yeah, what I'm really looking for is a straight answer on whether bounces are a percentage of total exits, as I've been getting different explanations from within my organization depending on whom I ask. If they are, the difference in bounces and total exits is then an "exit" as you defined above, which changes how I view an exit as an engagement metric.

In my previous post, I didn't account for people who came directly and took a meaningful action on the page before exiting, which lowers the effective exit rate from 80% to ~41%. So looking at an exit rate as 41% vs 66% tells me a different story when considering engagement and user journeys.

So to recap, the total exit rate is 66% (330/500) and bounce rate is 60% (210/350), as I'm seeing in SiteCat. But total exits that were a bounce is ~64% (210/330), and total exits that weren't a bounce is ~41% (120/290). If this second sentence is accurate, then it tells me I need to consider these metrics beyond what SiteCat reports to tell the whole story around exit rate, which may cause me to analyze the journey differently when considering optimization.

[JeebusWithThisA]

Yes, the "bounce rate" is "bounces divided by entries" according to their docs.

So in the recap sentence, you're good. But in the second sentence, why are you changing the total number of exits to 290 from 330 in the non-bounce exit rate calculation?

[miked83542047]

My thought is that of the 330 who exit, 210 are bounces, which leaves 120 exits that still need to be accounted for. Then taking the 500 total visitors minus the 210 who left via bounce, there are 290 visits that still need to be sorted out. Those 290 consist of both folks who arrived internally (150), and those who arrived directly but didn't bounce (140, or 350-210). Therefore, the "exit" pool would be the 120 remaining exits divided by the 290 remaining unaccounted visits, or ~41%.