Decrease Bounce Rate by Using target="_blank" on External Links
Original posted on Erik Vold's Blog
PageRank is built on links, so search engine optimization is centered around them, and people link to the entities that they support. But many times, I see people increasing their own bounce rate by linking to an external page they support without using the target="_blank" attribute+value pair on the anchor tag.
This especially does not make sense most of the time, because most of the time, the external link is really a side note to the website and webpage at hand. So, using target="_blank", which forces the link to open in a new tab or window, is exactly what you should want, for the simple reason that it makes sense, and that it will reduce your bounce rate.
Don't be a fool, use target="_blank"!
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Another method is to use the attribute rel="external" and then use unobtrusive JavaScript to modify the behavior to mimic the target function. It might be overkill for most, but since we're advocating better practice here...
More info at http://www.sitepoint.com/article/standards-complia... and http://perishablepress.com/press/2007/11/20/open-e...
http://learningtheworld.eu/2007/xhtml-with-target/...
http://lachy.id.au/log/2008/04/target-attribute
But, if you really don't want to use the target attribute, I would not recommend using the javascript functions provided by:
http://www.sitepoint.com/article/standards-complia...
http://perishablepress.com/press/2007/11/20/open-e...
Because these functions will not work if you use a rel attribute microformat:
http://microformats.org/wiki/rel-faq
I'll write a better one tonight for those of you that care about microformats and use the xhtml 1.1 strict 1st edition or html 4.01 strict doctype, for which the target attribute is not valid.
I'm sure i'm not the only developer out there a little foggy about the target attribute, so it's nice to have the additional information.