Have you ever walked into a room and forgotten what you were going to do or get? We’ve all done it and now people are researching it. 
Research from University of Notre Dame psychology professor Gabriel Radvansky found it happens when we walk through a doorway. He called it an “event boundary” which wipes the short-term part of your memory clean.
The researchers didn’t look at websites, but I believe moving from one web portal to another or from one page to another can cause the same effect.
Have you ever visited a website and thought, “Why am I here?” or “I don’t see anything for me”? Many times the informational material or sales material we distribute doesn’t match what you see on the website. Or, the site has not been optimized to the keywords most people are searching. It all makes us frustrated and forgetful. At home, we walk around searching for what we were going to do. On the web, we bounce off the page and are gone forever.
Minimizing the event boundaries on your site starts with a clear statement of what you want people do when they come to your site and understanding the words and phrases they use to find your site. Even if people do forget why they are there, you want to have a compelling enough site so they’re willing to stay to find out more information.
Really acute insight…so many websites are “committee compromises” that try to flood you.
I’ve definitely gone through that feeling! That’s some good insight.
Helping your website visitors avoid that feeling, aka remind them why they are there or making info easy to find, will likely lead to more conversions or engagement.