Before addressing long homepage design, there’s a very important hurdle we must cross first: The Fold. Those vertical 600 pixels at the top of a website are thought to be prime real estate for content since no one ever scrolls below. In this article, I’ll go through where this myth came from, why it’s not true, and show you some analytics to back my claims up.
The Origin Of The Fold
I’ll make this lesson brief. In the newspaper industry, the papers are fold! in half and stack! up atop each other. In an effort to increase readership, newspaper !itors would put the most interesting headline above the fold-line so that people would be compell! to buy the paper and read on.
This idea was adopt! into web design. The principle itself holds water. It’s true that you should put your most captivating headline at the most accessible location, but the mutation of the principle has gone out of hand.
The Mutation Of The Fold
Instead of using the top 600 pixels for compelling content, companies opt for compressing all of their content together to fit in a tight spot. Instead of using that first panama whatsapp number data 5 million impression as an inviting entrance to more interaction, they cram in images and copy and links and CTAs so much so that it becomes a turn-off.
They do this because of a stubborn belief that people don’t scroll.
But People Don t Scrol Do They?
Surprise surprise, they do. Clicktale has conduct! what is copywriting? studies about web-page scrolling and here is the summary of what they’ve found:
76% of the page-views with a scroll-bar, were scroll! to some extent.
22% of the page-views with a scroll-bar, were be numbers scroll! all the way to the bottom.
While the 22% seems like it’s a small number at first, you have to keep in mind that returning viewers who have already scroll! all the way to the bottom are not likely do so again if they visit the website later.
You also have to keep in mind that these 22% who stuck around till the end are qualifi! leads. These are people who are legitimately interest! in what you’re offering, and they scroll! over the entire page to receive information. If you can capture 22% qualifi! leads just from a homepage then you should take the day off and treat yourself to a nice dinner.
In fact, ContentVerve has prov! that CTA’s plac! above the fold don’t always convert better and those plac! below the fold. In this study, they split test the same CTA plac! at the top of the page or at the bottom of the page.