Design Above the Fold – 9 Crucial Items

Website Design: 9 Items a User Should Immediately See On Your Blog when Designing Above the Fold

Twenty years ago, “above the fold” only referred to the upper half portion of a newspaper. Now, above the fold can be applied to many things, especially website design, and the first screen of content a user will see when they go to your URL.

Earlier last year, Menshealth.com increased their pages per visit count by optimizing their content above the fold. They understand that starting your site content as close to the top of the page, and putting your most crucial navigation above the fold is very important.

At that time, they had seen an astounding 78.3% increase in pages per visit from the previous year by putting story navigation above the fold, in a table of contents type of style. This year, they’ve seen another 64.3% jump in pages per visit. See some more examples of their innovative, above the fold navigation here.

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Here are nine items to include when you design above the fold:

• The title of your site
• At least one article—if your site is news-based, or periodical in nature, your main headlining article should stand out and be seen first
• Primary navigation
• An OFIE that offers a complimentary product and asks for an email address
• A way for users to subscribe to your RSS feed
• Ads (if you sell them)
• A way for users to search your site
• Links to your blog archive or other topics to show readers what they’re likely to learn about on your blog
• One featured product

Does your blog follow these guidelines? How can you better organize the space above the fold on your blog?