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77 viewsA website is the first visual identity of your brand that can potentially gain or lose a customer within a fraction of a second. Maintaining a good website structure is the primary responsibility that any marketing enthusiast should actively focus on.
But have you ever wondered which section of your site most influences visitors?
The answer is “ABOVE THE FOLD”!
The topmost section of any web page that owns the first visibility on a device screen is ideally referred to as “above the fold.”
Let’s dig down deep into this topic and explore the significance, practices, and some of the best techniques to fetch the maximum out of the “above the fold” of your website.
What Does “Above the Fold” Mean?
The visible section of a webpage that appears first, before you scroll down, is referred to as “ATF” or “Above the Fold.” It starts from the top and cuts at the bottom of your device screen.
How your “above the fold” looks defines the success of your brand’s digital endeavors.
Know the Importance of Above the Fold
Above-the-fold is technically the first impression of your brand on users. It is immensely responsible for captivating the immediate attention of visitors. If the “above the fold” is not promising enough, you may lose the users instantly after they enter your site.
On top of that, Google also takes serious consideration of the data available at “above the fold.” Thus, “Above-the-fold” plays a crucial role in the search engine ranking of your content. So, it’s high time you optimized your above-the-fold section.
Learn Some Best Practices of Above the Fold SEO
After knowing the significance of “above the fold” in websites, you must learn some of the best practices to optimize them. Some of the best SEO for “above the fold” are:
Build Responsive Web Design
An automated web design automatically fits into the shape and size of the user’s viewport. You have to make sure that multiple necessary page elements like images, texts, or infographics get settled down within the frame of the device screen.
To make this possible, you must first do a technical website audit. When the technical elements of your site stay free of errors, the above-the-fold will automatically stay intact.
You can use RankWatch’s site audit tool to identify current issues. The possible problems could be failed URLs, broken pages, redirection issues, short titles, short descriptions, etc.
The more you fix these issues, the better the technical clearance of your website will be. Google, too, promotes a website free of technical errors, and it is the sole responsibility of your marketing team to adhere to the same solution.
Optimize Header Section
The site header is the topmost section that is ideally replicated across every page of your website. It makes the other segment accessible and easy to reach. Thus, streamlining the header section will pave the way for a better user experience.
The significant elements of the website header section are the brand logo, hamburger menu, banner, sign-in/sign-up links, region flag, search bar, and cart icon. You don’t have to overcrowd the section but place the right functionalities to make the header section beneficial for the users.
Develop a Comprehensive & Catchy Heading
A descriptive, catchy, and comprehensive heading is the best that you can place on the “above the fold” section. This makes users understand the context and purpose of the page. To develop a catchy headline, you can use the on page SEO checker of RankWatch.
It gives you insights into the exact keywords in H1, the top competitors using the respective keywords in their heading tags, and the number of times you need to increase or decrease it.
Likewise, you get details on broad keywords in H1, the market competitors using the same keywords in their heading tags, and the number of times you must increase or decrease it.
These collective insights will help you develop a unique and snappy heading for your above-the-fold slot. The more appealing your heading is, the higher the possibility of users sticking to your content.
Get Directly to the Point
There’s no point in playing a puzzle game with the customers and keeping them in a dilemma. Your above-the-fold should clearly state that the blog has all the necessary ingredients that users are looking for. Thus, you need to get directly to the point and optimize your “Above-the-fold” to make the users scroll down for the content.
Integrate Ads With Content
Many brands monetize their website with ad content, but you need to figure out a perfect balance in their placement across the “above the fold” section. If your “Above-the-fold” is already brimming with too much ad content, it will distract the users and make them leave your website.
Also, the brand of advertisement determines how influential your above-the-fold would be. To make a user stay longer than usual, choose to make advertisement partnerships with renowned and relevant market brands.
Improve Loading Speed
We all know that loading speed adds excellent significance to consumer engagement. The digital era centers around continuous internet navigation, and your website must offer high speed to reign in the global market.
You can use the free SEO analyzer of RankWatch that comes up with page load speed tips for your website. You just have to apply those recommendations to make your site faster than before. Another important metric of page speed is core web vitals. The three significant pillars of core web vitals are:
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): The loading duration of the biggest page element is called LCP.
First Input Delay (FID): The response time of the first user interaction is FID.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): CLS is the smoothness of the website’s running without any glitches.
But how can we improve the core web? Don’t worry! RankWatch is here to help you.
Reduce JavaScript (JS) Execution
Waiting for more than 300 milliseconds is ideally considered a poor FID score. A reduction in the JavaScript execution time would result in an improvement in the FID score.
Again, you can use the free SEO analysis online tool of RankWatch to identify the JS code and then reduce the execution by deferring the JavaScripts.
Use Optimized And Compact Images
Images are one of the heavy elements of a website. Using optimized and compressed images can significantly make your web pages lighter. Heavily pixelated images often reduce your website’s LCP score. With regular compression and image optimization for SEO, you can improve the LCP parameter of your domain.
Offer Mobile Friendly Website
How friendly and responsive is your website with mobile devices? This will fundamentally define the mobile-friendliness of your brand. These days, users have more affinity for mobile phones than desktops or laptops.
You can use the mobile friendliness checker of RankWatch to recognize whether your site is compatible with mobile devices. If the analysis report is poor, you will have to take the necessary actions to improve the compatibility of your site with mobile devices.
Make it Appealing & Decent
There’s no point in making the “above the fold” too vibrant and complex. Keep it simple, comprehensive, and readable. Use decent texts, visuals, animations, icons, symbols, and layouts that serve the purpose of users.
Track Performance Metrics
Well, we all know that adopting an SEO strategy is simply not sufficient enough. You need to measure it with the right metrics and parameters.
Don’t worry! RankWatch would help you fulfill this task.
The analytics section of RankWatch gives you insights on new visitors, unique visitors, returning visitors, pages per visit, page views, time per page, bounce rate, time on site, etc. You also get a graphical representation of direct traffic, organic traffic, paid traffic, referral traffic, social traffic, and other mediums.
If the number of visitors increases after implementing the respective ATF strategy, you can consider that your SEO for above the fold is feasible and productive. Else, you may restructure your strategies for better results.
Further, you can also use the rank tracking feature of RankWatch, which offers you data on country-wise “Share of Voice.” It defines how popular a particular brand is across a certain geographic horizon.
Best Examples of Above the Fold Websites
After learning the best practices, you must know about some examples of websites above the fold that are performing exceptionally well in the market.
Let’s learn about them.
Shopify
Shopify is a brand that assists worldwide users in setting up their ecommerce platform. So, the above-the-fold section of Shopify allows readers to navigate the content and take the initiative for their own ecommerce business.
The ATF is composed of images, texts, instructions, logos, and CTA that quickly influence the minds of visitors. The CTA has been stated as “start the free trial,” which influences the mind of every ecommerce business enthusiast visiting the website.
Mint
Mint is a leading budget tracking and financial planning application that captivates customers’ interest with a catchy, professional, and conveying ATF. To grab the attention of users, Mint offers you sign-in and sign-out options, image, CTA as “check it out the tab,” and other necessary elements like tools, credit cards, loans, resources, and significant tabs for different financial insights, right away from the above-the-fold section.
Animalz
The leading content marketing agency called Animalz makes the maximum out of its ATF. With the magnetic headline scribbled as “The world’s best content marketing happens here,” CTA offered as “Let’s talk,” and a hand-drawn simple logo, you can witness the best “above the fold” sections that you have ever come across.
This brand is known for creating a high thrust of customer conversion with adopting SEO above the fold. Using the right keyword, Animalz has also given a small message to the customers, stating, “Animalz delivers growth outcomes through high-quality content marketing to enterprise companies, startups, and VC firms.”
Ceremonia
Ceremonia is a hair care brand that is known for offering products with long-lasting results. If you look at its “above the fold” section, you will get CTA as a “shop now” tab, a “hair quiz” tab that takes a hair test, attractive images, and some text describing the utility of available products.
King Arthur Flour
This Boston-based baking ingredient brand has an outstanding ATF with two major CTAs, “Start Baking” and “Shop Essentials,” along with a magnificent background of delicious bread that defines the purpose of the content. The slogan “Ready, set, sourdough!” also clearly gives visitors an idea of this brand. Further, it has other significant sections like shop, recipes, learn, baking school, and impact that would help you explore the more insightful areas of this website.
ESPN
The frontline American international sports channel, ESPN, has a competent “above the fold section” on its website. Starting from audio visuals ads, sticky ads, countdown ads, upcoming events posters, sign-up, sign-in, and login options, you get everything close to mandatory at the very first go.
With the above image, it is clear that this sports website also offers a live score display of the Indian Premier League, which is currently a hot event across the globe. You can also see top headlines offering updated information on recent events. As you click on any headline, the website will route you to an information page about the event.
Aya Paper Co
Aya Paper Co. offers celebration cards to its users as per the occasion and demand. It has also optimized the above-the-fold section of its website that invariably shows sign-up, sign-in, free shipping offers, and add-to-cart options. Besides that, it also offers attractive visuals that are appealing enough to make the customers explore the brand’s offerings.
Airbnb
As a vacation rental company, Airbnb is compelled to optimize the “above the fold” section and offer maximum offerings to users. Thus, the “above-the-fold” section of Airbnb starts with the list of top-ranking staying accommodations, as per the opted filter and category. It also allows you to change the category like beachfront, trending, tropical, caves, A-frames, etc. On top of that, you also get their photos, average star rating, location, price, dates, etc.
Nordstrom
Being the leading department store chain at present, Nordstrom has no better option than optimizing its website’s “above-the-fold” section. Their ATF section offers multiple product categories and subcategories like women, men, kids, designer, shoes, accessories, home, beauty, gifts, etc. As a result, the product filters, categories, and options would prevent shoppers from getting confused and landing on the wrong shopping page. So, Nordstrom’s “above-the-fold” section not only adds convenience to users but also builds a loyal customer base for long-term gain.
Kombu
Kombu is a fruit drink brand that is quite famous for its authentic taste and flavor. Thus, it has made a high-toned and sophisticated “above the fold” section with appealing images, add-to-cart options, pricing, and a sort of CTA as a “discover” tab.
The categories get scrolled horizontally, which tells you about the available flavors. When you click on the Discover tab, the website will take you to the purchase page for that particular category. It has everything that can lure a fruit drink lover to go ahead and try the product at least once.
Get the Right Place to Fix the CTA!
This has always been quite a debatable topic. The question is, “Which is the right place to fix the CTA button?” Many marketers believe the “Above-the-fold section” is the best place to put the CTA button.
Meanwhile, others come up with rational logic that customers would never press the CTA button without knowing the end-to-end details of the products and services. So, the bottom of the page would be the correct decision to place the CTA. To identify what works best for your brand, you can try the A/B test, also known as the SEO split test.
Just follow these three simple steps:
- Choose 2 CTA locations, one above the fold and the second below the fold section.
- Offer one design to 50% of the users and a second to the rest.
- Measure the conversion rate and implement the one that gives the maximum result.
So, firstly you have to adopt the hit-and-trial method first and then initiate the correct placement of CTA on your website. Further, you may take the necessary steps to fix the CTA button and compel the users to try your product and services.
The better you fix it right, the higher the possibility of purchase.
Wrapping Up!
So, here you have scratch-to-end information on ATF, like above-the-fold meaning, the best practices to optimize them, and the role of RankWatch in developing the best ATF for your website. We have also learned about some websites that made the best optimization of “above the fold” for high conversion rates of their business.
Hope this article has offered you enough reference on “above-the-fold” and its implementation would bring abundance prosperity to your restaurant business.
Cheers!
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