Beware the Scroll? Real statistics on scrolling and user experience
Recently, I’ve noticed that a few of my clients have been apprehensive about pages on their website that are “too long” and they want to have more information “above the fold”. It seems like this question has come up more frequently around the concept of Sales Pages - landing pages designed to drive sales of a certain service, product, membership, or course.
So it got me thinking, where is this concern coming from?
In my opinion, it’s a remnant of the earlier days of the web — think like 2005 to 2010 — when we tried to make our sites “stickier” and more interactive by packing in a bunch of information and links on the part of the page that’s visible when the site loads. Remember that? Let’s not go back there.
In fact, the term “above the fold” stems from newspapers and the idea that you wanted the most attention-grabbing headline to be the first thing people saw.
But is that still relevant now?
Do we ever hear users of the most popular, stickiest websites - like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube - complaining about scrolling too much? (Other than our own TikTok addictions, but that’s a story for another post…)
Definitely not. In fact, it’s exactly the opposite. Those websites want their users to keep scrolling, because it’s a form of engagement! The use of mobile screens has also played a major role in how users expect to engage with websites and scrolling has become the norm. There are plenty of statistics to back it up:
Data analytics provider Cheatbeat analysed over 2 billion website visits and found 66% of attention on a typical web page is “below the fold” – people scroll to get there.
Eye tracking studies by usability guru Jakob Nielson found people tend to focus above the fold, but people still do scroll, especially when the page follows certain conventions that facilitate it, like visual cues and animations.
On a mobile site, around half of all users start to scroll within 10 seconds, and 90% within 14 seconds.
Assuming designers follow scrolling design practices, people will scroll, according to an eye-tracking study by CX Partners.
So now that we feel a little better about scrolling, we still have to remember that there are certain best practices to follow with content like this to maintain a good user experience. Here are my tips:
Use a sticky menu to keep navigation links visible
Sticky menus are fixed to the top (or sometimes bottom or side) of the screen and remain in that position as the user scrolls. This allows them easy access to access other parts of your site. You could also have the menu disappear when scrolling down but appear again when scrolling up. It’s a common feature that users expect. Just remember not to have that sticky menu take up too much space on the screen. It’s always best to keep it simple.
Integrate visual cues
Incorporate functional animation
While animations should be used strategically and thoughtfully, they can be helpful in piquing the interest of the user and encouraging them to continue to scroll. Specifically, scroll-based animations - like this super sleek example from Apple - make it obvious to the user that the more they scroll, the more they see.
Add a “Back to Top” button
And just in case you’d like to have another way for the user to scroll back to the top of the page, you can always add a simple “back to top” button that sticks in the bottom right of the screen. This gives users an easy way to scroll back to the top of the page where they may access other navigation features. This usually works best when you don’t already have a sticky menu.
So overall, the main point is: if you build it well, they will scroll. Don’t worry too much about long pages, there are ways the make the experience manageable - and even delightful! - for your users.
