Designing Above the Fold

Recently I produced a proof-of-concept for a large Seattle-based software company (take a guess on who). During the design process I came across an interesting concept around how to use analytics more effectively with my design strategy. Maybe I was inspired by the fact our friends at WebTrends were joining my team for the pitch, but never the less I felt the concept worth sharing. The idea is to use analytics data to determine how best to deliver messaging below the fold.

For those of you who don’t know what the fold is, it is simply refers to the part of the screen that cuts off the remainder of the page. Statistics show that users very rarely scroll to see content below this line. In the case of content heavy web pages (or in this case email) this can cause a major problem when attempting to get your message across.

So, this is a simple way to offer “incentives” for your users to read below “the fold.” Notice that this screen shot of the email has a call to action or a headliner that rests just above the fold. I know that this is the fold, because my analytics software (in this case Google Analytics) has given me an overwhelming number of users who have a screen height of 768px.

This is a perfect, albeit simple example of how to use data gathered from Web Analytics to determine creative strategy. I haven’t tested the effectiveness of this approach, but will be conducting an A/B split test later this week. I look forward to sharing the results with you.