Time To Focus On Designing Great Website Footers

How many times have you, as a web designer, ever thought of doing something out-of-the-box with a website footer? If you are not a web designer who tries to take his game to the next level at every opportunity you get, then the answer to the question would probably be: “None”.

I don’t blame you though; everyone is always bothered with the stuff above the fold. Moreover, what great things do footers offer anyway? It holds a repetition of the information that can be found elsewhere on the website. And to add to the woe, studies reveal that footer links have the lowest CTR of all links as well.

But you know what, there is a valid reason why visitors click so less on footer links. It is because only a handful of visitors see the footer in the first place. In fact, I have a personal opinion that if visitors scroll all the way down on a page, the CTR is actually quite high for footers.

An awesome Footer design(Source: Launchmind)

So, what can you do to bring your visitors down below, and attract them to click on the links?

#1. Avoid making it an SEO Dustbin

I know that it’s hard to resist using innumerable footer links to run your anchor text optimization and internal SEO link. This method used to be valuable pre-Panda update, but is rarely recommended anymore. You must remember that Google has already come up with algorithms that can easily detect excessive (and needless) linking, and give them a low SEO value. And this will damage you more than doing any good.

#2. Introducing a Hierarchy

Starting with what’s important and continuing with everything else is the mantra for success in web design. If you are a diligent follower of this rule, then why should you not adopt it in the footer? Placement, scaling and alignment are your 3 best friends when it comes to introducing a hierarchy in the footer. Grab the attention of your audience with the most important info placed at first, keep them hooked, and guide them down slowly to the end.

#3. Make Good Use of the Whitespace

The use of whitespace is not only underrated in footer design, but also in web design as a whole. Most web designers feel that they need to stuff in as much information as possible, and as a result, they end up making a webpage looking cramped. This holds true for footers as well. Even the content in the footer need some breathing space, where every piece of information will get equal emphasis.

#4. Displaying the Social Media Badges

The social media badges in the footer of a website are a testament that the respective business is pretty active in social media. I’m sure that you know how important is a social media presence these days. Not only does it increase exposure and reachability, but also plays an active role in establishing credibility. So when web visitors see social media badges at the bottom of a website, it automatically creates good impressions in their minds.

#5. Consider Using a Sub-footer

The sub-footer is the area that gets used to display various legal links or stuff which disclose some of your operations (for example, the copyright clause, terms, privacy policy, etc.). Having a sub-footer with all these elements actually makes visitors consider your business as extremely professional and detailed. And trust me, these two are very important when it comes to generating leads.

These 5 things mentioned above can help you make your footer useful and attractive. So make sure you take them into consideration. And don’t forget to leave your precious comment on the value of this post.