Leading web usability consultant Jakob Nielsen has found that Internet users spend a massive 80% of their time engaging with the information that appears above the page fold. Information ‘above the fold’ is that which is immediately visible on a page before a user has scrolled down.

Nielsen observed that while users do scroll down and glance over the content that occurs lower down, they allocate the majority of their attention to the information they are immediately confronted with.

This confirms what we already know about typical user behaviour. People don’t like having to work for information on the Internet – they expect that what they are looking for will stare them right in the face within the first few seconds of arriving on a page, and will move swiftly along if it doesn’t.