What belongs above the fold on an expert's landing page
The first screen of a landing page does most of the selling, or most of the losing. Here is what earns a place there, and what should move further down.
· 4 min read
The first screen is the page
Most visitors to a landing page decide whether to keep reading before they scroll. On a phone, that decision is made on a screen roughly the size of a playing card.
That first screen, the part visible without scrolling, is what marketers call above the fold. It has one job: convince the right person that the rest of the page is worth their next thirty seconds.
Experts often fill it with things that matter to them rather than the visitor. A large logo, a full menu bar, a headshot and a line like "Helping you live your best life" all take space and say very little.
The five things that earn a place
If you strip the first screen back to what actually moves a visitor, you are left with five elements. Each one answers a question the visitor is silently asking.
- A headline that names the outcome. Who is this for and what will change for them? "For consultants who want a full calendar without cold outreach" is specific. "Grow your business" is not.
- A subheadline that adds the how or the proof. One sentence that makes the headline believable, such as the method, the time frame or the type of client you work with.
- One clear call to action. A single button with a verb on it: "Book a call", "Watch the training", "Get the guide". Two competing buttons split the visitor's attention.
- A sign of credibility. A short line of social proof, a recognisable logo strip of past clients or a specific credential. Keep it to one line.
- A visual that supports the message. Either the person behind the offer or a picture of the result. Not a stock image of a laptop on a beach.
That is it. Everything else can live lower on the page, where visitors who are already interested will find it.
Writing a headline that does the work
The headline carries most of the weight, so it is worth writing twenty versions before you pick one. Most of them will be bad, which is the point.
A useful structure is audience plus outcome plus constraint. "For coaches selling $5,000 programmes who want ten booked calls a week from paid ads" tells the right reader they are in the right place, and tells the wrong reader to leave.
That second effect matters. A headline that repels the wrong people is doing its job, because every unqualified visitor who clicks the button costs you time later.
Test your headline by reading it to someone in your market with no context. If they cannot tell you who it is for and what it promises, rewrite it.
If a stranger cannot repeat your headline back to you, it is not doing its job yet.
What to move further down
Plenty of good content does not belong on the first screen. It is not that it is unimportant, it is that it answers questions visitors only ask once they are interested.
- Your story and background. Useful in the middle of the page, distracting at the top.
- Long testimonials. Put one short line near the top and the full stories lower down.
- Pricing details, unless the price itself is the hook.
- Frequently asked questions, which belong near the final call to action.
- Menu bars. On a landing page with one goal, a menu mostly gives people somewhere else to go.
- Video players that autoplay with sound. If you use video at the top, make it optional and say how long it is.
Check it on a phone first
Many experts build their page on a large monitor and glance at the mobile version at the end. For traffic from social ads, that is backwards, because most of those visitors will arrive on a phone.
Open your page on an actual phone, not a desktop preview, and look at only what appears before you scroll. Ask three questions.
- Can I read the headline without zooming?
- Is the call to action button visible without scrolling?
- Does the image push the headline out of view?
If the image takes up the whole first screen on mobile, shrink it or move it below the headline. A beautiful photo that hides the offer is a cost, not a feature.
A quick test you can run this week
You do not need a full redesign to find out whether your first screen is working. Pick one variable and change only that.
Say your page gets 1,000 visitors a month from ads and 3% click the main button. That is 30 clicks.
Write a sharper, more specific headline and send half your traffic to each version for two weeks. If the new version gets 4%, that is 10 more people a month moving to the next step from the same spend.
Keep a simple log of each test: what you changed, the dates, the traffic and the result. After a few rounds you will know far more about your buyers than any template can tell you.
Start with the headline, then the button, then the image. Those three account for most of what a visitor sees before they decide.
