The footer of your blog is one of the most important areas of your blog. Even though it is located on the bottom of your page, it still acts as a reason for why people should stay on your blog and maybe even subscribe to it. That is, if the user even makes it that far down the page.
Footers have been receiving a lot more attention over the last few years, and two man styles have been created as a result. A footer can be in two different sizes: large (often behemoth sized) or small (sometimes as small as a navigation bar in your header). It is questionable as to which is more valuable to your site, but I have some very convincing reasons why one is better than the other in any situation.
Large vs. Small Footers
How does a large footer compare to a small footer? How can a simple vertical strip of space compare to a multi-column, miniature homepage? We’ll see how the two types of footers can benefit your site, and which one benefits the most.
Large Footers
A large footer has the space for as much information as you would want. Large footers come in all different sizes, and the way you organize that content is completely limitless. We’ll see what a larger footer has to offer your blog below.
-
It looks beautiful
-
Holds more content…duh
-
Great SEO benefits
-
Great call-to-action
-
Eases content load in sidebar(s)
There are countless examples of gorgeous footers on the web that truly look stunning. The best part about this is you don’t even need to have advanced illustrations or ingenious typography to make a large footer look good. A little sense of organization is all it takes to really make a large footer look great and complement the other elements of your gorgeous blog.
The great thing about large footers is all of the space it creates for you to stuff it with content! Unlike smaller footers, you have room to add multiple columns, add beautiful images and throw in giant lists of links. Because you have so much room, you can be as creative as you want; make things as big as you want, or as small.
Search engines don’t miss out on the important information you stuff into your footer. Just because it’s at the end of your page doesn’t mean it has to be valueless.
Footers are actually important to your SEO because search engines do find value in the content you add to the very bottom of your page. So, if you can throw in some keywords your blog is trying to rank for, and links to some other pages (sitemaps work great here), then you will be taking advantage of a fat footer. Don’t spam of course, but the room a larger footer gives you makes it easier to add links to more content.
If a visitor of your site manages to scroll to the bottom of your page and see your footer, it’s important that you try and take advantage of that unusual occurrence and get them clicking on something!
A huge footer will catch the eye of many people who visit the bottom of your blog. It’s a lot easier to get people clicking around on links and possibly subscribing to your blog with a larger footer.
Sidebars are meant to have important information in them, but they can’t hold it all. The use of a large footer really eases the load in the sidebar, and weakens the competition for the readers interest between the content area and your sidebar.
-
Readers can miss out
-
Easy to clutter
Since a footer is at the bottom of the page, and the amount of people who actually scroll to the bottom of your site is often very few, you run the danger of having few people seeing the important content in your footer.
A large footer has the potential to hold a ton of information, but it is also easy to fill it with a lot of clutter. Lists are most common in these types of footers, and lists can become very lengthy and take a lot of vertical space. If you have 3 or 4 length lists sitting next to each other, it will look pretty cluttered and hard to read.
Small Footers
Small footers obviously don’t hold much information, but they make for a simple and lightweight solution for your blog. How do they compare to large footers?
-
Easier to organize
-
SEO benefits
-
Cuts down the amount of scrolling
Since you’re working with such a small area, it is much easier to organize. You won’t be working with long lists of links in a small footer, or worry about having multiple columns of text. So, adding content without worrying about creating clutter is what a small footer brings to the table here.
Big or small, a footer will still bring in some SEO benefits. You could argue that a small footer has more value to search engines as it holds less, but more important information than a fat footer which has information all over the place.
A large scrollbar is very unappealing to many people, and at least you’ll know that your small footer won’t be the cause of it. Large footers take up tons of space and really decrease the size of your vertical scrollbar.
-
Easier to miss
-
Holds much less
If there is a chance that a large footer can be missed, what do you think the chance of a small footer being missed? Like I said, it’s unlikely many people will even get to the bottom of your blog, so it’s important to try and do whatever you can to make whatever is at the bottom as appealing as possible.
Unfortunately for small footer users, they will miss out on the call-to-action that large footers provide for cases like this.
Because the idea of a small footer is to keep it small, you miss out on adding a lot of useful information in it. You are generally restricted to copyright text and a few links without making your footer seem massive, so you don’t want to add too much to your footer if you want to keep it small.
My Verdict: Large Footers
No questions asked, larger footers are the best kinds of footers to have. Because they add so much extra space to your blog, you can spread content out and lessen the load of information you stick into your sidebars. Large footers also give you the opportunity to catch a visitor right before they leave and get them viewing other pages of your blog, and maybe even subscribe. Large footers take this one by a landslide.
Tomorrow on Design Versus
I will be talking about a trend that has been exploding amongst the design community tomorrow: minimalism vs. compact design. I will be comparing the new design of Blogussion to my other blog, Asnio. Stick around, you will really enjoy this one.
The Discussion
Leave a Comment Read Again?Now this was damn obvious! Haha! I love the footer here at Blogussion … You should release the vode you know.
.-= King Sidharth´s last blog ..Truth about Enlightenment & How to Attain It =-.
I really love fat footers, ever since I had started using Wordpress fat footers has been my choice, nice to know your verdict was also fat footers
.-= Shiva Chettri´s last blog ..Contest Season around the Blogosphere – Blog-O-Status =-.
Large footer definitely do look great. I have always thought so, but never put one on my own blog. Next chance I get, I am going to add one.
I will probably rip off yours cause I like it a lot
.-= Patrick Toerner´s last blog ..How to Write Your Ebook in a Week or Less =-.
Hey Alex! These posts are working! I’ve been freshening up my design over the last couple days. They’re changes that most people will never notice, but hopefully they’ll notice on the sub-conscious level.
Anyway, I agree with you on this one. I’m inspired to refresh my footer in the near future as well.
.-= Nick Tart | JuniorBiz´s last blog ..How to Successfully Launch Your First Blog =-.
I knew it! I somehow felt better and more comfortable @ JuniorBiz… c’mon tell me what it is your are doing Nick!! I love hearing (and making) evil palns.
.-= King Sidharth´s last blog ..Truth about Enlightenment & How to Attain It =-.
Haha… I finally figured out how to make gradients so I spent several hours placing them all over my site
. There are probably too many… But it was fun! I also changed the sidebar borders to 1 px like you recommended awhile back.
.-= Nick Tart´s last blog ..Interview: Sabirul Islam, Hundreds of Wedding Proposals =-.
I think that large footers are nice if done well, but I don’t use one on my blog. The reason for that is with the current layout, it would just look stupid!
By the way, it is done very nicely here on this site!
.-= Eric B.´s last blog ..Test Your PHP Apps On Your Own Computer =-.
Alex,
I would have to agree with you here on “fat” footers. Why? If someone were to scroll all the way to the bottom why not present the most information that you can. What I find is what to limit yourself on what you put down there.
You have to really ask yourself what are the key elements you want from your audience.
.-= Derek Jensen´s last blog ..How Blogging as a Hobby Transformed My Future =-.
Phat Footers! Great for the reader who gets to the bottom and is still looking. Great for Google to key in more search words. Great for Internal Links. Design it well and it works great!
Thanks for pointing that out!
.-= paul | entertainment tonight´s last blog ..Jessica Simpsons on Marie Claire May 2010 =-.
I really like to look of fat footers. It will be the next design customization on my site. I especially like the layout of your footer. There is lots of information without looking cluttered
.-= Clara Mathews´s last blog ..Friday Night is Date Night =-.
I’d have to agree with larger footers. I’ve consulted Dallas SEO Services and they’ve revamped my site with larger footers. They said that most site visitors really don’t see smaller footers or they tend to ignore it more often.
I think if you have info that you want to add then make the footer to fit that.
I think a HUGE footer is a waste of space.. but same time I see people with a half inch footer and they are wasting space that could be used.
.-= John Paul Aguiar´s last blog ..Google Says – A Strong Twitter Community Will Get Your Tweets Ranked On First Page =-.
I can see that large footers provide more visible advantages. I nonetheless believe that we can always try both one at a time and see the results.
.-= Julius´s last blog ..How Accessible is the iPad to Persons With Disabilities? =-.
I’m not trying to be sarcastic at all when I say this but I think medium footers are the best! They allow you to put in just the right ammount of information about yourself or about your blog as well as allowing you to put in a few links to related posts. Plus, they’re just about big enough not to be missed.
Interesting pro’s and con’s. I have always been more of a slim footer fan. Maybe it’s time to split test a few things.
.-= Bradley Davis´s last blog ..Crazy Human Strength =-.
After reading this, I see my footer sucks. It has nothing neither it is small not big. I have to make a footer first,
.-= Agent Deepak | Blogging, Marketing & Success´s last blog ..The Secrets of Success – Desire =-.
Large footers would always be more appealing as compared to small footers as they are easy to read. We understand things better when they are more clear, bold and larger. This better understanding will provide a user friendly environment to the reader. As in the case of small footers, it should only be used if there is a cramp for space.
.-= Mark Slater´s last blog ..Talking to Your Doctor About Anxiety Medications =-.
Hi,
My pick is also the large footers, they are more beautiful and even some widgets could be used with them.
Thanks.
.-= Onibalusi Bamidele´s last blog ..Get over 1000 new unique visitors to your website every month =-.
I like the big footers as well, It’s nice to have that extra information at the bottom of the screen.
.-= Christopher´s last blog ..There Are No Limits =-.
I prefer large footer to share my profile and blog roll.
.-= Reza Winandar´s last blog ..This is blog is now Do Follow =-.
There is good news afoot (was that a pun?)
Due to as you say, “Footers have been receiving a lot more attention over the last few years”, I think the chances of readers missing it” are shrinking also.
Personally speaking, I’ve checked every blog I land on for one, since I saw my first one.
.-= Dennis Edell | Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..DEDC Remains DoFollow – BUT… =-.
If i were to choose i would love to have a large footer on my site so i could put more informations there for my readers
.-= How to blog´s last blog ..Top 5 Reasons Why People Started to Blog =-.
Personally, i really like the footer in blogussion.com. You are right! Sometimes, readers will easily miss out something good in the footer. For me, bigger footer is more easily to be noticed than smaller.
.-= Kok Siong Chen´s last blog ..Tamoxifen – Breast Cancer Treatment =-.
Personally, I like large (but not too large, like the one on Blogussion) footers better than smaller ones. They’re like an extension to the sidebar, filled with links to content. This not only helps your visitors navigate and get more from your website, but search engines to index more of your content.
I am current on the berge of choosing a theme for my blog. Hope this would help in choosing the right theme for my entertainment blog.
i also prefer large footers, they looks beautiful and some of my blogs have large footers.
As a blogger, I usually look at the footer to learn what theme the blogger is using especially when his/her blog is a certified WOW!
i like your blog because of unique content and thanks for sharing that.
i want to upload a comment, but i dont know why can not submit it
Comments on this entry are closed.