Scrolling V.S. Clicking

When you land on a website sometimes you notice, sometimes you don't, but the navigation of a site is vital to what information is presented. Since mobile have became the norm for anyone to view online content, it seems that users prefer to scroll rather than click these days and that leaves designers in a spot of bother when creating page flow for a site.

Earlier thoughts about page design was, if you made your page too long, users would only view and read the top half (above the fold) and only glance over or ignore the bottom half completely. Today, things have changed. Many users do scroll to the end of the page and have no problem doing so. Mobile and tablets have made scrolling second-nature and clicking a chore.

So, lets see the pros and cons for both...

Scrolling is faster for users than clicking. With mouse wheels and touchpad swipes, users can scroll through content with a flick of a finger. Compare that with clicking, where users have to find the link, read it, target it, click it and wait for the page to load. Users get content in the order that it’s designed on the page with a glimpse of everything. With clicking, users can skip a link and go to the next one without ever visiting the pages they skipped.

Scrolling keeps perfect flow and feels more like a story that a page driven exercise. People scroll to continue reading until they read the end of the page. Clicking breaks the user’s reading flow because after they’re through with a page, they have to stop and click the link to the next one. Users also don’t have to wait for a new page to load, which can further break reading flow. All they have to do is scroll to the next section.

Clicking doesn’t win out on speed or ease of use, but it also has its advantages. Clicking allows you to track clicks to a page with analytics. Which in building a more structured site is vital. You can’t do this with scrolling. The only thing you can track is the top-level page, not the sub-sections. Each page will have a link that you can share with others. This link will also index in search engines and linking building to help your trust rank (more on this another time). With scrolling, only the top-level page will index.

Knowing theses advantages of scrolling and clicking will help you decide which way to go. Depending on what you're building decides the best function for your site. Personally, if its a short detailed site, with great photography and visuals then scrolling feels far better. Building a click through is for a more structured site and offers more room to grow.

So think hard about what you want to build, because the users are are always after a unique experience.

'Til the next time

James x

p.s.

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