Fat Footer Website Design: Pros & Cons
A website footer may appear at the bottom of a page, but it can play a major role in website navigation, usability, and overall design. One popular approach is a fat footer website design, which uses a larger footer area to organize important links, contact details, resources, and other information.
A fat footer can also have several columns and categories of content unlike a minimal footer that might have just a few links and copyright information. Properly planned, it can enhance the user experience and assist visitors to locate helpful information without overloading the main navigation.
However, a bigger footer is not necessarily superior. Excessive number of links, lack of organization and irrelevant information may make it confusing and aesthetically displeasing. Knowing the pros and cons can assist businesses in making decisions on whether this type of web design is suitable to their use.
What is a Fat Footer in Web Design?
A fat footer is a big content-filled area at the bottom of a web site. It usually has a number of links and helpful information that the visitors might require after visiting the main page.
A standard fat footer can contain links to About Us, Services, Products, Blog, Contact, FAQs, customer support, privacy policies, social media profiles, and other valuable pages. Other websites also utilize this space to have newsletter sign-up forms, business addresses, phone numbers, or calls to action.
The main reason is to offer a secondary navigation system that is convenient to the users. Rather than making visitors go back to the top of the page to get to the main menu, a good footer provides them with an alternative means to navigate the site.
Pros of Fat Footer Website Design
Better Website Navigation
One of the biggest benefits of a fat footer is improved navigation. There can be dozens or even hundreds of pages on a site, and not all useful destinations can be put in the main menu.
A fat footer gives more room to put these pages into logical groups. The visitors can easily scan the options available and decide where they want to visit.
More Useful Information in One Place
Fat footers are capable of gathering valuable information at the bottom of each page. All contact information, customer support links, company information, resources and legal pages can be found in a single consistent location.
This comes in handy especially when the user gets to the bottom of a page and is in need of the next action.
Reduces Pressure on the Main Menu
A website may be cumbersome due to a cluttered header navigation. Adding all the possible links to the main menu may result in excessively many options and distract the users with the necessary actions.
A fat footer enables the designers to push the secondary links out of the main navigation. This generates a cleaner header and at the same time useful pages are not lost.
Supports SEO and Internal Linking
An effective SEO strategy can also be achieved with a well-organized footer. Internal links assist search engines to know how various pages relate to each other in a web site.
The strategic linking to key pages may facilitate navigation and page discovery of the websites. The aim however should be to provide useful links to the visitors and not to overload the footer with key words or too many links.
Cons of Fat Footer Website Design
Can Make the Website Look Cluttered
The greatest drawback of a fat footer is that it may be visually cluttered. The footer may be hard to read with the addition of excessive links, icons, forms, and blocks of text.
There should be a visual hierarchy in a big footer. Users should be led through the information by headings, spacing, typography and columns.
May Overwhelm Visitors
The more information, the better user experience does not necessarily apply. When visitors are presented with dozens of links with no apparent categories, they might not be able to find the option they require.
This is why designers need to focus on the most useful information and eliminate redundant links. A fat footer must be detailed yet not excessive.
Can Affect Mobile Usability
A footer that works well on a desktop screen may not work equally well on smartphones. Multiple columns may become long vertical sections when stacked on smaller screens.
Responsive design is thus a necessity. Footer content must be readable, accessible and easy to navigate irrespective of the size of the screen.
How to Design an Effective Fat Footer
Creating a successful fat footer requires more than simply adding additional content. Start by identifying the information visitors are most likely to need at the end of their journey.
Create links in meaningful categories with clear headings. As an example, an online business may employ sections like Company, Services, Resources, Support and Contact. Limit the number of categories to be manageable to enable users to scan through them.
Use regular spacing, legible fonts, adequate contrast and visual distinction between sections. When they are of a real purpose, important calls to action (newsletter subscriptions or contact options) can be included as well.
It is also necessary to test the footer with the various screen sizes. A reactive fat footer must be able to adjust to mobile, tablet, and desktop layouts.
Fat Footer vs. Minimal Footer: Which Is Better?
The correct option will be determined by the size of the site, its audience, and objectives. A basic footer can be perfect in a simple portfolio, landing page, or small site that has few critical destinations.
Fat footer is also more applicable when the site has a lot of content, has many services, ecommerce sections, resource bases, or a complicated structure in terms of navigation.
Design trends should not be the sole determinant of the decision. Think about what visitors require. When users have to use a lot of secondary pages, a bigger footer may enhance usability. When there are few significant links, a large footer can be an unnecessary complication.
Bill Yeager, Co-Owner of High Point SEO & Marketing in CT
