The big bad scrollbar, a true mythbuster story

First of all, I expect and hope that while reading this post, you are eventually forced to scroll down in order to see and read the entire content. Of course, this is conditional on me being able to get your immediate attention and make you stay focused on this personal piece of advise – otherwise you’ll probably leave by the end of this sentence and browse on to new places. Am I right, am I right?!?

Scrollbars – a misunderstood myth?
If you work in the web industry, then you’re probably familiar with all the constant talks about screen resolutions, browser optimization and usability. We need to optimize our copy, create a flexible design and implement it in a technological shell, which interprets and renders it all out perfectly as planned. And most of all, we have to make sure, that the poor user is not forced to utilize the dangerous scrollbar to the right in order to get the message, that we want to send out.

Well, this is a great thought and a great basis for creating a usable and logic interface. However, I truly believe, that the entire “scrollbar” issue have been somewhat misunderstood. People tend to categorize the heavy use of scrollbars as something deprecated from the past, the past being around 1995!

I hear it all the time, everywhere I go. “We have to optimize for 1024×768“, “copy must fit in a max. height of 600 pixel or preferably less“, “have in mind, accessibility issues“, “for God’s sake, the content can’t go below the standard browser view!” and so on …

Is it really that dangerous?
Why is it, that all our content have to be squeezed inside this ridiculous view of some 960×600 pixels, give or take? Is the scenario of a user eventually forced to pick up the mouse and start scrolling the page for more information so dangerous? I seriously don’t think so. Actually, if the user decides to start scrolling, could it be a sign of interest and a desire to gather even more information?

The answer to that is yes – if we’re able to logically order and prioritize our content. If we’re successful in doing this, then we’re also able to guide the user through our messages – as intended. It’s not only the user who dictates where to go, what to click and how to convert. You have all the options of guiding and showing the way, it’s all a matter of prioritizing and creating valuable content. Content is king, remember?

Prioritize your content
No doubt, we have to categorize and more so prioritize our messages and this have to be very clear in our designs, our IA, our overall structure and of course the final output, which the user have to navigate. There’s a reason we call it a “footer” – it’s all the boring legal stuff, which is not that important for the actual messages we initially want the user to interpret. So we place it at the very bottom of our website, allocating it at a low, but well fitted priority. If you’re seeking legal information or contact information on practically any modern website today, you always know where to go – scroll to the bottom of the page, right?

On the other hand, we want to emphasize on our brand new product line, so we decide to place that part at the top of the site, probably right below the main navigation. This way, we ensure that the user does not miss it, once they enter our website. If it is of interest, the user will click our product and away we go! By categorizing and prioritizing, we’re able to plot in all our products, offers and messages in a very logical and intuitive structure.

Less is not always more
I often come across websites – especially micro sites, campaign website, corporate HR-sites – with massive amounts of content which have been squeezed inside a very tiny area/box. Text written in ridiculously tiny fonts in order to fit it all in, images and graphic on top of each other etc. The result of this is, that I completely lose my sense of perspective, and I have a hard time deciding on where to put my focus?! The messages gets blurred and I end up leaving the page while catching my breathe, thinking “God, that was stressful – I wonder how the actual company looks works”?!

In other words, if you want to tell multiple stories, display multiple offers and multiple products, use the space available dammit! And if your stories, offers and products are any good, no one minds using the scrollbar in order to read it all. How many of your daily websites doesn’t have a scroll bar or contains more information than what is initially visible in a 1024×768 browser view? If the content is appealing to you, do you seriously find it annoying, that you might be forced to use the scrollbar in order to satisfy your curiosity and get even more valuable information?

If I find a great resource online, I’m actually pleased to see the scrollbar to the right. If what I’m reading pleases me, I’m thrilled to know, that there’s even more great stuff further down and I can’t wait to start browsing, clicking, scrolling and exploring the site. Amazon ins’t a major online success for nothing, you know.

Don’t customize your scrollbars
And oh yeah, in the words of Jakob Nielsen: Comply with GUI standard and use scrollbars that look like scrollbars. Please forget about styling and customizing your scrollbars in order to graphically fit them into your own designs. You quickly risk losing your readers, because they are not able to easily identify and decode the graphic element to the right as a scrollbar. This goes for all standard elements such as radiobuttons, checkboxes etc. – just leave them they way they are and the way browsers interpret them, thank you.

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