Web & Digital

What to Put Above the Fold on a Nonprofit Homepage

4 min read · 416 Strategy

The first screen of your website has one job: help people understand who you help, why it matters, and what to do next.

The first screen is the whole game

"Above the fold" refers to the portion of your website visible without scrolling — what a visitor sees in the first two seconds before making a decision to stay or leave. For nonprofits, this is the highest-stakes real estate in all of your communications. It's where first impressions form, where clarity is tested, and where the decision to engage or disengage is made. Most nonprofit homepages waste this space on beautiful imagery and vague taglines.

The three things that must be there

Every nonprofit homepage hero section should answer three questions before the visitor scrolls: (1) Who do you help? Be specific — not "underserved communities" but "single mothers in the foster care system" or "refugees resettling in the Dallas metro." (2) What changes for them? The outcome, not the activity. Not "we provide meals" but "no child in our program goes to bed hungry." (3) What should I do next? One button. One obvious call to action. Not three options — one.

What doesn't belong above the fold

Your founding year. A generic inspirational quote. A rotating image carousel (they are almost universally bad for conversion and clarity). A lengthy mission statement. Your organization's full name in a tiny font with a long explanation underneath. Social media icons. A navigation bar with twelve items. All of these things belong somewhere — just not in the first screen. The first screen has one job: make the visitor want to stay.

Testing your current hero

Pull up your homepage on your phone. Cover everything below the first screen with your hand. What's left? Can a stranger understand in five seconds who you help and what to do next? If not, that's the only thing to fix right now. Don't redesign. Don't rebuild. Rewrite the headline. Change the button text. Move one thing. Small changes above the fold consistently produce larger impacts on donor behavior than extensive redesigns of secondary pages.

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