Main Content Area: Keeping Sidebars and Ads Off Your Copy

Main content area: on a lot of the small business websites I review across Greater Montréal, it's the part of the page that gets the least room. I'm Marven Salgado, founder of Social Influence in Mascouche. The copy on a page is supposed to answer one question clearly, but the template boxes it in with sidebars, stacks ads around it and drops a pop-up over it before anyone has finished the first paragraph. That mix confuses visitors about what the page is for, and it gives search engines a muddier picture of it too. In most cases, the fix starts with the template.

Main content area: what it is and why your template decides what a page is about

The main content area is the block of text that answers the visitor's question, and everything around it, from sidebars and menus to ads and widgets, is supplementary content that should support it.

Your template decides the order and the visual weight each part gets. The problem I run into most often on WordPress sites is a theme that puts widgets ahead of the real content, both on screen and in the page's code. If a theme stacks a wide sidebar and a promo banner before the body text, a visitor sees site furniture first, and a search engine has more work to do before it can tell what the page is about. Good writing can't make up for that, because the problem sits in the layout around it.

Search systems use the HTML structure, the position of the text and how much of the page it fills as clues to which block is the main one. Wrapping your copy in semantic tags like <main> and <article>, and keeping the sidebar markup outside them, makes that split explicit.

The copy has its own job here: it should answer the visitor's question first, before anything else on the page competes for attention. That's where I start whenever I take on SEO content writing for a page, and it only works if the template lets the copy show up first.

Sidebars and widgets: when supplementary content starts competing with your copy

Sidebars and widgets start competing with your copy once they outweigh the article, either in visual weight or in how far they push the real content down the page.

Widgets tend to pile up one at a time, and each one seems harmless on its own. Together they push the article further down and scatter the page's topic across unrelated links and labels, which dilutes the keywords a search engine associates with that page. I keep a sidebar element only if it helps the reader finish the article in front of them.

Related-post lists, tag clouds and promo blocks

Related-post lists, tag clouds and promo blocks pull attention away from the article when they sit beside the copy, because readers treat whatever sits at the same level as equally important.

Picture someone reading a Terrebonne landscaper's post about spring cleanup. Three paragraphs in, a related-post thumbnail catches their eye, they click it, and they never finish the piece they came for, because the thumbnail sat right beside the copy. Main content vs supplementary content comes down to hierarchy, and visual weight sets that hierarchy before anyone reads a word.

Move related-post grids, tag clouds and promo blocks to the bottom of the page. Let people finish your argument first, then offer them more once you've delivered what brought them there.

Ads and pop-ups: how placement interrupts the answer a visitor came for

Ads and pop-ups interrupt the answer when they cover the text, or show up before the visitor has read a single line of it.

Say someone searches for a Laval dental clinic's weekend hours and clicks through from the results. Before they reach the first sentence, an email signup slides over the page. Closing it takes a tap they didn't plan on, and some people will go back to the results instead, which makes it a page layout and user experience problem.

Let visitors read the opening screen of actual content before any pop-up appears. If you run display or affiliate ads, keep them beside or below the text, never on top of it, and never inside a paragraph or between a heading and the text under it. Every pop-up needs a close button that people can see and reach easily on a phone.

Mobile layout: where the sidebar lands once the screen narrows

On a mobile layout, most themes move the sidebar below the whole article once the screen narrows to phone size, so every widget ends up stacked underneath your copy.

If ads sit in that sidebar, they can load while the article is still rendering, and the text jumps down the screen as they appear. Heavy widgets and ad scripts also slow the page load, which a visitor on a phone connection notices quickly.

When I check a template on my phone, I look at three things:

• Does the sidebar disappear completely, or does it just move to the bottom?
• Do the ads load before or after the main copy?
• Does the page jump when images or widgets finish loading?

Calls to action and internal links that support the copy instead of crowding it

Calls to action and internal links support the copy when each one sits where the reader needs it next. Too many of them clutter a page as badly as a crowded sidebar does.

One clear call to action at the end of a section works better than three buttons fighting for attention, and it should follow from what that section just said. Internal links belong inside the sentence, pointing to something that helps the reader next. A link added only for sidebar SEO value pulls attention away from your main message, and a page packed with links spreads that attention thin.

When I audit a page, I check whether every link earns its spot. If removing it wouldn't hurt the reader's experience, I cut it. Fewer, better-placed links keep the copy readable and still give search engines clear signals about how your pages connect.

Page template review checklist for a small business site

A page template review checklist catches the small layout mistakes that pull readers away from the copy, and I run the same one on every redesigned page before a client sees it.

• Does the sidebar sit clearly apart from the main copy, with enough white space that nobody confuses the two?
• Are ad blocks beside the content or below the fold, never inside a paragraph or between headings?
• Are related-post grids, tag clouds and promo blocks at the bottom of the page, below the article?
• Can a visitor read the first screen of content before a pop-up appears, and is the close button easy to find?
• Does the WordPress template keep the content column wide enough to read easily on mobile and desktop?
• On a phone, does the sidebar move below the article without delaying the text?
• Is the copy wrapped in <main> or <article> tags, separate from the sidebar markup?

Once that's done, I scroll through the whole page the way a visitor would. If my eye drifts away from the copy, the template needs more work. You can also run the page through the website grader before you go through the list by hand. Repeat the review whenever you add a plugin or switch themes, since either one can bring clutter back into the main content area.