A website’s homepage is probably the one you’ll put the most work into. It is also the one that seems the most daunting because it is the physical embodiment of you as a company or brand. It needs to be able to introduce who you are, what you offer and entice the reader to continue further into the site. So what do you do? Well here are some things that you should think about when planning your homepage contents.
Have a plan
The average user has an attention span of 8 seconds. If your hompage isn’t able to grab them in that time then they’re already gone. Think about what emotions, feel, look and most importantly information you want to convey to your reader. Draw out a rough plan of the layout of the site and think about the journey you’re going to want them to take in the site. What is your ultimate goal? What is your websites purpose? They seem like simple questions but far too often small businesses make a website just to say they have one and then don’t get anything out of it. So know what you want and how you want to say it.
Be Mobile Friendly
More and more of us are looking at websites through our phones so having a site that works for them is important. Try to minimise some aspects or change how it is formatted. A lot of web design programs or sites allow you to make the changes you need for different formats so it would be foolish not to take advantage of it.
Finding the right images
Ideally you want to populate your site with images that you own. Unfortunately this isn’t always the case and we sometimes have to rely on stock images. There are sites that provide these such as Pixaby (which is free) and Shutterstock (which isn’t) both offer a wide range of images that can be taken advantage of. The trouble you now face is making sure that the images you choose aren’t generic or samey. Try to think about the impression these images give when on your site. Will the user click off since it is just like every other one they’ve seen or how can you change it to make it your own?
Take advantage of space
You have all this information and those images and it’s natural to put them together but, you then run the risk of the site looking cluttered. Try to space them out so that the reader’s eye can move naturally from one thing to the next instead of being assaulted by a whole bunch of information. Having some white space on a site is good but this is a case of trying to find the right balance. Too much looks like you don’t have a lot to talk about, too little and you end up messy. This again comes down to planning your reader’s journey and the layout.
Hopefully you’ve found these tips useful for your own homepage and if you need anymore don’t hesitate to contact us today! If you liked this article then why don’t you check out our blog page? We update it weekly and there is sure to be something of interest to you there.
