The web still resembles the Wild West in many ways. There is a lot of good land, and firms are fighting it out for the finest locations to draw in customers.
Google enforces the slack rules of the land by galloping around on his horse while brandishing a shiny gun. The argument is that the stakes are too high and there is too much competition online to rely just on a homepage that draws in and converts visitors.
Your homepage should capture visitors’ attention right away and entice them to explore more because it serves as their initial introduction to your brand.
How do you do it? with the messaging and web design as its two main components.
While creating your homepage, there are a lot of opportunities to get sidetracked, but if you keep your attention on these two factors, the result will be both attractive and worthwhile.
The five most crucial elements of your homepage design and how they affect the success of your website as a whole.
A Simple Messaging
Maintaining visitors on your website requires effective messaging. By identifying their problems and outlining your solution, your messaging strategy should pique the interest of potential clients.
Most crucial, when someone visits your homepage, they need to understand who you are and what you do right away. This enables you to write copy with your audience in mind and more effectively target your messaging to their problems.
Companies concentrate on creating a distinct headline and tagline for the top of their website. It doesn’t have to be clever or fancy.
Keep in mind that website visitors only skim the portions, not the entire thing. It’s simpler to determine if your solution is the proper one for them if your material is kept straightforward.
You’ll then begin developing the narrative that draws users in and guides them through the website. “By using language and pictures, you may provide your user with this experience when they visit your website.
As a user navigates through a page, everything from the colors to the element composition to the language used will create this experience. And it begins with your home page.
What you want website visitors to accomplish should also be obvious. You should include secondary calls to action (CTAs) all around the page that make the same request in addition to your major call to action (CTA), which we’ll explore later in this piece.
Give users clear instructions and make it simple for them to do whatever it is you want them to. They only need to click a button, link, or scheduling app if you add one right there on the website.
Design
A select few crucial website design components have the power to make or break your homepage. This could entail organizing all of your product pages into a “Products” category or grouping your blogs, case studies, and market research into a “Resources” tab.
- Website navigation
- Header image and text
- Primary CTA
- Responsiveness
To make it simple for visitors to find exactly what they’re looking for on your website without having to navigate through the various category levels, you can also put a search box in your main menu.
The header language and image on your website should be commanding and huge. Whether it’s a picture, a graphic, an animation, or an illustration, the image should grab the user’s attention right away.
Your language should clearly describe what you do and be consistent with the image you used. Together, these two components will establish the overall tone and feel of your website.
You can then examine your main CTA. The StoryBrand Framework states that your main CTA should be repeated throughout the page and be located in the upper right corner of your website.
We need to, use bold colors for your CTA and a high-contrast font color. By doing this, you make the button stand out on your website and make it simple for visitors to understand what you want them to do.
Finally, a responsive design for mobile users must be supported on your homepage. It should therefore adjust to all screen sizes.
By the end of 2022, 92% of internet users reported using a mobile device to access the internet, and approximately 60% of all website traffic was done so.
Not to mention that Google priorities mobile-friendly websites when indexing and ranking content, thus having a poorly designed website may harm your SEO.
To achieve consistent branding, she continues, your color palette should be the same across your website and other marketing platforms. Users will begin to connect your colors with your brand, which will make it simpler for them to recognize you in busy online environments.
Above the Fold
“Above the fold” refers to the content that visitors see on your homepage before scrolling down. As the heading of this section implies, it is the most valuable area of your entire website and is where your solution belongs.
What you can do for customers is the first thing they need to know about your company (and want to know). What issue do you address? Your header content should be focused on the response to that query and prominently featured above the fold of your page.
We can say that headline conveys what you do or what you have to give. Therefore, it must be the first thing visitors to your website read.
The user should be immediately captivated by the content, whether it’s a video, animation, or static image, and want to explore more of your website.
The remainder of your homepage should contain explanations of how you address problems and testimonials that serve as social evidence, with your solution as the focal point.
Below the fold is where you want more specific information. You should still keep it brief and straightforward, but you can include more language to inform readers about your brand.
Your messaging truly stands out in this situation. Below the fold, you should include a value proposition, instructions for working with you, client testimonials, and one or more distinct CTAs.
The objective is to keep enticing visitors to interact with your homepage as they scroll down by providing them with all the knowledge they require to feel secure in their choice.
Improve for SEO
There are a few chores that can assist you optimist your content and web pages for the best results when thinking about search engine optimization for your homepage (and full website). These can be divided into two broad categories: on-page SEO and technical SEO.
Your site’s speed is arguably the most crucial technical SEO factor. Make sure your pages load quickly to avoid leaving users wondering where your page is while they’re stuck staring at a spinning circle. There are several ways to increase site speed, but the one that needs the most attention for most firms is the size of their images.
Excessively large graphics impede down page load times. As a general rule, it’s crucial to check your file sizes and make sure they’re no larger than 100KBs.
An additional crucial component of technical SEO is your sitemap. When creating your homepage, using UX/UI design principles to help users navigate and flow naturally through the page.
Along with this layout, it’s crucial to make sure your sitemap is similarly clear and hierarchical. This will facilitate accurate indexing and ranking of your website by Google’s algorithm.
Additionally, you must guarantee the security of your users and demonstrate your website’s reliability to them. An SSL certificate makes this simple to achieve. It provides you with the little padlock icon next to your URL and informs visitors that your site is secure and that it is safe to navigate past the home page.
On-page SEO techniques, which deal with your content and copy, come next. These recommendations are considerably clearer and simpler to follow.
- Use header and title tags on the page where necessary. Title tags are used for page titles, headlines are H1, subheadings are H2, and so on.
- Use keywords in the copy on your homepage to help your website receive more organic traffic. Remember that you should never pack your content with keywords. To minimize SEO penalties, keywords should be natural and regularly spaced.
- To the appropriate photos on your page, add alt text. These comprise visuals that help readers comprehend the copy of your brand.
Calls to Action
CTAs have previously received some discussion; they should be placed at the upper right corner of your page, repeated across the homepage sections, and use simple, direct language.
You might believe that’s all there is to it, however your CTA is without a doubt the most crucial component of the design of your homepage.
It’s what motivates customers to interact with your business and take action. Consequently, you should give it special consideration as you design your website.
You must first and foremost think about the color of your buttons. Bold colors are important.
There are numerous sticky, floating CTA buttons that you can design that will move down the page with users, according to the expert. This is especially useful if you want the visitor to remember the call to action throughout their whole visit to your website.
As an illustration, we can say non-profit organization whose main CTA is “Donate Now.” Making this button “sticky” causes it to remain at the top of the page even when people scroll down or click on other websites. This keeps it at the top of the page and in people’s minds.
Conclusion
Do these five web design best practices apply to your homepage? If not, you could be passing on leads. If you want to know whether your site is working hard enough or if it needs some updates, you may examine your page analytics or sales pipeline.
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