5 Homepage Facts
10 August 2008
Here are some facts about your website homepage, and what it means for you.
Obvious Fact 1. About a third of your visitors will leave your site without ever venturing further than your homepage.
What this means for you:
Your homepage needs to not only capture the attention of your target audience, but draw them onwards to explore other strategically written and crafted content on your site.
Obvious Fact 2. First impressions (and hence subconscious judgements about you and your business) are made within a matter of seconds.
What this means for you:
Having a website that looks dated or doesn’t immediately convey your message to your visitor is like wearing boardies and thongs to a meeting. Unless that’s the image you want to project, don’t do it.
Obvious Fact 3. No one reads your text.
What this means for you:
The less written content on your homepage, the better. Delivering textual information in bite sized pieces and doing it gracefully is the key.
Obvious Fact 4. It’s about them, not you.
What this means for you:
Today, it’s all about me me me. It’s easy to think about what ‘I’ want. I want a blue banner. I want a bigger logo. I want the font smaller.
Stop. Think about what your clients or customers want. Do they really give a damn if your banner is ice blue or sky blue? They want to know how much your product costs, where to buy it and why it’s better and if you don’t give them that, they’ll move on to the hundreds of other options available to them, regardless if your banner looks the right blue.
Obvious Fact 5. Most websites look like crap.
What this means for you:
Seriously. As proof, search any business type on yellow or google, and look at the first 5 results you get. I guarantee you the majority of them look like they were designed in the 90’s.
Which means it’s actually quite easy to stand out. All it takes is some initiative and some idea of what you want your website to do.
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Bluewire Media, on 23 November 2008 said:
Great points – I agree with you!
Also, did you know? … that according to Google, on average, 50% of users bounce of a website within 8 secs.
And that users only read the first three (3) words of any sentence.
Not much time to get your message across is it?
Internet Solutions, on 20 January 2009 said:
Very well said, I agree with you.
Apple Juice, on 9 March 2009 said:
It might be easy to stand out, but not so easy to get your site in the top 30 to be seen :/
ActiveStudio, on 18 March 2009 said:
I agree as well.
Also as important is simplistic and easily accessible navigation – there’s a reason why a person visits your site, if they can’t visualize how to get what they need in the first few seconds, they’re gone.
G Web, on 20 March 2009 said:
I so agree with everything that you have to say. Point 4 is my best its about them no you. People are so trapped into the fact that when they open their site everyday it looks pretty. Analytics is our friend in getting our message accross. Great post, Goran.
Sam Gemmell, on 20 March 2009 said:
G Web shared your link with us in the office this morning and I have to agree with all posts, well said and well put. Agree agree agree! Thanks so much.
Cubicle Ninjas, on 16 April 2009 said:
Good web design template must be needed to build a quality web site. front end is much important. because front end is the part will interact with users.
so the design should be an understandable one also we should give more preference for users friendly.
Thanks,
Cubicle Ninja – Chicago Design|Website Design,
http://cubicleninjas.com
Website Templates, on 31 December 2009 said:
No doubt, first impression of the website design for the visitors plays vital role and its impression should be everlasting in the minds of the visitors for the successful of the site.
Rockreative, on 24 February 2010 said:
To create an original & impressive website, you always need custom designed website but yes you need to know some facts while coding it in to a HTML that it should contain a good & original information also as your design.
Templates are always reused & used again & again which mean the website as yours is a website of another company in your field.
So I suggest, never go for templates but for original custom design.
John, on 4 May 2010 said:
I thoroughly agree with you, thanks for the sharing…
Business Advice, on 24 June 2010 said:
Great facts. A must read for a customer who is looking for a website design. A design is which attracts the customer at the foremost. i totally agree!!
website design analyst, on 2 July 2010 said:
i completely agree with you…Homepage gives the first impression about the website to the visitors and if it doesn’t serve the purpose of drawing the visitors to read more… then what’s the point of having a website with 20 pages and no one to see.
A custom designed website is far better than the usual template coz every website has its own needs and unique features. Small and medium business need to take this seriously as they are in dire need to make an identity of their brand, product or services.It is advisable to take consultation from agencies who cater to small business website design as they are the specialists in their field of work and have the knowledge to take your website where you want it to be.
i really liked this article and will surely pass it to my team
recover data, on 21 July 2010 said:
Hello,
Great findings! I fully agree with you, content on homepage should be shorter but smarter. Thanks for the post.
Greg Gillespie, on 11 August 2010 said:
Yes people don’t read but they still follow orders.
Harsh as it may seem, I feel you have missed an opportunity hear to draw attention to the direct response style of website that may seem a little crass, is a wonderful lead capture tool for your clients to connect with some of the bouncers.
Visitors are hungry, go ahead and feed them, you would be surprised how this helps to begin a relationship.
No relationship, no client pretty simple but often over looked.
Greg.
Stock Images Philippines, on 10 September 2010 said:
Very alarming but very true points. Site owners should know that the decision of whether or not to explore a website even further is made in a matter of seconds, so your site needs to have all of the relevant elements to encourage them to do so.
internet marketing melbourne, on 17 December 2010 said:
But I think we should add a small information about us I mean a separate page named “about us” or “who we are”.
Many websites I have seen in them the web owner add something in a particular side, I liked also that idea.
Thanks for your words…
Singapore WebDesign, on 27 January 2011 said:
Really super blog to readers,everyone can motivate from this blog.
Commercial Telecoms, on 12 February 2011 said:
wow! as everyone has said…thank you for this article!! it is wonderful! and so nice to hear / read that others feel the same way!
DSU Group, on 20 February 2011 said:
I’m finding lately that a lot of businesses are just writing for the search engines, not for the user, which can be frustrating at times to read an article full of mumbo jumbo. Great article, a lot of people can benefit from this.
air max 2009, on 14 April 2011 said:
Great findings! I fully agree with you, content on homepage should be shorter but smarter. Thanks for the post.
Hayman, on 22 April 2011 said:
I agree with your points, I will have to implement a few of them. Sometimes one can get tied up with a design as a creator and forget to look at it as a visitor would.
Robin Jennings, on 28 August 2011 said:
Most websites seem to cater for the owners of the business not their customers.