There are so many different questions to ask then it comes to creating a website. Should it be responsive or built for desktops? What colors should be used? Should it be parallax scrolling? What images should we use? But by far one of the most important questions is what should go on the homepage to make it great.

Browse the web for just half an hour and you’ll probably find dozens of different directions you could take with your homepage. It can be impossible to tell which is best for your business. In fact, the truth is that, just like every business is unique, every homepage is to. What works for someone else—even your competitor—may not work for you. While we can’t tell you exactly what your homepage should include (unless we’re designing it for you) we can suggest several things that every great homepage layout has.

Why your homepage is so important

Your website’s homepage is probably the first part of your brand many customers will interact with. Everyone knows the importance of making a great first impression and usually this duty will fall to your homepage. Make a bad first impression and customers will probably leave your site immediately. Make a good one, and they may just stick around and convert.

The trouble is that unlike your brick and mortar store, there is no friendly or helpful sales assistant to guide them round the shop. They have to do everything on their own. That means your website needs to be designed so that it can help visitors find what they are looking for and answer key questions such as:

What you do?
What you offer
Why you do it better?
What to do next?
How to get in touch?

Your homepage has to answer all these questions and more if it wants to be really effective.

What makes a homepage great?

Below we’ve outline the key elements that every great homepage needs to have.

A Headline

Your headline should succinctly sum up exactly what your company does. If someone doesn’t know about you when they land on your site, they should know after reading the headline.

A Subheading

This lets you expand on your headline, offering more information once you have captured the customer’s attention.

A Call to action

Now you need to point your customer in the right direction. This could be to sign up or to learn more or to make a purchase depending on what you do and offer.

An Image or video

One of the best ways you can further get across what you do is by using images and videos. People respond much better to these mediums than they do to text.

Logo

Your website brand has to be in line with your offline brand and one of the ways to do this is by including your logo prominently.

Nav bar

You need to guide your customers round your website. Your navigation bar is how you achieve that.

These are just a handful of the elements a great website needs. For more information get in touch with our team today.

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