Stef Lewandowski
Create something every day

10 things to ask yourself about your new web site home page layout

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I’ve just been chatting to a friend of mine, Chris Garrett, about a new home page layout for his new venture - a video production company operating in the UK with international clients, using social media tools and platforms to good effect.

He asked me my opinion on what he’d put together, and I came up with the following ten points.

I’m posting them here as pointers for anyone else looking for similar feedback on their pre-launch homepage layout. If you can answer these then I’d guess that you’re well on the way to having a successful launch:

1. Who are you targeting?
Write a list. Pull out the main one or two audiences your really want to reach. Personify them. Actually write down “Albert is a commissioning editor for a major broadcaster, Bertha is a film distributor.”

2. What do they want?
Seriously - step away from your own viewpoint on your work and put yourself in the position of these people. Really - they’ve just typed something into Google, or followed a link, an email referral. Why did they do that? Why are they looking at your page? What are the things that they are looking for?

3. What do you want?
Now that you have Albert or Bertha looking at your home page what is the absolute key thing you want them to do?

Buy your service? Put a big link to whatever means is required for that to happen somewhere prominent. Register? The same. Make it really really easy for people to do that one key task. If there is more than one make sure that they do not clash with eachother.

4. How much time do they have on their hands?
The sad answer is that some people make a decision about your site in the split second before it has loaded. If it takes too long they are gone. If they stick around long enough to bother with you the chances are that you need to grab them with something interesting within a few seconds. Don’t have too much text. Don’t use too much jargon unless jargonistas are the target market.

5. Will they bother clicking on anything?
Possibly not, so if you can give them everything they want with no interaction you are laughing. In the case of a video startup, my suggestion was “Put a big HD video right on the home page with a play button”.

6. What does ‘conversion’ look like?
A successful home page will ‘convert’ people from casual surfers to ‘converted’ surfers. Make sure you’re clear on what you want the user to achieve on coming to your site and send them along that route so it feels completely natural. If you’re clear on what it is then they will be too.

7. Do you have a complex sell?
Sometimes it’s difficult to explain exactly what it is you are offering. If that’s the case put it right up at the top so we’re all clear on it - don’t make the visitor sit there thinking ‘what exactly do these guys do?’

8. How is your service different?
Are you offering something similar to other people? Put the top line ‘we are different because we do X, Y, and Z in nice big letters so the visitor knows exactly what the deal is.

9. Where are you and are you more or less expensive than the next guy?
Now everyone can have a .com it can be confusing - if you’re operating a geographic service make sure that’s included in big letters. Don’t waste people’s time by putting it in the footer. If you’re mainly working in Scotland be up front about it. If you want international clients, say so.

10. Are you human?
Don’t be jargon-tastic just for the sake of it. “Leveraging” is possibly one of the ugliest words I’ve seen spring up over recent years. Use simple language, give visitors some background about why you’re doing what you do and what the background is. Prove that you are human - not just another faceless organisation.

Over to you - do you have any other rules for improving that first impression?