Your visitor has found your website on Google by entering a search term that is associated with what products/services you sell. That’s great, congratulations. Well not so fast…
You have 30 seconds or less to convince him/her to stick around and learn about your favulous new widget or must have service. Well, what can you do to make sure that happens? Examine your home page and make sure that your visitor can answer these 6 questions, because the reality is that if he or she can’t, the person will most likely mash the back button and be lost to you forever.
Well, here we go…
WHERE AM I?
Can your visitor recognize that the page being viewed is your home page?
Don’t forget, from the search engines your visitor could land on any of your internal pages, so it must be very obvious which page has been clicked through
WHO ARE YOU?
Does your visitor see an “About Me/Us” button on the top navigational bar?
In addition, have you placed some general information about your company in the body copy of the home page?
People who visit your website want to get to know who you are and understand why they should consider doing business with you.
They may want to know how long your company has been in business and what do the key personnel in your company bring to the table (credentials).
WHAT PRODUCTS/SERVICES DO YOU OFFER?
Do you have a “products” or “services” button on your top navigational bar?
This button when clicked should take your prospect to a services landing page.
“You ask what is a landing page?”
It is an internal page on your website, in this case to show a clickable list of your products or services. When each item is clicked, it will bring your visitor to a page describing the particular product/service.
Also, it is a good idea on the left side of the home page to have one of the following product or services catalog:
- If you sell a finite number of products or services, list them here hyperlinked, when clicked should take them to an inner page describing the product or service and its benefits
- If you have numerous products or services to sell, your catalog on the left will contain general categories of these products or services, with hyperlinks to category landing pages and from there leading to separate product/service pages.
“But, you just said that it is a good idea to have a “Products” or “Services” button on the top toolbar, isn’t that enough?”
When your visitor starts scrolling down through the lines of copy of the home page, he or she will not want to go back to the top of the page to click on the “Product” or “Service” button. Make it easy for them to get where they want to go as quickly as possible.
HOW WILL YOUR PRODUCTS/SERVICES HELP ME?
Can your visitor get some sense of how you can solve, the prospect’s needs or challenges, or at best help them begin to understand that they have come to the right place to purchase an item they have been researching. In the body copy of the home page, there should be some general information that will at least start to answer their questions.
WHERE DO I GO NEXT?
Is it very obvious what path the prospect must take to travel around your site?
Be careful not to overload your home page with too many links. Most people when entering a site like that will become bored in a hurry and be gone in the blink of an eye.
Make sure from the home page, that it is very clear which links your visitor must click on to learn about your products/services and be easily led down the path and eventually reach the “Buy Now” button.
Some sites will want the user to fill in their contact form to receive a FREE report.
Why Should I Trust You?
Is your company contact information displayed at the bottom of your home page?
One of the things that Google and users look for in order to understand if you are trustworthy, is some solid identifying information about your company, and it looks for this data on the bottom of all of your website pages, not only on the home page.
Here is the information that you should include:
- Name of your company
- Company mailing address
- Telephone numbers
Feel free to show not only your office phone number but you can also include a mobile and a fax number as well.
Finally, a lot of companies place their email address with a link to send them a message right away even though they already have a tab in the tool bar labeled “contact form, or contact me/us.”
More trust signs would include:
- Testimonials from past clients
- Logos of clients you worked with
BONUS: Some Other Great Hints…
If your company is a B2B (businesses selling products or services to another business), the body copy of your home page and all internal pages should be easy to read with an eye friendly font such as Times New Roman, and whatever you do don’t use a vivid colored background with yet another color for your body copy.
This best practice also holds true if you are a professional group or sole proprietor providing more conservative services such as a doctor, lawyer, financial planner or an accountant.
In either case, it is recommended that businesses like yours use a white background for the body copy with a black font. You can experiment with using different color backgrounds for the side and top tool bars.
On the other hand, if your company sells products/services directly to retail customers, especially when your target audience is teen agers and young adults, playing around with different colors and fonts for the body copy of your website, should be considered.
In conclusion, if your visitor has to strain their eyes trying to read all about your company and its products/services, you can bet that they will leave your website in a hurry.
IM Creator is right here by your side.
We provide an array of design templates which could be the design structure you have been looking for to build your soon to be website.
“But you say, I am not really sure what content I should put on each page of my website.”
Again, IM Creator will come to the rescue. Soon we will make available to you and other businesses like yours, a FREE set of Content Templates, which will guide you through the process of filling your website pages with well targeted information.
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