How to Stand Out: Homepage Web Design Tips

How many websites are currently offered to the world? Millions? Billions? It’s probably near impossible to track down and count every single website ever created. Not to mention, who has that kind of time? However, the overall point is simple: There is a never-ending supply of websites available to consumers. Where does your site rank in the mix?

In order to beat the competition, you will need to stand out from the competition. Specifically, that means you need to have a stellar homepage. After all, it’s the page users visit the most, and you want to ensure that they stick around for a while.

Homepage Web Design Tips

As with most factors in life, first impressions are key. We rarely get a second chance; therefore, it’s imperative to make your first chance count! Start with a design that offers a clear and valuable headline. Heading tags are also crucial to SEO, so you really can’t afford to neglect them.

Though new visitors to your site will most likely know what you have to offer (whether it’s a product or service), it’s still important to list exactly why your website has been created. Specifically, choose a design for your homepage that will clearly and simply state your site’s purpose within five seconds. No fluff!

Sub-headlines are just as important as headlines. While a headline is intended to grab the visitor’s attention, a sub-header will keep them on your page. Therefore, it’s necessary to have a web design that accents this information. Unsure about what a sub-headline should offer? It should be a brief (yes, brief) description of your product or service. Don’t use filler words, and don’t just talk about yourself or company. Let people know why you exist, and, more importantly, why they should choose you.

Today, calls-to-action are extremely important. While you never want to force someone into making a decision, a little push is sometimes needed. It’s perfectly acceptable to use your words to try and get a consumer to react. Does your homepage design support your call-to-action? The CTA should be visible, precise, and stationed towards the bottom of the page.
Images are important. However, too much of a good thing can immediately turn into a bad thing. Don’t overwhelm your visitors, because they’ll leave and never come back. Choose a web design that allows you to provide subtle images, or a background canvas that is noticeable, but not too over the top. After all, images are great, but content is still king. Take a look at your chosen design. Is all of your content visible?

The Best for Last

It can’t be said enough: Visitors don’t want to be confused, or feel intimidated by your site. The most important factor to consider when choosing a homepage web design is navigation. If you want people to stay on your site and fully explore it, then the navigation tools must be user-friendly.

Designed to Succeed

You may have the best product or service in the entire world, and offered at an amazing rate. However, if your homepage web design is lacking, then you’re going to struggle finding consumers. No matter what industry you’re in, you are already well aware of the fact that competition is huge. Brand yourself a winner with a design that succeeds.

Zen Den is an award winning web design agency in San Francisco.
Request a Quote!

What Defines a User-Friendly Website?

In this day and age, it’s critical for your business to have a user-friendly website. If your site is difficult to navigate, many people will get frustrated and your bounce rate will sky rocket. If you take the time to implement a few best practices, you can increase return visitors and boost sales. Here are some of the most important characteristics of a user-friendly site:

Spend Time Creating a User-friendly Layout

Seamless Navigation

You may have a strong opinion about your likes and dislikes, but your website is open to thousands of visitors, so what they like is more important.

  • Short paths (no more than 3 clicks should be necessary to get to a page or content, such as a document to download)
  • Visible / accessible menu, placed at the top of the pages or on the left and in the footer for parent pages
  • Orientation: your site should not be a maze and users should always know where they are. Highlight their location in the navigation header.

Contrasting Color Scheme

A user-friendly website also displays good contrast between the background and text. For example, black text on a white background makes your content easy for users to read. If you, on the other hand, had purple text on a blue background, visitors would probably struggle to read. Read more on How to Choose a Good Website Color Scheme.

Speed it up

Fast load times

Few things are as annoying to an online user as a slow loading website. If visitors have to wait minutes for your website to load up, they will likely go to another website. To keep visitors interested, try to have your web pages load in just a few seconds. If your website isn’t loading as fast as you want, there are several things you can do, like removing unnecessary plugins and optimizing visuals.

Mobile compatibility

With more and more people visiting websites on their mobile devices, it’s essential to make your website responsive. In fact, Google has made it one of its pet-peeves. Responsive web design is no longer an option, it’s a requirement.
A User-friendly Website is a Readable Website

Well-formated content that’s easy to scan is also important for usability. Instead of reading the content on a website word for word, many users scan certain parts to see if the information is relevant to them. Use sub headings, short paragraphs and bullet points to break up text to make your content simple to scan.
Don’t forget to use visual content, as well. Users like images and videos and have a higher rate of retention when text is paired with a visual representation.

A user-friendly website can mean higher ROI for your business. The goal is not just to attract traffic, but keep visitors engaged and incite them to browse more until they finally convert.