Tired of your website’s homepage that was designed several years ago and now has become stale? Want to freshen up the most important page on your website? If so, you have an exciting road ahead.
Your homepage is the most trafficked portion of your site and so it must be attractive, engaging, and useful to your constituents. And since your website is likely people’s first impression of you, you must pay special attention to what your homepage says (or doesn’t say). The following are common mistakes.
1. Too cluttered: your homepage may contain too much information. This can overwhelm your viewers and also hide the really important content you want them to see.
2. Static information: certain static info. is important like service times and location, but other static information becomes stale after like one visit to your site. And if you want them to return to your site, you must provide new information on a regular basis.
3. Lack of visual appeal: many website homepages lack images. Although not wrong, these sites can provide a simple image or two to “show” rather than tell. A nice image slide show can also prove helpful in providing visual interest.
4. Outdated event info.: there really is no excuse for this. Since your first impression to others is your homepage, make it professional. Remove old content immediately.
5. Poor font types: Times New Roman looks nice on paper but not as the main type face for your website. Choose Arial or some other sans serif font. Also make sure your font size is at least 12 to 14 pixels large so people can read it. And your line height should be between 20 to 24 pixels high.
The above are some general guidelines and are not to be taken as prescriptive. They surface some of the general categories you should consider when redoing your homepage. And as you redesign your homepage, make sure you communicate to your readers what changes will occur so they won’t be caught off guard.
If you need help redesigning your website, we are happy to help. To get started, please complete the Work Request Form.