I thrive on usability; it’s what inspires me. After all, a website isn’t just for looking at, you have to be able to use it.
Home Page Content
First and foremost is the content on your home page. This is vital. Unless you’re a well-branded company (like Nike or Target), you can’t assume that everyone who visits your site knows who you are.
To determine the first message when someone visits your site, you need to ask the question, “What is the first impression I want to make?” More importantly, ask yourself, “what is the message I want to portray?”
The answer is a basic, clean and simple introduction to who or what your company is or does or a call-to-action message that sells your service. Do you want users to take action on your site? Do you want them to go to a specific page? If so, then you have to lead them to that specific page — and it’s all in your messaging.
It is important not only to let everyone know who you are but also how to find you; your home page content should be very SEO friendly. SEO, which stands for search engine optimization, involves ensuring that your home page and website include specific keywords and removing certain barriers to search engine indexing. This way, your site shows up earlier in searches on search engines like Google or Yahoo.
Next week, I’ll cover Web page layout and how to capture users’ attention.
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