It takes a lot of effort to attract visitors to your website. You require ideal search engine optimization (SEO) strategies to ensure that your hard work doesn’t get wasted. However, you still may have nothing to show for your hard work if your website homepage doesn’t do justice to your website. For example, if your home page contains a blurry background image or has a call to action (CTA) button that contains informal language, you will expect to see a high bounce rate of your website.
As part of Strikingly, we fully understand how important the first impression is. However, if we talk about the world of eCommerce, the first impression isn’t enough for the success of your website. It is also about explaining your business, making your eCommerce products valuable, ensuring direct communication with the visitors, and much more. An ideal home page design creates a bridge between the visitor and the business owners as both parties come on the same page.
What is a Homepage?
Before we learn the importance and strategies, we must first know what a website homepage is. It is defined as the default or the first page of the website. When visitors land on a particular website, they first see the website homepage. The website makers can control the user experience of their website by managing the home page appropriately. For example, if you create a website on Strikingly, you will find its home page in the website's root directory.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
Through the website home page, the users can understand what they should do after landing on the website. The website provides users with the navigation elements, such as “contact”, “about us”, “mission statement”, “services”, etc. The home page also provides the users with images and visuals to make people understand the reason behind building this website.
Importance of a Homepage
1. Increases Conversion Rate
By creating the best homepage design, you will give yourself a chance to increase your website’s conversion rate. Even if you attract your visitors to your website but don’t provide them a source of motivation or opportunity, they will eventually walk away. For example, if the visitors cannot see a sign-up form, your database will remain empty for a long time. Similarly, you can include effective CTA buttons on your website. CTA buttons enable the visitors to know what they should do after landing on your website.
For example, if you have built an eCommerce website, your CTA button will most likely bring them to the eCommerce store, where they can start purchasing products. Furthermore, you can increase the conversion rate by creating an effective website logo and tagline for your website. The logo should be placed on the top of your home page. Some website makers tend to include the website name alongside the website logo as part of their brand personality.
2. Improves Brand Personality
On Strikingly, you will find many website examples that give a lot of importance to brand recognition. There is no reason for you not to be on the same wavelength as them and create a strong brand personality via an effective homepage. By managing your brand, you will be able to ensure that your brand stands out from the rest of your competitors. You can create a strong brand image and make sure that your company becomes memorable in the eyes of your visitors.
When we talk about brand recognition, we talk about various website elements, such as a website logo, background image, color scheme, navigation elements, etc. Your “about us” section must inform the visitors about your website background and the kind of services you are expected to give. If they have any queries, they must be able to directly interact with you so that you can overcome their problems.
Best Homepage Examples on Strikingly
1. Emily Penn
We can safely say that Emily Penn on Strikingly possesses one of the best homepage designs on the platform. This website is solely based on Emily Penn, a public speaker and advisor on issues associated with the ocean and future society. As you land on the website, you will realize how big of an influencer Emily Penn is. As an influencer, she increases awareness of the day-to-day challenges encountered by society. You will also see a video that covers Emily’s story.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
Furthermore, this website provides the users with various navigation elements, such as shift, projects, contact, talks, and about. You will find numerous blogs containing achievements and working progress as an influencer. The CTA button enables you to book Emily Penn for your particular event. The contact section contains Emily’s email address and their social media accounts.
2. Unlocked Capital
If you want to look at the best homepage examples on Strikingly, you don’t need to look further than the Unlocked Capital website. In various phases of your professional career, you may have heard the saying, “Action speaks louder than words”. In this case, this saying matches perfectly because it contains an image of a person who made value out of his investment.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
Unlocked Capital is a funding website dedicated to the ventures’ success founded by returning citizens. This provides its users with scholarship, mentorship, and networking to enable the returning citizens to start their work. Just like is the case with most Strikingly websites, Unlocked Capital provides users with different navigation elements, such as the “about us” section and mission statement. The contact element also enables the users to directly interact with the business owner. Once the business owner has the visitor's critical data (email and name), he can use it to send emails about his future work.
Best Strategies to Create a Homepage
1. Ideal Background Images
If you take out a sample of Strikingly websites, you will see brilliant website homepages in almost all of them. These home pages would have a source of attraction for their visitors. One of the big reasons for that source of attraction is the background image of the home page. A background image is defined as the most highlighted image that you can see on your screen. It represents your business, brand, and everything else that you stand for.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website.
When you build a website on Strikingly, your background image will likely take up most of your home page design space. It depends on your business and background about the kind of background image you want to insert. It doesn’t have to be a photo you have captured from your mobile phone. It can be an animation, a 3D photo, and even a GIF.
2. Have an Appropriate CTA Button
CTA buttons are also considered one of the most important aspects of a homepage design. As we have described previously, CTA buttons give a sense of direction to the visitors. After clicking on these buttons, they will understand what to do on a website. For example, if you land on a fitness website, the CTA button will likely help you get a fitness tutorial.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Website
Most importantly, you shouldn’t include too many CTAs or it will confuse the visitors. It is better if you include only one CTA button on your website. You should know the text you want to include on your CTA button. For example, you cannot expect to attract traffic if you put a text of “Download” or “Click Here” on your CTA button. You must be a little bit more creative when choosing the CTA text.
3. Have a Proper Color Scheme
The design of your homepage shouldn’t just be related to conversions and website visitors. If you want to create a successful home page design, you must follow a specified color scheme for your website. Having an appropriate plan for your color scheme will not just be pleasing to your visitors but also give them a reason to stay on your website for longer. It shouldn’t be a combination of random colors, but you must do brainstorming and analysis before deciding on your colors.
Conclusion
If you want to build the best homepage design for your website, you don’t need to stick to a strict formula and continue from there. Many examples on Strikingly share similar elements, but their niche ideas are different, as you can see from the home page examples shared above. It is an excellent strategy to be bold about your website design, but make sure that you don’t sacrifice the principles of your website’s niche idea.
By creating the best home page of your website, you will be able to display distinctive attributes of your products and services. If you have any problems related to website building, you can contact our Happiness Officers right away, and we will be available to you 24/7. So without any more questions, start building the best possible home page and attract your visitors.
