You don’t get a second chance to make a
great first impression so creating the perfect homepage is crucial. Not only do
you need to show your visitors who you are as a brand, but they need to know
how to buy your stuff!
So how do you go about making sure you are
getting it right? You’re about to find out…
Resonate
with your Audience
Chances are if they came to your homepage,
you’re providing them with something they want, so the groundwork has already
been set. What you need to do now is give them a reason to stay. Incorporating
their language into your copy is a great way to help you resonate with your
audience and get on their level. Do plenty of research and find out what your
customer likes, what they don’t like and then speak in their language.
Powerful
Design
Check out our features page
and you’ll see that we provide the tools to help you custom design your site.
We give you the ability to choose a theme that has been tried and tested in the
ecommerce world so all you have to do is build your brand. You can very easily
change colors, text, and layout, and if you have the skills, you can even code.
Think about the Fold
The fold is
basically the place where visitors will have to start scrolling down your page.
Above the fold is where you need to
focus on easy entry to your store, clear communication about your products,
your very best offers and confidence builders for your visitors to trust in
your brand. Try and include great sellers and strong navigation to the
categories of your store, above the fold.
Below the fold is also
important for your ecommerce store. Here you should also include easy access to
different areas of your store, plus different promotions and popular products –
so that you can show off your very best stuff! You can also include other confidence
inspiring messages such as your shipping policy, return policy and security seals.
Navigation Bar
The top
navigation bar is arguably the most important design element of your website.
It’s the place that users will click on as a guide to find their way around
your site. It should be less focused on ‘about us’ info and more focused on the
whole shopping experience. Think carefully about your customers and the
different categories that they will want to navigate to. Make sure you clearly
show the shopping cart in the top header and a section for number of items in
cart, checkout access and account login.
Search Bar
On an ecommerce
site, the search bar provides an easy way for people to search for and get
access to your products so it’s definitely an important feature. Using auto
suggest in your search bar can improve results, which is why we integrate with
nextopia for auto suggest and greater search functionality.
Shopping Cart
Like we
mentioned above, it’s important that the shopping cart is in a prominent
position at the top of your homepage. The shopping cart should clearly show
what products are in the cart, easily allow customers to increase quantity,
check the total price, add discounts, use loyalty points, determine shipping
rates and include confidence boosters to encourage checkout.
Feature
Products
The last thing
you want to do is clutter your homepage, but featuring your products is a must.
Think about an inspirational image of your product so not only will it look
great but also your visitors will get a feel for what you do. Another smart
move is to feature some of your best offers – after all everyone loves a
bargain!
Logo
This is probably
a given, but make sure your logo is featured in a prominent place at the top of
your homepage. It will be the most recognizable part of your company so
visitors will expect to see it. Your
logo will reassure visitors that you are professional and that they can trust
you.
The Footer
The footer is
the bottom section of your website and it still plays an important part. Often
if a user can’t find what they are looking for, they will instantly scroll
straight down to the footer to see if it’s there. Links to feature in your
footer are those little extras such as ‘About Us’, ‘Press’, ‘Careers’ and
‘Contact Us’ pages.
Consider
the Customer
CTA
Every homepage
needs a call to action. In fact, every page on your entire site should have a
call to action. Make sure you don’t overcomplicate details and ask too much
from your visitors. If you want to get more leads then a simple name, email and
number box is perfect for that – check out our
homepage for a fine example of this.
Social Media
Social Media is
a great way to show off your personality and build your brand. Make sure you put
links to your
Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and other pages so
that your customers can continue to find out more about who you are as a
company. Where you put your social icons is up for debate, but many ecommerce
sites tend to feature them in the footer, as this is where users tend to look
for them.
Customer
Support
Customer support
is extremely important for the success of your homepage. Think about building a
live chat box on your website and time it so that it pops up and asks if the
user needs any help. This has been known to increase conversions, particularly
if people know that they can speak to a human about products on sale.
We
can help!
Hopefully if you were struggling to create
the perfect homepage, this blog post has helped somewhat! But don’t forget, we
have plenty of
tools to
help your online store look as great as it can be, so give us a call – we are
always happy to hear from you!