Your Home Page Is a Direct Response Page

Yes or no - what do your stats say?

[richardb]

Hi All

I would be interested in hearing from folks who already use this approach and their site stats actually support or otherwise this approach.

[clickz.com...]

I am considering using a halfway house approach, e.g. introducing the company and linking various keywords to specific areas in the site.

Thanks for any feedback.

Rich

[Dante_Maure]

Nick is 100% on point.

Just take a look at the top 50 web properties on the web. Apart from a short snappy branding tag line, every single one that I checked has a home page which almost exclusively directs visitors to the content they are most likely to be searching for.

Does Google talk about themselves on their home page?

Does Amazon?

eBay? AT&T? Monster.com? eTrade?

Go right now and see how much space is dedicated to company info on the WebmasterWorld and SearchEngineWorld home pages.

Save your company info for the about us page.

If you're going to "introduce the company" on the front page, keep it incredibly short and entirely focused on the benefit you have to offer to the visitor. If the statement doesn't immediately answer the visitor's question "What's in it for me?"... dump it.

Devote your prime real estate to giving your visitors what they are looking for.

The golden rule of marketing is that your prospects don't care about you... they care about what you can do for them.

[richardb]

Hi Dante_Maure

Thanks for that.

Perhaps I should have stated that the company is not a global brand name, e.g. no one has ever heard of them so the home page needs to quickly disemminate the companies USP's in order to seperate them from the competition...

However, I think that my initial thoughts i.e. a halfway house approach info about the company strateically linked to various pages on the site, about 2 paragrphs, will work?!

Rich

[richardb]

and one of these days I'll learn to spell :(

[Jon_King]

I am well read in the chieftains of web design and have by default taken their advice, which for the most part concurs with this article.

The sites I have designed use this very "direct response" approach to at least the home page (and often in sub categories as well) which quickly and accurately directs the visitor to their area of interest.

I do not have the data to back this up, because I have not built to any other design principles; for this article just restates basic proven marketing and design concepts as taught by colleges and universities. I believe this is the way to go.

[rogerd]

While I don't think that it's a good idea to put the whole company background on the home page, firms without established name recognition might still do well to put a line or two that says who they are, e.g., "The largest power tool dealer and repair center serving Western New York".

Personally, I didn't care for the Citibank example very much. I found the design kind of unfocused, with multiple areas of the page competing for attention. I think the idea of giving visitors a few main choices is great, but they didn't do quite enough to guide the user to them.

[Macguru]

I always put about 100 words in 2 or 3 paragraphs to tell visitors what they can expect to find on sites.

This text uses all top ten keyprases visitors are likely to type in search engines.

Google is my main traffic provider.

Home pages are more likely to have the strongest Page Rank of all pages in site. So I just can't miss this opportunity.

It is fairly easy to beat most competitors in easy markets (like French language or niche markets) with this simple detail and basic directory listings. In such markets, you can make a killing with a decent homepage at PR 4. In tougher markets, it certainly wont hurt.

Had a client once who used to put the "latest news and press stuff" on home page every week. So the text was different on every crawl. So was the traffic : a roller coaster ride! He went all the way up by just stabilising text content of homepage.

Main navigation is usually the same from any page of site. Users can pick where they want to go whatever there is or not text on home page. Writing text on home pages is not exactly force feeding users.

[sem4u]

> Had a client once who used to put the "latest news and press stuff" on home page every week. So the text was different on every crawl.

This info should go on a press information page. Each news release can achieve high rankings, potentially higher than other optimised pages. Some people may call it 'accidental SEO'!

[Jon_King]

Macguru is absolutely right. In addition to major focal interests as described in the article, a reasonable amount of copy for seo purposes should be included.

[edit_g]

If you have a USP which clearly sets you apart from all your competitors you could put something optimised about that on your homepage. Give your customers a good reason to choose you over the competition.

On the other hand a little about part- as Macguru says- can have a fantastic impact on your search engine rankings. I've had experience of this first hand- and it does make a huge difference.

[richardb]

Thanks all

That is clarified matters; I can't believe I missed something so unbelievably obvious.

There is probably a system to rationalise this based upon company profile and size of the site e.g. small scale site 5 – 10 pages no real need, 10 – 20 pages USP’s + direct links feeding into the most salient areas, blar blar blar, but too tired to think now.

Will track the stats and hopefully remember to post the data in a few months.

Rich

[jlr1001]

SEO aside, Nick's column fails to address the issue of customer confidence. Assuming that we're working with a small, new, or developing company the visitors won't have the automatic associations of quality and service that come with an established brand. Some of you have made this point already, and I agree with it.

Given how easily one can design a professional-looking website, the "scummy" factor doesn't really apply to whether or not a customer will trust any given business. This is where effective copy needs to step in.

A well-designed, easily navigable site selling collectible thing-ama-bobs won't guarentee business success, despite how well it's designed to direct a visitor to any given action.

Why worry about optimizing for qualified search engine traffic if our copy doesn't instill trust in our product?

[jlr1001]

Just another point of interest.

The homepage argument is fairly moot if the majority of your traffic comes from SERPs, which most probably will send the visitor to a page other than your index or homepage.

So to some degree the search engine query is already the product of a visitor's directed action.

Just a thought . . .

[john316]

>>Assuming that we're working with a small, new, or developing company the visitors won't have the automatic associations of quality and service that come with an established brand.<<

They will if you present yourself like an established brand.

If you spend time "defending yourself", you only solidify the message that you are trying not to convey.

[Mardi_Gras]

The homepage argument is fairly moot if the majority of your traffic comes from SERPs, which most probably will send the visitor to a page other than your index or homepage.

An interesting - and I think perceptive - thought. I had a disagreement with Overture a year ago over a client site - they turned down the URL to the home page but said they would accept the search term if it linked to an interior page. This was a small travel site for a client and it wasn't designed to have people dumped into the middle pages - it was designed to be entered from the home page.

I found a creative way :) around the Overture rejection, but I never really solved the underlying problem that you bring up again. Sites really need to be self-contained from any given entry point. I'm not sure all of mine are :(

[lorax]

... "latest news and press stuff" on home page every week. So the text was different on every crawl. ... way up by just stabilising text content of homepage.

I agree with a little something to chew on up front combined with a good navigation. And press stuff I can see on another page but on-topic news? What if it's only a portion (half or smaller) of the top page?

[aussiedave]

I'm curious, with regards to featuring "latest news" or simialr on the Homepage (which is quite common) - does that mean that even if the majority of the page stays the same, with just a "latest news" section changing, that it effects search engine listings?

And is there a difference if you're using dynamic news contant, so that the actual code on that Homepage will stay exactly the same?

Cheers
Dave