7 Design Tips to Drastically Improve Homepage Conversions

So your homepage isn’t converting the way you thought or would like it to?

We recently re-designed a homepage for one of our clients, PeopleDoc, with that very challenge in mind. We wanted to create the best possible solution for their industry. To do this we had to analyze a few different key elements on their page. We had to:

• Layout a way for the user to have an easily navigable path through the page

• Figure out a way to include an attractive video in their hero to showcase their software

• Design a way to showcase relevant stats for their buyer personas

• Showcase reliable social proof

• Find a way to easily convert anywhere they happened to be on the page.

Here's how we did it!

1.Give clear direction/Create an easy user flow.

Have a clear and concise message right off the bat. Optimize your value proposition!

Arguably the most important element of making the right first impression is the value prop. Design this to be easily understood, concise so the user knows exactly what it is you can do for them, and ensure that it is prominent enough to be noticed precisely when the page loads.

2. Do not clutter the page with useless elements.

Decide what works with the goal in mind. Keep your personas in mind and cut the rest out!

This is much easier said than done. Most cases that I have experienced in either a redesign or newly designed site is the tendency to cram every bit of content and elements above the fold.

This may have been good practice in the past but nowadays users, young and old, know (and expect) to scroll once they land on a page. With that in mind, the focus should be to arrange the “story” of your page in such a way for your target audience so that they enjoy scrolling past the hero.

3. Design with the user in mind.

(who we are -> how we can help you -> heres others that we have helped -> let’s get started!)

As I was saying, keep your user in mind when structuring the content on your site. Try to envision what would be the most important information and ensure that they can easily access it once they land on the page.

4. Use a video!

Videos have shown to convert 70% better than those without.

When at all relevant or possible use a video. A study from marketing profs shows that simply putting a video can drastically increase your conversion rate. How simple!

Here are some tips when thinking about creating your video:

• Keep it under 2 minutes

• Use visuals and imagery. If your video is made up of just stats, numbers, and charts, you’re not using the medium to its full potential.

• Give them the elevator pitch, not the hour-long presentation on your growth charts and financial diagrams. That sort of video is valuable somewhere else but for your homepage.

Overall, make your video informational, but short and to the point. Keep it short and sweet, trust me. Itll be easier to make (cheaper) and much easier for your user to digest a short video than a long one.

5. Show stats that relate to the persona's pain points

Show stats that will actually relate to the user

This means show only the stats that the user will find valuable. Again, they don’t really care how much money you made last year. What they really want is how you helped people in the past and how you can help them in the future.

Also, remember to be honest. This is very important. Do not lie to your audience by faking or exaggerating stats. This could not only be crushing to your street cred, but also be extremely harmful to your trust building initiatives.

6. Provide reliable social proof

Once again, don’t lie. Put exactly what your generous client provided you as a testimonial. The value here is simply showing that your service or software is actually being used in real life and delivering real results for real people. Real people sometimes aren’t good at testimonials. *shrug*

7. Position a way to convert at any point on the page

Have a CTA in the header/hero

Giving a clear way to convert is probably a no-brainer, but this is forgotten so many times. Give the user an over-the-top, obvious way to convert at the top of your page.

Here are some tips:

• Use contrasting colors for your below the funnel offer

• Use real verbiage when creating the button

• Position it so that it is second in line on the hierarchy stack. (Right after the value proposition)

• Use a sticky nav to always give the user a way to convert

What we have found with converting users on homepages is that giving the them an obvious CTA that stayed with them to any point on the page provides them with a clear path to take action whenever they were ready.

• Show the BOFU CTA in the footer

The idea here is to ensure that the CTA is accessible from anywhere but not be overwhelming with it.

For example, in order to not be overwhelming to the user, in the case above, we included the CTA in the value proposition. After scrolling, it is in the fixed navigation, and finally once the user reaches the footer the navigation will go away revealing the CTA in the footer.

It creates a nice user interaction as they scroll and by simply removing elements and adding elements generates focus exactly where we want their focus to be.

Key Takeaway

So if you are having trouble getting your users to convert on your homepage, keep these tips in mind. If you have any questions, we would love to help. Talk to us or submit your site to our Website Throwdown.