Custom Website Design and Development: Homepage Tweaks to Make Visitors Feel at Home

A website is like a house where you invite guests over. Its homepage is the living space where guests hang out. So, naturally, you'll want your visitors to feel as comfortable as possible so they'll stick around.

But keeping a visitor on the site is a challenge. It's like throwing a house party. You let them in, they greet people at the party, and hang around. Next moment you catch them sliding out the backdoor and giving you a canned excuse about a pet dog.

Like a dull house party, your website visitors leave early because they're not "feeling" it, and a site's homepage influences this because it's the first thing they see. Luckily, Mesmeric knows a few tweaks to help your homepage give off a homey vibe.

What Can You Expect From Making Homepage Changes?

Any website owner would feel a tinge of hesitation regarding website design changes. We want to hold onto the same design because these changes take time and resources. Plus, we're not even sure the changes will bring any benefit.

But the tweaks we recommend will be easy to do. These are small changes to a homepage's components that will greatly impact the user's experience. Here are some of the awesome things you can expect to happen.

Visitors Will Stay Longer

Implementing the right changes will improve your website visitor's session time. It will feel inviting, comfortable, and familiar enough that your guests will want to hang around your website's homepage.

They Take a Tour

When they hang out on the homepage longer, they'll likely scope the place out more. This is a good thing. This means they're intrigued enough to want to check out the rest of your website and what you have to offer.

Why would they do that? Because they're planning to come back.

They Come Back for More

Once they're comfortable with your website and know it can deliver, they'll keep it in mind. Perhaps even save it on their browser bookmarks or Pinterest. They'll return to it repeatedly because they know it brings a positive experience and gives them what they need.

They Buy Your Stuff

For e-commerce websites, the ultimate goal is conversion. So if your website is something that sells a product, the longer the visitors stay and the more frequently they come back, the more chance they'll buy your stuff.

All this starts with an awesome homepage design that's comfortable, easy, and looks just as expected for the function it offers.

Custom Web Design Changes to Improve Your Homepage

The changes we recommend will help your website's homepage be customer-centric. It focuses on the needs of your visitors while keeping your unique website design and identity intact. Consider these changes to make your visitors enjoy their website experience.

Put Your Brand's Call to Action (CTA) Top and Center

A compelling CTA must be on the upper fold of your homepage. It should be dead center and easily seen by website visitors when it appears on the screen. Think of it as a Welcome sign you hang on your front door, except it does more than welcome the visitor—it entices them to check out what it is you can offer.

Describe What They Will Get From Your Website

Your CTA must also be efficient. The few words you put in there must pack a punch. So the way to go is to be descriptive.

If you have an e-commerce website, think about how you can describe your business's unique selling points. Make it benefit-oriented while thinking about your visitor's wants and needs throughout the process.

Make Font Sizes Legible

A large portion of most websites is in text. So it's no surprise that how words appear on your homepage will significantly affect your visitor's experience.

Font style is subjective, and you'll have to think about or consult with a UX professional. But for starters, a minor tweak you can do that creates a huge effect is on font sizes. Make it at least 16px. This makes words legible and easy to read.

Make Pop-up Boxes Small

Full-page pop-ups (also called interstitials) can be overwhelming for your visitors. It may feel like holding up a sign inches away from their face.

Keep those pop-up boxes small. Then put it on the bottom half of the homepage's upper fold. That way, it'll feel like handing them a nice, sleek business card they'll be eager to examine.

Include Testimonials and Positive Reviews

Proof of value sells. So if you're an e-commerce website with positive product reviews, put them on the homepage. Similarly, testimonials are tremendous social proof tools that boost a visitor's trust in your site.

If you have plenty of good reviews and testimonials, don't put them all on your website homepage. You want to give just enough to prove your website is reliable without appearing braggy.

Put Your Best and Most Popular on the Homepage's Frontline

Whether your website offers a product or a content piece, if it sells well or is currently popular, make space for it on the homepage top fold. That's because visitors will most likely be checking your website for that product or content, and you want to make it easy for them to grab and go.

Make Your Own Unique Images

Your visitors will know if you use a stock photo. Most of them can tell from a glance, and if they do see one, it can affect the trust they give your website.

Go bespoke. Preferably for all of your images. But if it can't be helped, at least create genuine images where it counts. Things such as product images or your team's headshots are non-negotiable and must be 101% authentic.

Shun the Automatic Carousels and Roulettes

Avoid image galleries that shuffle automatically. Similarly, avoid those roulette types of ads that peep from the side of the homepage screen.

From your visitor's point of view, this makes them feel like they're suddenly thrown into a carnival prize game, except they don't see themselves winning. And if they don't win, then so does your website.

Carousels and roulettes are hard to follow, and visitors' inability to stop them makes it a terrible experience. While there can be ways image carousels can work, it still takes skill and finesse to execute them well.

So shun away from automatic image carousels. Instead, make it user-initiated.

Go Easy on the Ads

Ads are helpful for your business, but only up to a certain point. Flooding your homepage with aggressive ad pop-ups would be like serving your guest a big slice of cake, and several spoonfuls of the same stuff are aimed at their face while they still have it in their mouth.

It's going to feel forced and unpleasant. So remove those ads. Avoid overwhelming your visitors. Let them enjoy the cake that is your home page.

Make a Search Bar Visible

For almost all websites, search engines are a staple. But to give that grab-and-go experience your busy visitors need, you have to make your search bar easy to find. You do this by making it visible.

Make your search bar thick and wide. Put it on top of your home page and make it noticeable by contrasting the white rectangular bar with a dark-colored background. Don't forget to add an auto-suggest feature, too.

Put All of These Into Your Website With Custom Web Development Services

You may be wondering how all this can be implemented on your website. To save time and execute these changes effectively, hiring a custom web design agency is your best bet.

A web design and development company is a technical team with expertise in user experience planning and execution. They can take these homepage tweaks and apply them to your website.

How Custom Website Design and Development Work

A website design company's process mostly involves UX analysis and research. Whatever findings come from the data will be translated into website design and then implemented by web development professionals.

Here's an overview of a professional custom website design service:

UX Process

This process is the first step in custom website design services. It involves analyzing your company, website, and target audience to determine what your website visitors need.

Website Design

UI designers will draft web page designs or make design revisions. Then, once you approve, they work with developers for the design launch.

Design Development and Implementation

The development team will execute the web page design. During the development process, the front-end web developers will take care of the webpage, while a back-end development professional will handle the page functionalities.

Testing and Continuous Improvement

UX and UI designers will continue collaborating with web developers to gather data during testing. Then, based on these data, they'll find out what else can be improved on your website.

Make Your Homepage Feel Like Home With Custom Web Development Services

Mesmeric's custom web design services have a dedicated team that will make it easy for you to execute all the homepage tweaks recommended above. Plus, they can provide other user experience services beyond these minor tweaks that suit your website's custom experience and business needs.This custom web design and development firm can take your homepage and make it feel like a place where you and your guests can hang out and have fun. Go on and learn more about our services today.