It’s easy to think the home page of your website is the front door everyone uses.
But that’s not the case. Any page could be the entrance.
It’s weird.
We’re used to going into places in life where we have to use the front door (or occasionally a side door or trademan’s entrance or whatever).
But even then, it’s a designated entry.
But websites are different
Unless you’ve used your robots.txt file to tell Google that it can only index your home page, it will show the page on your site that it thinks best serves the intent of the person searching.
And actually that last statement isn’t totally true.
Asking Google not to index a page with a setting in your robots.txt file (or an on-page meta tag that says noindex) only means it won’t crawl the content of that page.
It can still show it in the search results.
But instead of a useful description, it will say something like “A description for this result is not available because of this site’s robots.txt”
So people could still conceivably find the page in the search results and use it to enter your website.
It’s be a bit like going to the supermarket and instantly being transported to the correct aisle for each of the products on your shopping list.
Very, very odd.
And something that we find difficult to get our heads around.
Website designers are dab hands at ignoring this!
Most website designers will quietly ignore the fact that anyone can “arrive” on your website on any page,
They’ll spend a long time getting the home page right and then hope that the remaining pages will look OK.
But that simply isn’t how things work in real life.
Anyone can link to any of your pages.
And – unless you’ve password protected those pages – that means anyone can view them.
It’s how product download pages get shared by unscrupulous people.
You’ve created a product and launched it.
But people need somewhere to go to download the product.
You can ask Google not to index the page and they’ll probably honour your wishes.
But you can’t easily enforce that process on other sites – there are whole legions of sites whose sole purpose is to share products without paying for them.
But that’s a digression
Because it doesn’t just apply to product download pages.
It applies to any page on your site.
Think about it for a second or two.
When was the last time you went to Wikipedia’s home page?
If you’re like most normal people, probably never.
Even Google’s home page is touch and go – not that there’s much on it anyway.
I use the search box at the top of Firefox and that gives me the Google results.
If I’m using Chrome, I just type my search into the bar at the top – I could type Google first and then my search, but I don’t.
So when you’re designing your website, you need to think about this.
A lot.
Every single page on your website needs to create a good impression.
Because first impressions count!
Another thing to remember is that because of the way we search and because of the way the search results get delivered, we expect the page we reach to be the correct one.
Your site visitors don’t expect to have to jump through extra hoops to get the information they want.
If that happens, unless you’re the only site in the world offering that specific piece of information, they’ll just click the back button and find a site that treats them with respect.
That probably means clean, uncluttered pages
It might not – YouTube’s pages aren’t exactly clean and tidy – there are lots of distractions on them.
But the main focus of the page is the video that you searched for.
So maybe the “clean, uncluttered” description is maybe wrong.
Focused might be a better description.
The main thing on the page people arrive on – whichever page it is – should be what they’re likely to have searched for.
Even that isn’t as easy as it sounds.
Google index every word on the page and do their best to give the best matches to whatever people searched for.
So potentially this page could show up for clean uncluttered web pages,
And people searching for that would probably be looking for web designers or WordPress themes or inspiration.
It’s one stage on from the supermarket analogy I used earlier.
You’re not just transported to the aisles with the products on your shopping list.
You’re possibly also transported to the aisles that have the food that you might fancy for your meal tonight.
This does make the navigation on your site ultra important
Again, most web designers will say that the navigation on your site happens in certain places:
- Maybe a breadcrumb trail
- Probably a menu near the top or down one side of the site
- Possibly a list of other pages on your site (that’s what the WordPress theme for my site currently does)
What they’ll not mention are all the other navigation links that we kind-of expect from a modern website.
If you’re using Amazon, chances are you’ll use their search box rather than the navigation menus.
That then brings up a list of items that hopefully match what you were searching for.
If you’re using Wikipedia, chances are you’ll use one of the many unobtrusive links to drill down for more information.
In the case of Wikipedia, they’re there to encourage you to roam around the site.
In the case of YouTube, there are related videos and playlists.
All of those are designed to keep you on their site as long as possible.
You need to be thinking the same way when you design your website.
The purpose of each individual page should be as clear as possible.
The main focus of the page should be clear.
But there should probably be options to explore further.
Yes, I know that’s a bit “wooly”.
Because the main focus of your site might be to get people to sign up to your email list.
That’s a good idea.
Terry Kyle has done that with his Email Marketing Academy.
Near the top of each page is a very large box with an incentive to sign up to his list.
That’s the aim of the site – build an email marketing list.
You can scroll down to the content and it’s still apparent that the content is available.
But ideally he’d like you to sign up to his list.
So every page on the site has that large sign-up box.
Even the “contact” page and the “about” page.
So it doesn’t matter which page you first arrive on, you’re greeted with the option to sign up to his list.
If you’re aiming on building a responsive list, that’s worth considering (and if there’s a giant sign-up box on this page when you get to it, you’ll know I’m testing that!)
If you’re selling a service where you’d prefer people to phone you, make your phone number prominent on every page.
That’s not the focus on this site, so I don’t parade my phone number everywhere. But it is on the contact page so it’s available. As is my Skype ID.
You need to think this through for your site.
And then apply it!
What’s your most wanted action when people arrive at your site?
Regardless of the page they arrive on.
Whether that’s your latest post, some ancient page that you haven’t looked at since you created it, or any other page.
Once you’ve decided this, apply it to every new page you create.
Then gradually go back through your older pages and amend them as necessary,
When you do this, ask yourself what your reaction would be if this was the first page on your website that you landed on.
Is the impression good, bad or indifferent?
If it’s good, move on to the next page and apply the same test.
If it’s less than good, adjust the page accordingly.
Now.
While you remember!
If you’ve got easy access to your stats (they’re usually in your website’s hosting control panel), pick on the most popular pages first.
The 80/20 rule applies to this just as much as it does anywhere else.
And by picking off the most popular pages first, you’ll get the best return for your efforts.
If you’ve got any comments on this, please use the box below.