What Kind of Front Page do You Need?
Much can be said about the index of your site’s contents. Usually, it’s the first thing people see. To show your direct traffic a good time, it makes sense that the way you have your home page set up serves a great deal of importance to your first impression.
There are many species of blogs, each with different needs. Each with different ways to get the most out of that first time visitor. The wrong home page can seriously confuse an innocent search engine goer, and the right one can give you one more return visitor.
The Personal Blog
Whether it’s attached to your name, some pseudonym or identity you personally maintain, the home page will not only speak volumes for the site as a whole, but also for you as a designer. I find it’s best to not get fancy here. When someone comes to me with a personal blog I am instantly thinking of a standard two column layout.
You don’t have to let the restrictive structure limit your creativity, though. That set up is the go-to standard for simple, personal sites, no matter the size. Three columns is hard to pull off well for this type of content. One thing you have to consider is not only the type of content and writer, but the quantity of it. If you happen to come across a small tech writer putting out four or five articles a day, you can go for a portal style or multiple column design.
Speaking of the “portal” or “magazine” style design- please as blogger avoid this if you aren’t producing the sheer amount of content to make these designs look the way they’re supposed to. With the recent influx of free and paid themes of this nature, everyone and their mother are ruining the idea by publishing new content once a week and displaying featured posts and 15 other ones.
Some of these sites get up to two month’s worth of content of the home page. As a rule, if content comes out as per usual, I like to display a week to a week and a half of articles on the front page.
The High Quality, Low Producing Blog
When you’ve got yourself a widely read blog that opts for more of a quality than sheer quantity, much like Blogtrepreneur, the approach can be much of the same. Here at Blogtrepreneur there may only be a couple posts a week, but it’s well worth it when they do come out. Because of this, I like to keep the articles front and center for as long as possible.
Personally, with the new Blogtrepreneur design, we went fairly standard in terms of structure. We wanted the latest article to stay in the limelight until the next one arrives, and it’s only a small scroll away.
Although, with articles that usually get pretty in depth, it’s a good idea to chop them off with WordPress’ “more” tag or something similar. This way your page doesn’t get stretched down too far and you get more content across.
Again, I’m going to say the magazine style design won’t work for the same reason as most personal blogs. There just isn’t enough content over the span of a week or so to keep your home page fresh.
Your aim should be to have new content every couple of days (or whatever be your regular schedule) so that if someone were to come via direct visit in correlation with your schedule, they would get something new every time. You can’t assume everyone is using RSS readers and ignore your home page.
The High Producing Blog
When you’re pushing multiple posts a day and it gets to the point where it would be too hard for the non-RSS reader to keep up, a more grid inspired portal style page can work. Sort of in the style of Problogger.
Although I can’t say I’m a fan of the commercial WordPress themes in this style, the way it has been done at Problogger gives the idea a good reputation.
The reason it works so well for them is because there is a clear definition of the sections. Whether it be recent posts, the featured post or the videos, they all have clearly defined sections of the page. There is no confusing whatsoever, which separates it from other blogs of this style.
Review sites (games, movies, etc…) also use this structure well, and it allows important or controversial content to stay on top for longer.
Lessons to Be Learned
In the end, what can we say of all this? I think it’s more about considering the type of site and their content (type and amount) when designing for them. There are popular sites that don’t use their design to their reader’s advantage, and there are most definitely unheard of sites with great designs structured well.
Design Thursdays on Blogtrepreneur are brought to you buy freelance web designer Connor Wilson.
I think no matter what kind of site you have, your front page needs to do several things that are going to retain that visitor - highlight your best content, promote something unique such as a giveaway, emphasise your rss feed if the site is a blog and so on. I think these things are more important than layout.
A lot of this is about figuring out what it is you want to be. Probably best starting off with a simple fairly generic layout then tailoring to fit the type of blog you have become.
Caroline: I wouldn’t say that those things are more important than a layout, but would be important parts of one for specific sites. In terms of best content, popular posts can do that, but shouldn’t you strive to have the newest posts be continually better? A little trivial, but I guess you could just say “highlight content”.
The latter two, the unique item (ebook, give away, contest, an ad unit, etc… I guess) and RSS feeds are more niche specific. Not everyone will have something like that or even want to promote feeds. The whole RSS thing is an author choice to expand readership, so I would say those two things are in no way more important than the structure you choose and the way you show your content on the home page.
Tom: I agree with that. Figuring out where you want to go, but I guess designing for the present is sometimes required. It’s more of realizing that you won’t achieve that success overnight or just because you’ve designed big, you’ll become big.
I like to aim for the future, but there has to be a clear one to do that.
I think layout is very important because it is the first thing most reader see, then they start reading. I am that way. A very visual type.
I think having an email subscription highlighted on the main page is also extremely important as well.
My number one front page tip, however, would be…based upon your targeted audience, how can you slant the design so that it’s IMMEDIATELY apparent readers will get their questions answered? I think that all depends upon the type of information/services you offer.
Enjoy,
Barbara (aka Owlbert)
I agree with Tom. At first, it should just be simple and generic. Focus on content. Then, when you develop your niche, tailor your home page to what you are or what you have become and what your readers enjoy.
A great post mate. I am currently in the process of redesigning my blog, and i have started off with a magazine-style template, however i am editing its layout and design to the point of it being fully suitable to my type of content, and posting schedule.
There are some great tips in this article, so keep up the good work. You just been stumbled.
Connor,
All good points. The front page is definitely important in many ways, but from my experience most visitors don’t enter through the front page. I think that it’s also important to keep this in mind too. The other pages need to have navigation that is easy and logical and they should be able to find there way around.
I submitted this post to Design Float if anyone wants to vote for it: Link
Steven….great insite regarding the front page comment. You are dead on as I checked my own Google stats and they come via the individual posts.
Most blogs look the same on the inner pages as they do on the outer but it is something to consider for sure.
Steven, I think you would be right for the audience of this site. The entrepreneur blog is more about marketing your content for referral traffic than direct traffic I think.
I just checked and my blog is about 25% direct, 45% referrer and 30% search engine. I guess once you’ve had some posts that get a lot of attention, the focus is more away from the home page. Good point.
I personally like blog front page that are simple and in fact, I want them to be as simple as possible. However, traditional blog front page design won’t work for high producing blogs or else the front page will be very long.
One thing that I have seen bloggers moving into is the hype of using magazine style themes since the launch of the Revolution theme. They did not realize that their database and categories are not big enough to support the theme and in fact, they under-utilized the theme itself. Also, alignment and positioning on some blogs of what I call as boxes or modules on the front page is terrible.
Wayne, there is a new premium WordPress theme called <a href=”http://mimbo.prothemedesign.com” rel=”nofollow”>Mimbo Pro</a> that I think could actually do a site with a good amount of content.
Not quite very simple, in fact very detailed and intricate, but it’s very well done. Aligned well, too
I still can’t come around to those magazine-style themes.
Well, what exactly is a Magazine theme? A magazine features different sections (categories) of content throughout, and the theme basically shows excerpts from posts from different parts of the site.
While not being a fan, I bet I could design a magazine style theme that you would like. Maybe the paid themes that were made with commercial success in mind (and not the user) have given you a bad idea, Flimjo.
Some good information here, thanks guys. I am just starting to think about designing a new blog and looking for any hints or tips available before I set off. Great posts,
Many thanks
I don’t have a problem with magazine style themes although they say something different to me than the traditional blog format.
When I hit a magazine themed site, it suggests more of an organization than an individual. Depending on the message you’re trying to convey, that’s not necessarily a bad thing but it does, at least for me, change my gut reaction to a site.
choosing the right homepage has become one of my biggest problem ever since i started building my own website. it’s not easy to choose something that appealing for everyone. this is probably one of the best tips i ever get on this topic. thanks.
Most websites I have ever built tend to be bland. My family states that I have to much geek and not enough pimp.
It definitely depends what type of blog you have and the look your shooting for. A number of factors should all be considered when looking for a design for your blog. Some blogs work better w/ magazine style, others it may actually take away from the community feel. I like your design @ the blogtrepreneur. Nice article BTW
Steven: “The front page is definitely important in many ways, but from my experience most visitors don’t enter through the front page. ”
I totally agree. It’s really a matter of website structure. If you are targeting for the “long-tail” and you have a lot of landing pages different than the homepage, then homepage doesn’t seem that important!
Neat discussion, and it’s really got me thinking about my own sites. I’ve always had issues making a good index page.
Good Form! I’ve stumbled you, let’s get this to a wider audience.
Good points made, I have also stumbled this., and will link to it from an info site I have.