The Optimal Homepage Text — This Is What You Need to Know

Your homepage is much more than just a window into your business. With the right homepage text, it can be an effective marketing tool. Even a good welcome text puts the visitor in the right mood and hopefully makes them curious to explore more, read your blog or buy your products.

On the Internet, the adage holds true: content is king — content is the most important thing. If you want to be even more precise, you would have to add the word “unique”. With high-quality texts written only for your website, you are on the road to success. In Germany alone, there are almost 17.5 million websites ending in “.de” — so you have to come up with something to be found.

In this article, we’ll show you what types of homepage texts exist and what factors really are critical for the homepage of your website.

What Types of Website Texts Exist?

The homepage of your web presence consists of a variety of different texts, each of which follows different criteria.

SEO Homepage Texts

SEO (Search Engine Optimization), i.e., texts optimized for search engines with the correct and most relevant keywords, are of enormous importance for the best possible placement in the search results on Google etc. Your offer can be as good as it is, your products can work as perfectly as they do, and your web design can be as eye-catching as possible … If users don’t find your site, none of this will help you at all.

Category Pages

The category pages of your store are about the best possible description of the product categories you sell. These texts will help search engines to understand your focus even better. In addition, you can already insert many internal links here and thus give structure to your website.

Product Descriptions

Probably most people will not know your site or your store. They simply search Google for a certain product. The better your product description fits, the better you will be ranked. In addition, customers and users of your site can get an idea of what exactly your product is about, what it can do, what technical features it has, and so on.

Blog Texts

Website texts in the context of a thematically structured blog are an excellent way to write texts on a wide variety of topics. Ideally, all topics in the blog should be oriented to the character of the website, complete it or go into further detail on individual aspects.

Advisory Texts

Well-researched and competent guides, checklists, summaries of scientific papers or help of any kind are an exceptional means to prove your expertise on the one hand and to increase customer satisfaction on the other hand. You offer your readers a real added value, which customers love.

Information Pages

In addition to the types of pages already mentioned, there are other information pages such as the company portrait, an about us page and press releases, for example. All these texts serve on the one hand to pass on information to users, and on the other hand they help search engines to better rank the page.

Lexicon & Glossary

A glossary or lexicon is a particularly suitable means of explaining important keywords, enforcing or intensifying further keywords, and giving the entire website more structure. In addition, a lexicon has a high informative character, which provides further added value to the readers. Through encyclopedia entries, you also create many internal links, which benefits SEO.

Which Factors Should Be Emphasized on the Start Page?

The start page of your website cannot be given enough attention. In most cases, it is the first page that a (new) user sees. Therefore, it should be created with special care and optimized again and again.

Below, we have compiled the most important factors of a successful start page so that you know exactly what you should focus on when creating it:

Tip #1: Prove Your Relevance Right From the Start

As mentioned at the beginning, there are millions of websites in Germany — worldwide there are almost two billion. When a visitor comes to your website, he must immediately feel the importance and relevance of the page. If he notices that the site does not offer him what he expects, he will be gone with one click just as quickly as he came.

You Can’t Please Everyone

It is essential to write your website texts in such a way that they appeal to your most important target group. It is impossible to please everyone. You need to focus on the users who are most likely to close the deal, i.e., buy something or make a booking. More on this in tip #2.

Always Keep the Customer Journey in Mind

If you simply write “Welcome to my website” as a greeting text, followed by an irrelevant and generic text, don’t be surprised if your bounce rate is very high. Instead, think about where the user is on his journey.

He probably searched for a specific product or service. He has searched the search engines, possibly visited other websites, or even asked friends for recommendations. Now he wants a solution to his problem. So, you have to be able to grab this new, potential customer right from the first few sentences and pull him along or at least convince him of your competence.

Answer Questions

Every user has certain questions in mind when searching for a product or service. Think about what questions they will come to you with. You can also type a relevant keyword into Google and see what questions are displayed for it. Now you need to process these questions and provide answers to them — especially to the well-known five W-questions: who, what, when, where and why?

Examples for the First Headline on Your Homepage

For better clarification, here are some concrete examples:

Good/bad	Headline	Note
bad	Welcome, we are glad you found your way to us.	Much too general, meaningless.
good	20,000 satisfied customers can’t be wrong.	Shows competence, puts you out as an expert.
good	Are you looking for the best Bluetooth speakers? Your search has finally come to an end.	Highlights the customer’s problem from their perspective and makes them feel good about having arrived.

Tip #2: Know Your Target Audience and Focus on Them

Not every user who hangs out on the Internet is your true target audience. First find out who you really want to address and focus specifically on this group. The writing of the texts for your homepage will then be oriented exactly to this target group. Of course, you are aware that you have to address a rather young target group completely differently than a target group consisting of people over 50. If you sell hip sneakers, the texts will look differently than the ones on a website for hearing aids.

The target group determines the length of the texts, the tone, the statements, the outer form — simply everything. To get to know your target group better, most like to work with buyer personas. These are fictional people who have the character traits of the people you want to target: Age, income, life circumstances, hobbies, etc.

Only if your most important target group feels picked up and understood right at the beginning with the first words on your home page, there is a chance that they will stay, read on and make a transaction (purchase, order, booking).

Tip #3: Always Write Texts in a Reader-friendly Way

On some websites, longer texts make sense, on others rather short ones. This depends on the target group and product. In any case, however, it is imperative that the texts are reader-friendly. But what makes a text easy to consume? Here are some important criteria:

• Short sentences and paragraphs
• Good structure with subheadings
• Loosening up and easy to grasp bulleted lists, checklists, or tables
• Use of highlighted passages
• Summary (conclusion) at the end

Tip #4: Use “above the Fold” Correctly

Above the fold (ATF) is the area that is visible first without having to scroll. As soon as your website is accessed, this area appears in the screen. Whether on a PC, tablet, laptop or mobile, the ATF should be optimized separately for each device.

The ATF Is Your Icing on the Cake

This area can be compared to the largest and best placed window display in a department store. A shop window that you walk towards on the promenade and always have in view. The ATF is also comparable to a billboard in Times Square in New York.

It’s your icing on the cake, and you can’t neglect it at all. Here you have to arouse the interest of your target group and inspire the visitor. You have to motivate them to read on. You have to use every square inch of this space for your purposes, which does not mean that you should overload it.

Although this is certainly obvious, you see a lot of miserable ATFs. In numerous instances, the top section of the web page simply features a large image and a meaningless tagline. It’s a pity that many people give away a lot of potential here — do it better!

Homepage Examples in Relation to the ATF

Let’s look at some bad and good examples here as well:

Good/Bad	ATF elements	Note
bad	Slider with fast changing motifs and supposedly a lot of information.	This is too much of a good thing. Here you try to get as much as possible under, with the result that no info really sticks with the reader.
bad	Atmospheric image with a meaningless statement.	Doesn’t give the reader anything, doesn’t add value or interesting information.
good	1 plus 3: In addition to the most critical statement, there are three other topics in the brief overview below (teaser).	Highlights the customer’s problem from his perspective and gives him the good feeling of having arrived.

Tip #5: Create Trust

Most visitors to your website don’t know you or your business. Therefore, it is important to show them that you can be trusted and that you are just the right partner. To achieve this, you have several options:

1. Testimonials

It doesn’t have to be testimonials from celebrities. Honest testimonials from satisfied customers are perfectly sufficient to create trust. A new visitor sees immediately that he is obviously in good hands with you. Testimonials are helpful not only about products, but also about customer service, fast delivery, etc.

2. Reviews

An overview of all reviews of your company such as from Google, Facebook and Trusted Shop give visitors a certain security. Good rating scores paint a positive picture of your offer. Even if people did not know your company before, they can get a good picture.

3. Awards, Certificates

Especially if certain awards, certificates, DIN standards or safety aspects play a major role in your industry, you should place them clearly visible on the homepage. Mention in the website text if you have achieved certain outstanding goals.

If you work with customer data, references to your obligations to the GDPR and the secure storage of data are always helpful and build trust. Too much mischief is done with it, and customers like security.

4. Press Review

If your company or products have been reviewed in the press, you should show it. You can be proud of it. It also shows your visitors some relevance.

Tip #6: Use Images With Sense and Reason

Of course, pictures belong on a good homepage. However, there is a lot to consider when using and selecting images:

1. Do Not Use a Free Agency Image on the Homepage

In a blog or on a subpage, you can use an image from a free agency like unsplash or pixabay. However, on the home page, you should go for a unique and specially made image that is exactly aligned with your business or products.

2. Choose Image Headlines Wisely

An image overlay or caption should not simply say the same thing as the website text. Come up with something new, appropriate and unique. When writing text, the headline should be considered and the topic mentioned should be accurately implemented. The headline, image, and text should form one unit.

3. Avoid Boring and Thousandfold Used Symbols

Of course, it is easy to display a thumbs-up icon when referring to a TOP service. However, this bores visitors because they have already seen it too many times on too many other pages. Come up with something new, but still just as meaningful. You’ll have to be a little creative here if you want to get your visitors out from behind the stove.

Tip #7: Always Consider the Aspects of SEO (Search Engine Optimization), But…

In the past, many website owners overdid it with SEO. They wrote texts that were solely for SEO, but were boring, hard to read or poorly researched. SEO is important to be found in the end in the search engines for the relevant keywords, but the reader (your customer) must ALWAYS be in the foreground when you write a new text.

Google’s search algorithms can nowadays very well recognize whether a text is pleasant to read and written for humans or purely for the search engine. So, you won’t do yourself any favors if you string SEO keywords together, conjugate words inappropriately, or use keyword phrases too often.

Tip #8: More Tips for a Better Homepage

Here are more tips for a better homepage in a nutshell:

• Notice what your competitors are doing. Without even copying a word, you can always get inspiration here, research topics, optimize your keywords, or see what they’re working with.
• Checklists and tip boxes delight readers and increase the clarity and readability of the page.
• Use understandable language appropriate to your target audience. If your target audience is normal end users, you should not be too technical. If, on the other hand, you are addressing software engineers, you may of course use technical vocabulary — in this case it shows your competence.
• Texts on the homepage do not always have to be short. It depends on your topic and the target group. However, you run the risk that many people will drop out of longer texts. However, you also have the possibility to hint at texts and to elaborate on the topic on a subpage.

Conclusion: Get Your Optimized Homepage With Blogtec

Whether you already have a homepage that can be optimized or you are planning an entirely new internet presence — we at Blogtec will help you with all the aforementioned aspects and the textual content in the best possible way and according to your needs.

Not only do we have website copywriters and editors who put the texts through their paces, but we also have SEO specialists under one roof who make sure that the texts for your website are

• unique and relevant
• contain the crucial keywords
• are the right length,
• are SEO optimized,
• do not contain spelling or grammatical errors,
• fit your target audience,
• have an SEO-Translation, and
• are published regularly.

Writing texts for your homepage, blog, or information page is our profession and passion. Analogous to Food-Porn, we do Word-Porn for you and your customers. Just give it a try — we will be happy to advise you.