Stop Hoarding on your Home Page
Your home page is one of the most important pages on your website. It is the great entryway to your business, the identity of your brand, and the most compelling sales pitch to your customer. Or at least it should be.
Since the home page is valued so highly, it also tends to be the page that is most easily destroyed.   Many times the home page turns into a catch all for supplier brand logos, miscellaneous ad style banners, and random phrases hinting at something but never fully explained.Â
Do you ever find yourself saying “This button is important, but I don’t really have any place to put it… so I guess I’ll just put it on the home page.”? That is a slippery slope and one that leads to homepages that look like this:
Without a clean, concise homepage, your customer will be confused by what to do next and you may lose them before they even have time to discover what your business is all about. It’s time to stop hoarding on your home page and give it the make-over it deserves.
4 Key Concepts for a Clutter-Free Homepage
Answer the question: Why do people want to book travel through you?
- What’s the benefit in using YOUR agency over another?
- Most people have become accustomed to booking their own vacations, take some time to explain exactly what the consumers receives when the book through a travel agent.
- People want to connect and build relationships, give them a little personal flavor so they can accomplish that. A quick sentence about why you’re in the travel industry or how the agency got started works well.
- If you don’t want your website to show your personality, add links to your social media accounts (like facebook and twitter) so that your customers can get their fun, personal fix from your company there.
Call to Action
- Don’t make your customer think. Tell them what they need to do. Â
- Use call to actions like “Book your Vacation Now! Call for the best rates! Plan your next trip! Search our Vacation Offers!”
- Make sure your call to action appears on the first screen, above the fold.
Establish and Reinforce your Expertise
- Add a customer testimonial, credentials, years in business, etc.
- People want to know they are buying from a trusted expert.
Need an example? Take a look at these homepages for inspiration:
If you need a refresher on how to edit pages and make changes to your website, take one of our weekly NexCite Orientation webinars.  As always, feel free to contact us in the support department if you need any help.
Related posts:
- Travel Website Ideas (Part Two)
- How does your website look?
- 5 Things Travel Agents Can Put On A Facebook Fan Page Right Now