Blogging 101: Design Your Homepage

Similar to judging a book by it’s cover, people will probably judge your blog by it’s homepage. I know you shouldn’t judge a book but… well you’ve probably seen all the books I’ve bought just for the cover if you’ve followed me for a while. But if your site has shoddy design work that was drawn in paint, I’m probably leaving. If it looks like its from the 90’s… I will be outta there so fast.

Of course, every homepage should look different, and unique to the person behind the blog. But there are some suggestions to make the user experience better without compromising your designs look and branding.

Menu

First things first, you will probably need a menu. This will allow people to easily navigate your website to find what they’re looking for. You can (and should) include an about me and a contact page. Also, you can segment your content into different topics in your menu so people who are only looking for X content can easily find it. This should all be clearly laid out and easy for your reader.

Search Bar

Again, your readers need to be able to find what they want to read. Therefore giving them an option to search your site is great. This may also encourage them to search for older posts that they want to reread, or maybe they remembered you have an affiliate link and they want to support you. In both of these situations, you may lose out if you didn’t have a search bar.

Blog Posts

I’m not sure if this is just a pet peeve for me, but I hate blogs that have a ‘homepage’ and then a ‘blog’ tab in their menu. I am clearly going to your website to read your posts, that’s the sole purpose of your website. So please do not make me have to spend more time waiting for the next page to load, just so you can have an extra view on your analytics at the end of the month. Your blog should always be easy and quick to use for readers. You can arrange your blog posts however you want, whether it’s by topic, how popular they are, or just in publication order. Just keep them on your main homepage so people get straight into your content.

Contact  and Social

I already mentioned having your contact page in your menu so that should already be top of your to-do list (if it’s not already there). Contact details are really important if you want to work with brands, publishers etc. This is the best way you will get opportunities and if they can’t contact you they will give up and find someone else.

Social media is also important so that your readers can find and talk to you. There’s been so many time where I’ve had to hunt for social buttons on blogs because I want to follow them. This starts to get irritating, and from both a reader and PR point of view, it’s best they’re at the top and/or on the sidebar.

Design and Branding

I’ve already gone over this is previous posts, but your homepage design should be consistent with the rest of your site. And ensure your branding is on display. For example, I always keep my logo as my header and keep my colour theme throughout. Even for widgets in my sidebar, I edit them to keep them matching.