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Creating a Homepage for WordPress Website
When you’re eager to create a homepage for a WordPress website, diving into the vast digital world can be daunting. Don’t fret! This guide is tailored to ease novices into the process, ensuring your website isn’t just visually captivating and optimized for search engines.
The current article is "7.3. Create a Homepage" of our Complete SEO Guide Box.
Previous Article: 7.2. Creating Pages. Next Article: 7.4. Create Contact Page
Understanding Your Audience
Every effective website starts by addressing its audience’s needs. Identify their interests and problems. By doing so, you’ll be better equipped to create a homepage for a WordPress website that truly resonates.
Compelling Headlines Matter
First impressions count. Your headline should captivate and convey your site’s essence. Think of it like this: “Discover Gourmet Cooking: Tips, Tricks, and Tempting Recipes Await!”
Offering Value Immediately
To effectively create a homepage for a WordPress website, highlight some of your best or newest content. This exhibits the caliber of your offer and invites visitors to delve deeper.
Crystal-Clear Call-to-Action (CTA)
Whether encouraging subscriptions or guiding to a recent blog post, your CTA must be evident and compelling. It’s all about guiding your visitor on their journey.
Highlighting Your Unique Benefits
A crucial aspect to remember when creating a WordPress website homepage is to showcase the unique benefits of your service, product, or content. It’s not just about stating what you offer but elaborating on why it’s invaluable. Potential customers often think, “Why should I choose this?” Address this by detailing what sets your offering apart. Is it more cost-effective? Perhaps it saves time or provides a unique solution that others don’t.
Highlighting these benefits can be a game-changer. By positioning your service, product, or content as not just another option but the best choice, you elevate your brand’s appeal and directly communicate its value to prospective users or buyers.
By showcasing testimonials or user reviews, you enhance credibility. For someone new to your site, such endorsements can be the nudge they need to explore further.
When you create a homepage for WordPress, intuitive navigation is crucial. Simplify their search by making the “Search” bar easy to spot. For sites bursting with categories or pages, consider handy dropdown menus.
Engaging Visual Elements
Photos, infographics, and videos can enrich your homepage. They break the monotony of text and offer an engaging visual treat for your visitors.
Consistency is Key
From colors to fonts, ensuring a uniform look across your site is pivotal. As you create a homepage for a WordPress website, remember that consistency reinforces brand identity.
Keeping Content Fresh
As your website grows, your homepage should reflect that evolution. Frequent updates ensure it remains relevant and engaging.
Refine and Optimize
Lastly, tools like Plausible Analytics or Google Analytics are invaluable. They shed light on visitor interactions, guiding you to refine your homepage. Regular insights can help fine-tune the experience, ensuring it’s always at its best as you create a homepage for a WordPress website.
How to Create a Homepage for a WordPress Website: Step-by-Step
Login to your WordPress Dashboard.
On the left side menu, hover over [Pages], then click on [Add New].
Add the Title and the content as mentioned above.
Note: As the first block, you can set “Media & Text” to merge your logo and the first paragraph if you like.
Now, we will go over the settings for this page. If you skipped the Page Creation process in WordPress, you should check the article to understand these settings.
Settings under the content:
“Yoast SEO” section:
[SEO] tab.
Focus keyphrase: <Paste here your long tail keyword; Yoast suggests making keyphrase not more than 4 words long>
Meta description: <This should be under 156 characters, and it will be the description of your homepage on Google SERPs or any other search engine. You can check the Google SERP preview in this section>
You can check the [Readability] and [Inclusive Language] tabs for more improvement tips when creating a WordPress website homepage. You can enable “Inclusive Language” in the Yoast SEO plugin if you haven’t done it already.
Disable Related Posts display: [V]
Exclude this post from the related posts list: [V]
On the right panel, find the [Publish] button. There should be a [Settings] button on the right side of the button with an icon of a “square.” Click it.
Find the “Featured image” section. Check the box:
[V] Show featured image in the posts lists only, but hide it in the single post view
We do this to remove the Featured image from this page. You can add a logo separately on the page to look more authentic, rather than using the default Featured image location and size.
Click [Publish].
To return to the main menu, click on the top left WordPress logo.
On the left side menu bar, hover over [Settings], then click on [Reading].
Under “Your homepage displays,” select “(*) A static page (select below).”
Homepage: <Select the homepage that you published>
Click [Save Changes].
Refine After Adding More Content
After adding more content, you will return to edit the homepage to add navigation and more internal links.
Conclusion
To create a homepage for a WordPress website that’s both captivating and SEO-optimized might seem overwhelming at first. However, even newcomers can craft a compelling digital front door with the proper steps and consistent effort. Remember, adaptability and learning are your most powerful tools in the ever-evolving digital realm.
The current article is "7.3. Create a Homepage" of our Complete SEO Guide Box.
Previous Article: 7.2. Creating Pages. Next Article: 7.4. Create Contact Page
If you find any mistakes or have ideas for improvement, please follow the email on the Contact page.