Homepage Guidelines

Some Web Site Usability Guidelines

Reference: Nielsen and Tahir, Home Page Usability, 50 Web Sites Deconstructed, New Riders Publishing, 2001.

Show the company name and logo (site title if not a business site) in a reasonable size and noticeable location.
Emphasize what your site does that is valuable to the user and how it differs from key competitors.
Emphasize high priority tasks.
Clearly designate one page per site as the homepage.
Design the homepage to be clearly different from all the other pages on the site.

Use customer-focused language. Present information in terms of how it is useful to the customer.
Avoid redundant content.
Avoid clever phrases and marketing lingo that are hard to understand.
Use consistent capitalization and other style standards.
Do not explain items on the site whose purpose is obvious.
Spell out acronyms or abbreviations that might not be obvious to the user.
Avoid exclamation marks.
Avoid spelling words or phrases entirely in uppercase letters.
Present text in short chunks. Users read websites quickly. They usually do not take the time to read long paragraphs. You can include a link to "Complete Story" or "More Details" for conscientious readers.

Use examples to reveal the site's content, rather than just describing it.
For each example, have a link to directly to that example, not merely the page that contains the example.

Provide a link to the broader category close to the specific example.
Provide links to recently featured information on your site.
Don't use generic instructions (like "Click Here"). Specify the destination of the link.
Allow link colors to show visited and unvisited sites.
Make links obvious by coloring them blue.
Don't use the label "Links" on a page. If you give a title to a group of links, let it describe the destination category of the links.
Locate the primary navigation area on the homepage in a highly noticeable place. Do not make the user scroll to find it.
Group items in the navigation area so that similar items are next to each other.
Do not provide duplicate navigation areas for the same type of links.
Do not include an active link to the homepage on the homepage.
Do include a link from every non-homepage page to the homepage.
Do not use made-up words for category navigation choices.

Use graphics to show real content, not just to decorate your homepage.
Label graphics and photos if their meaning is not immediately obvious.
Edit photos and diagrams appropriately for the site.
Avoid background images (wallpaper) including watermark graphics.
Do not use animation for the sole purpose of drawing attention to an item on the homepage.
Do not animate critical elements of the homepage, such as the logo, tag line or main headline.

Limit the number of font styles, sizes, and colors on a page. A good rule is to limit the number of different fonts on a page to two. They should be obviously contrasting fonts.
Use high-contrast text and background colors.
The most critical home page elements should be visible without scrolling on a screen at the most prevalent window size (800 x 600).
Use logos judiciously.

Begin the window title with the information-carrying word--usually the site name.
Don't include the top-level domain name (such as .com) in the window title unless it is actually part of the company name (like Amazon.com).
Limit window titles to seven or eight words and not more than than 64 characters.

Avoid spash screens.
Avoid popup windows.
Do not use routing pages to choose the language. (Exception: your company is truly an international company with no single dominant language.)

If you support user communities with chat or other discussion features, don't just show generic links to chat rooms, list actual discussion topics.
Don't offer a "Guestbook" sign in for business sites.