What should a main page of a web application be?

Question

Designing a web application, how do you design the main page? By this I mean the page that is displayed to a user after entering the base url, like http://www.foo.com.

It would probably depend on a website, but...

• stackoverflow welcomes us with list of questions, no silly what is stackoverflow landing page,
• last.fm prestens a kind of dashboard, being very popular lately, kind of personalized landing page for registered users
• google welcomes us with a search box, but iGoogle i completly diffrent story - looks diffrent for everyone (well, and that's the point actually).

The other thing is, if the user is logged in (provided the website supports logging in), should we present him a diffrent content there then some new, random incomer? And I don't mean some personalized content, but something completly diffrent, like his user profile instead of main page?

From one perspective it could be good - registered users usually know our site, and get a kind of special greeting as soon as they come back. On the other hand, this could cause problems - when I show a website to a friend, then he goes there from his computer and sees something totally diffrent.
And other thing is, when I show a http://www.foo.com to a friend, and it takes me directly to my user profile / dashboard - this isn't sometimes what I'd like to show everyone, as this might show some of my personal data, etc.

What do you do when you design your web applications? What's, in your opinion, best from user's point of view, do my concerns about the website looking diffrent for registered and unregistered users do or don't make any sense? (Again, I don't mean small diffrences, like hiding huge register now link - but showing completly diffrent view then).

Answer 1

It should be whatever makes sense for the application, and this should be verified by testing the application with a group of expected users.

Answer 2

Without knowing the business area of your site then it's going to be tricky to answer this, but...

You should get the user into the main flow of your website as soon as possible, and the home page is the best place to do this.

If you're an online store, start showing your products. If you're a search engine, give the user the ability to search. If you're a blog/news site, show the user the latest news.

Yes - make the experience for a logged on/registered user better (show them THEIR news, show them their recommended products etc), but the purpose of your site should be obvious and accessible from that home page. Get your existing users into their flow as soon as possible, and attact new users in to your site by showing them the meat of your site.

There are plenty of places out there that discuss good web design, making your site "sticky" etc. Check out SmashingMagazine.com (it's one such site) but there are plenty of others.

Oh, and remember that there's one very important user of your home page that you need to accomodate - search engines. Make their life easy, make the content discoverable and indexable, and drive people to your site via Search.

Answer 3

It really depends on the focus of your application, but if you were to generalise I would say determine the one or two most critical paths in your application and focus on those.

• Registration is probably what you want to drive more than anything else, so make it clear how users can sign up and get involved.

• Make it is easy for existing users to sign in.

• Consider the amount of text you have on your front page and reduce and
  pair it down as much as possible. Keep the messages and information you convey here as succinct as possible.

• Provide some content immediately showing what your application or site provides. Don't make users follow a link to access the core functionality of your site immediately e.g. if you're building an auction site, ensure there are listings on the front page.

• Consider your audience. If your site is non-technical, the fewer UI elements you present the better. Portal like sites, with lots of compartmentalised functionality and information can be confusing and overwhelming for many non-technical users.

• Make it clear how users can get Help if they require it

Answer 4

The main page should provide a first-time user with enough visual and/or written information to understand what the application is about. They should have some idea as to what actions they can take to interact with the app and what the outcomes of these actions could be.

Answer 5

What I've found works best for me is to "role-play" the end-user's experience.

When they initially hit your site, what do they most want to see, or in other words, what are they most likely to be looking for and wanting to do?

I work on many intranet websites for a very large company, and what I've learned is that a home page that has detailed information of the site and what it does is useless and, consequently, my end-users just skip over it in order to get to the pages that they really need. So, my strategy usually consists in a home page that allows them to get straight down to business and whatever they're there to do.

BUT, that's just for the sites that I create. I think it totally depends on your target market and what they're wanting to do.

Answer 6

For the most part, a visitor landing on your page will already know the gist of what your application is about, so there shouldn't be a need to explain in detail what is is you do. Instead, show them that you have the information they are looking for. Screenshots and screencasts are becoming popular these days as a means of getting this across to the short-attention-spanned user.

For registered users, I'd recommend taking them directly to the primary application page instead of the homepage (unless the homepage is the primary application page). For many apps this is a Dashboard (Flickr, Basecamp, Campaign Monitor). If your app's main focus is the homepage, you may want to show them a personalized version of that page (think Google vs. iGoogle).

With all this said, it really does depend on what you are building. Every application is different and there's no right way to do it - only conventions that work for most.

Answer 7

I know people hate this answer on stackoverflow but there's only one way to find out what the most appropriate thing for your users is - you need to brainstorm ideas with potential users or at the very least you ask them.

I'm not suggesting that you do a focus group, or put a flawed poll up (neither of those things work). Rather, I'm suggesting that you go out and talk to people who will potentially be in your target users and do planning games with them (like card sorting) or go out and do some user testing with paper prototyping.

Anything else is guessing.

Answer 8

I would start by looking at the type of tasks that can be performed inside your web app, what's important? what's important when they are a new user? what's important when they are a repeat user? what's important when they haven't even registered yet.

Although all of these things happen on the the same page, it's likely that you'll need to define different states. e.g. If a user is on the homepage and not logged in, should we prompt them to login and register.

Perhaps also look at Personas so you can figure out exactly who will be using the app and what is relevant to them.