Three Ways to Enhance Your Homepage
Running a website on WordPress.com? Here are three ideas to help you ensure your homepage is doing all the heavy lifting.
Many people turn to WordPress.com to set up a website: either one that moves the blog from the homepage to showcase work in a different way, or off the site entirely to create a brochure site for their business. Today, we’ll look at three ways to make your homepage even more awesome.
(If you’re new to WordPress.com, welcome! Here’s some information about setting up a homepage on your site.)
Create a synopsis in your sidebar
When someone lands on your homepage, you have but a few seconds to help them understand precisely what your site is about. Text Widgets are a great way to display a few sentences that describe your site or your business offering, list your address and hours of operation, or even share a customer testimonial.
To add a Text Widget, go to Appearance → Widgets to drag the Text Widget into your sidebar and customize the text it contains.
Unleash the power of social media
Chances are, if you’re running a business, you already have a Facebook fan page to help reach out to customers and share information on new products, sales, and perhaps even do a little customer service or support. The Facebook like widget allows your site visitors to “like” your Facebook fan page, without leaving your website.
To add a Facebook like box, go to Appearance → Widgets and drag the Facebook like box Widget into your sidebar.
Not into Facebook? Why not give Twitter, Pinterest, or Instagram a whirl?
Create a Custom Menu to help visitors navigate
If you’re running a business, or if you’ve chosen a website as a tactic to showcase your work, you’ll want to create a Custom Menu to help visitors navigate to the content they’re looking for. Your business site might have a page to list services, a contact page, and/or an about pages. Artists, authors, and musicians might consider adding pages to showcase their latest compositions, including paintings, drawings, prose, poetry, or songs.
To create a Custom Menu, head to Appearance → Menus. Not sure if your theme supports Custom Menus? Check this handy list.
When it comes to customizing your homepage, let your imagination inspire you. Looking for a bit of help in getting these and other features implemented? Our Happiness Engineers can give you a boost.
- May 14, 2014
- Customization
WordPress.com News 
Good idea about the synopsis.
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Great ideas. Thank you!
I am toying with the idea of shifting to wordpress.org so I can monetize my site. Can you tell me why that might be a better option?
I have been all over your sites for discussions on this. Now I am ready to learn directly from the source.
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Hi Laura,
Here’s some information that can help you to make your decision. Here are the differences between WordPress.org and WordPress.com in a handy table:
https://wordpress.com/support/com-vs-org/
Here is a recent article from The Daily Post discussing the differences as well. You might find some additional insight in the comments section, in addition to this piece:
https://wordpress.com/dailypost/2013/11/14/com-or-org/
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Thank you, Krista!
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New at blogging so all the tips and advice are greatly appreciated!
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I update my homepage every time I post. I put a link to my most recent article there every single time I post.
I found this really helped the aesthetics and the navigation around my blog/site.
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Thank you!
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Is there an easy to understand synopsis of how to get started with the software instead of using the web? Does it cost to use the software?
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If you’d like to get help using the WordPress.org software, the Forums are a good place to start:
http://wordpress.org/support/
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Very helpful. Got some new ideas. Thanks.
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When you visit a new blog, what makes the join widget automatically pop up? Maybe mine does that and I just don’t know it?
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Anyone who is not logged in to WordPress.com will see a “Follow” tab on the bottom right of the blog. You can also add a “Follow” button to your sidebar if you like. Here’s a document that talks a bit more about how to do that:
https://wordpress.com/support/widgets/follow-blog-widget/
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Thanks Krista! I have a follow button, and the 101 really allowed me to increase my traffic! Thank you for all your help.
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Great post! I incorporated one of your suggestions, the synopsis in a sidebar. I wrote a poem I hope encapsulates what my blog is all about. I hope those who visit my blog find it useful.
By the way, is it possible to place a link to my About Page at the end of the text widget?
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Yes — if you use a bit of HTML, you can place a link to your About page in your Text Widget. Here’s a great article that explains how to create a link in WordPress: http://wpbtips.wordpress.com/2009/04/01/codes-useful-for-text-widgets/ (Scroll down a bit — the info is toward the middle of the article.)
You’ll want to be sure to put that link code into your Text Widget.
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Thank you so much!!! I did checked out the article and added the link 🙂
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I just added my first text widget. Can you have more than one?
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Yes, you can have more than one Text Widget.
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I’ve got the custom menu going and FB widget etc but I hadn’t thought of a text widget. Great idea! Thanks.
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Thanks. As always very helpful tips, always something to add a new dimension. I’m new at this, so I really appreciate all the great ideas.
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Very helpful for me too!
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The “Three Ways to Enhance Your Homepage” are concise. I find them very useful.
And, I totally agree with David Bennett – the synopsis is indeed a great idea.
I’ll put all three to use right away. Many thanks!
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Thank you for your clear explanations.
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You’re welcome, Patrick.
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I keep forgetting to use Text Widgets … thanks for the reminder. 😀
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They’re SO handy, aren’t they?
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The synopsis is a great tip. I recently added one to my author website. An image also looks nice if you want to add a personal touch (though I hate photos of myself!).
And if you know HTML you can add links to that synopsis. Feel free to click through my profile picture to my website for a look.
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Adding an image is a great idea — thanks for sharing, Craig.
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Good idea about the synopsis, agreed. The text widgets definitely will help.
Thanks
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Great idea about the synopsis. A really simple idea but one that will be really helpful for readers! Thank you 🙂
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Krista, you are a gem. Your help in the comments section has truly opened my eyes to the possibilities of wordpress. *Salute*
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I totally agree about the social presence. It makes a huge difference as it gives a feeling of trust-worthiness if you have a lot of followers.
By the way this post is on wordpress homepage, that is how i ended up here. Just thought you would like to know 😉
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I am on image overload so the drag and drop text widget reminder is perfect timing. Thanks Ben!
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Good idea. I will try the synopsis. Thanks for sharing a great post!
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