What to Put on Your Business Website Homepage

A visitor lands on your homepage and decides, within seconds, whether to stay or leave. They have not read your about page. They have not scrolled to your reviews. All they have is what is in front of them right now. If that first view does not answer “what is this and can I trust it,” you have already lost them, no matter how good your products actually are.

This is a practical checklist for what your homepage needs to hold, and in what order, to turn a stranger from Google into a customer.

Say clearly what you sell and who it is for

This sounds obvious, but it is the single most common mistake on small business homepages. A clever tagline that does not say what the business actually does forces the visitor to work for information they should get instantly.

Your homepage should answer, without scrolling:

• What do you sell.
• Who it is for.
• What makes you worth choosing.

“Handmade cakes for Lagos birthdays and weddings, baked fresh and delivered same day” tells a visitor everything in one line. A vague slogan like “Sweet Moments, Sweet Life” tells them nothing until they dig further, and most will not bother.

Show your best products up front

Visitors want proof, not promises. Your homepage should feature real products with real photos, not a wall of text describing how great your business is. Pick your best sellers or newest arrivals, somewhere between six and twelve items, and let them do the talking.

Each featured item needs:

• A clear, well lit photo.
• A name and a price, not “contact for pricing.”
• A way to see more or start an order in one tap.

If a visitor cannot see what you actually sell within the first screen or two, they will assume you are hiding something and move on.

Group featured products in a way that makes sense at a glance, by category or by what is newest, rather than a random jumble. A visitor scanning quickly should be able to tell within seconds whether you sell what they are looking for, without having to study every single item on the page.

Make the next step obvious

Every homepage needs a clear action for a visitor to take. This is often called a call to action, but the concept is simple: what do you want someone to do right now?

Common options for a small business:

• “Order on WhatsApp” for products.
• “Book now” for services.
• “See all products” to browse further.

This button or link should be easy to spot, repeated more than once on the page, and never buried at the very bottom where only the most determined visitors scroll to find it.

Build trust with real proof, not just claims

Anyone can write “we are the best.” What actually convinces a stranger is proof they can verify themselves.

• Real customer reviews or testimonials, ideally with a name or photo attached.
• Delivery or order numbers, if they are genuinely impressive.
• Photos of real customers using or wearing your product.
• Any recognisable detail that signals you are an established, ongoing business, not a page thrown up yesterday.

A homepage with zero social proof asks visitors to take a leap of faith. A homepage with even a little proof removes most of the hesitation.

Include a way to reach you, more than once

Contact information should not require a hunt. Your WhatsApp number or order button belongs near the top of the page and again near the bottom, so a visitor never has to scroll back up to act on a decision they just made.

Also worth including somewhere visible:

• Your general location or delivery area, so people know if you serve them.
• Business hours, if relevant to how fast you respond.
• Any other channel you are active on, like Instagram, if it strengthens trust.

Keep the design simple and mobile friendly

Almost all of your visitors in Nigeria will land on your homepage from a phone, often on a slow connection. A homepage full of oversized images, autoplaying video, or long paragraphs will load slowly and lose people before it even finishes appearing.

• Keep photos optimised so pages load fast on mobile data.
• Use short lines and clear headings instead of dense paragraphs.
• Make buttons big enough to tap easily with a thumb.

A fast, simple homepage that works will always outperform a slow, elaborate one that visitors give up waiting for.

Avoid the mistakes that quietly cost sales

A few homepage habits consistently hurt conversion:

• Hiding prices behind “DM for price,” which makes visitors assume the worst and leave.
• Stock photos instead of real product photos, which reads as untrustworthy.
• No clear next step, leaving visitors unsure what to do after they land.
• Outdated information, like an old address or a promotion that already ended.

None of these are hard to fix. They are just easy to overlook when you are close to your own business.

The shortcut: TextMint builds a homepage that already does this

Getting all of this right by hand takes design skill most small business owners never trained for. TextMint builds your homepage for you from a single WhatsApp chat, already structured with your products up front, a clear order button, and a layout that works properly on a phone. You focus on the business. TextMint makes sure the homepage does its job the moment a stranger lands on it.