Your business will go through many stages in its life. From finding your first client to building an established business.
At each stage you’ll understand more about your customers and your product offering.
In this case study I’m going to use the Pennine Academy of Dance website to show you how a homepage can evolve to support a growing business.
I’ve worked on this website through all stages of its development, so I have a close understanding of each stage and I created the strategy behind each change.
If you’re ever thought “What content should I put on my homepage?” then this is the case study for you.
Early start up
When the academy first started in 2014 there was a single dance class for a single age range.
We knew the business would quickly want to grow beyond this class, which it did. By 2015 there were 5 classes across multiple age ranges.
However, in the early period of 2014 the homepage ignored all of the future ambition and focused on that single class.
You see, if your business is trying to get its first few clients, focus on a specific, ideal customer. Don’t dilute your message. This maybe one of the only times your homepage can do this.
Here’s what the first homepage looked like.
The homepage language is focused on a parents looking for a Saturday morning class for their young child. This is backed up by using images of children in dacewear.
Expanding the audience
When it came time to open classes for other age ranges the homepage needed to change.
It couldn’t just focus on tots anymore but I still wanted it to speak to a single audience. So I picked parents as a general target – as opposed to parents of a specific aged child.
This is what the new website looked like:
As you can see, the header image now shows a wide range of ages.
Each section talks to a problem parents face with dance schools, I know these are problems because our parents tell us about their experience at previous dance schools. It’s an advantage of meeting your customers face to face every week.
Next stage
The homepage is due a review and update soon as the academy is now in its next stage of life. I’ll update this case study when a new homepage has been created.
The key takeaway I want you to get from this case study is that your homepage should support the main goal of your business.
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