How Understanding Your Audience Changed the Way I Built My Website

Lessons from Building My First Website

Creating a website is not that hard; creating a useful, helpful, valuable one is.

The Biggest Challenges I Faced While Building My Website

While I was building this website, I struggled with two main things: the home and about page content, I wasn’t sure what the content should be because these two pages are very critical and will either keep your audience on the website or not.

While working on this website I learned that a website is not only about design but about understanding your audience who will use it.

Why the Home Page Is a Game Changer?

Let’s start with the home page content first. Since this is my first time building a professional website, I didn’t know what a good home page would look like. So, I started searching online and observing which ones are keeping me on the website for a longer period of time. Here I learned that a home page should answer your audience’s questions rather than making them search for them.

The home page is a game changer; it’s either you are catching your audience and keeping them on your website, or they are gone forever.

A good home page should include the following:

• First, clearly state who your target audience is.

• Second, what is the main purpose of this website, and what your audience will learn?

• Third, why it matters to your audience, and what the value is?

These points shifted the way I think from my own perspective to my audience’s perspective.

The Challenge of Writing a Professional Bio

My other challenge was the about page, mainly how to write a professional bio.

According to Anthony Miyazaki, in order to write a professional bio, there are steps to follow. I will not mention all of them here, but I will share what stood out to me. I quote him here “Determine, and Know, your audience”. He also mentioned it again in another section of his article “Consider your target audience.”

Why Your Bio Is Not About You

I always thought that your bio is about you, your profession, your background, and that’s it. I hadn’t thought that while writing your bio you should consider your audience: what will attract their attention, what interests them, what will help them succeed, what they look for, how they receive the information, and how they react to it. This made me realize that bio is not about achievements, its about understanding my audience’s needs.

Your Website as a Communication tool

Writing my bio with my audience in mind resulted in a more valuable and purposeful message.

Your website is a communication tool; understanding your audiences will result in clear message delivered.