I know you really want that home page slider. But why?
It goes without saying that organizations are really excited about all the things that have to offer their consumers. Aha they said, now that the web is around, instead of having to pick what people see at first, we can say it all at once!
If you have a home page slider, it might be a symptom of not knowing what you want to say to which audience.
But is it perhaps only a 50% terrible idea?
If you don't know what you want to say, what better medium than the web to test out your idea? (See: your idea is probably bad, why not test it).
Enter: measurements and analytics. If your home page slider has 6 slides and 6 messages, have you been able to use the web as a way to figure out which ones are working and which ones are not?
I recommend instead to test individual hero images and messages one at a time and measure them. Run the "smiling student" with the message for 20-year-olds for a week and measure how it does. Then switch it to the "parents of the smiling student" message for a week and see how that one does. Even better, set up a test to show one or the other.
Testing is how you figure out what works. You should assume you won't get it right the first time. Through iteration after iteration your message and understanding of what engages your consumers will improve.
Will I need a web developer to do this?
The ideas here can be accomplished mostly with Google Analytics and a little elbow grease. To do the A/B testing (50% see one message, 50% see the other message) you can use a tool like optimize.ly. You create messages and optimize.ly gives you javascript to put on your site. Google has a similar service but it's harder to use.
Here at Caxy, we're experts in web development. If you're looking for support through your next development project, contact us. We're happy to help.
