First I have to say that my homepage is also not the best, but when I checked some homepages out there, I always find tiny things you should avoid doing it. Something I once learned is that a homepage is just the first page of your website and you shouldn’t use “homepage” if you talk about “website”, but for me it’s already so common that I don’t hesitate to use it wrong way.

1. Keep it simple: Don’t confuse visitors with too much information on the first page. Keep it simple and clean. The visitors want to say “Cool” and not “Oh my god”.
2. Make a good impression: The first page is like the visit card of you. If the visitors don’t like it, they will also not continue clicking on your homepage.
3. Easy navigation: Make a tree with all your pages and if you have a lot, use sub-trees in it. Make it as simple as possible for visitors to find what they are looking for.
4. Make it attractive: The visitors want to get something from your homepage. If you don’t put your know-how, links, software or text on it, nobody will visit it.
5. Easy fonts: Use simple and good-to-read fonts. Not more than 2 differents and don’t use red font on orange background.
6. Very important – Pictures: A digital picture has a size which is defined with pixels and a resolution. If you don’t know what I talk about, read my next post “Image handling”. 1600 x 1200 and 72dpi are the maximum for a picture on a website. If it’s not a picture from Angelina Jolie naked, use smaller size. 1024×768 for example. I use 800×600 and 72dpi as a JPG with quality 60%.
7. Under construction: Never write “Coming soon..”, “Under contstruction” or “will do it later”. Nobody believes you!
8. Multiple browser: Test your homepage with Firefox, IE, Chrome and Safari. Sometimes it’s looking awful on some browser and it can be fixed with just changing one row of code.
9. Check it properly: Click on every link on your homepage. Is it working like you want? Ask your friends to test every link and read every text.
10. Write a date: If you write a topic, always write a date. I hate homepages with content I don’t know their actuality.
11. No SPAM: Never write your email address on your homepage. If it’s necessary use “name (at) lastname.com”. Using a contact formular is better.
12. Stay legal: If you make a comercial homepage which you earn money, don’t steal pictures, videos or text.
13. Get know your visitors: Install Firestat to know who visit your homepage and know what they are looking for.
14. Be fast: As faster the homepage as better it is.
15. No sound: Don’t let play automatically sound, I hate that!
16. No frames: Don’t use frames, Google can’t find you with them.
17. Correct size: Make your homepage for 1024×768 windows.
18. Check other sites: A good example is probably my wedding homepage.

These rules are my opinion. Thank you.

This year’s Christmas evening was amazing. First we baked cupcakes, it was 3 am. To do everything by ourself was also a premiere for me. It was quite easy and the result looks amazing. If every xmas eve will be like this with my super wife, I’ll die as a very happy man. Thank you darling.

When I think back this year, I’m very happy that I’ve done everything right. It was a good idea that I went to Paris, but an even better decision to marry Yuko. Next year will be also a time with lot of changes. Private changes, looking for a bigger apartment for example. The rest I will keep you informed.

After a very nice sleep with my wife, we went first to my parents house to decorate the christmas tree and later we went back for the perfect christmas dinner. My wife did it and I just helped. She said “Thank you that you work hard the whole year!” Which Swiss girl would ever say this to their husband? She’s sooo cute! The chicken was sooo soft, it melted like butter on my tongue. The world best chicken I ever had. As side dish she made Italian ham with onions and Camembert cheese. Thank you darling, you are the best happened to me!