The most precious resource on any web team is time. Just keeping the show on the road requires so much effort that spare time has to jealously guarded.

That's why it's so important to avoid the black holes of web.

Black holes are issues that mercilessly consume your time and destroy any hope of meaningful progress.

The best example is the website homepage.

Forever circling...

How many endless hours have you spent debating homepage updates? I bet you have sent hundreds of emails and hosted countless video calls defending homepage integrity against nonsensical requests.

Bad news. You've fallen into a black hole.

The truth is that the debate will never finish. The mad requests will never end. You can't escape. You just end up circling forever...

It pains me to admit it, but there are some things we just need to give up. Endless homepage defence is one of them.

The effort is simply not worth it.

90% of visitors never see the homepage

It's our little secret. As web professionals we know that homepages - although significant - are not the most important thing about a website.

For most large-scale sites I have worked on, +/-90% of visitors never even see the homepage! That's right. 90%.

These visitors start with a Google search which directs them deep into the site. The most important things for them are whether the content is:

• Easy to read and understand
• Whether they can navigate intelligently between pages, and
• Whether they can complete important tasks.

As such, I don't allow myself or my teams to get stuck in 'black hole' discussions anymore. We have so little time for site improvements, that we need to target it to get the best possible return.

And the homepage simply isn't a priority.

So, if a business team absolutely demands some ill-advised homepage update, I'll definitely push back but I definitely will *not* spend all my time defending it.

As the business team endlessly obsesses over the homepage, myself and my team can get on with more important stuff - content, UX, accessibility, etc.

Labels: Content Design, Content Strategy, UX, Web Governance, Website Management