After suggesting a one-page website to a potential client, the response was, “A one-page website? What can I possibly accomplish with that?” I explained that since there was only minimal content, it would be more beneficial than a multi-page website, “You will not be putting little drips and drabbles on several pages, making your visitors experience less than desirable.” Like many with a new business, they wanted to take a tri-fold brochure and turn it into a website.
Until recently, I hadn’t been completely sold on them either. That was until my client, Jim Bertrand of Bertrand Landscaping came to me and said he wanted all of his categories and images on his homepage. I believe my first comment was, “Why?”
“I was in Paris this summer looking for a restaurant and came across this site. Look all of you have to do is scroll up and you see everything you need. Aren’t websites supposed to be designed for mobile first nowadays?”
“Yes, when designing a website, I do think of mobile first. But, Jim you have five categories all with at least six images each. That’s thirty images loading on one page. I don’t recommend it. I can’t image how long it’s going to take for all of those images to completely load.”
“When I first meet with a new client, none of them have a laptop with them, they are on their phones or tablets. I need for them to see everything on my website as quickly as possible,” he said.
“Okay, we’ll give it a try.”
Much to my surprise when finished, it did load quickly, and I liked the look on both desktop, laptop and mobile.
This was an easy transition as each gallery had been built with the Essential Grid plugin. Once the different sections were set up on the homepage, all I had to do was input the shortcodes for the individual galleries. He wanted to keep the navigation menu, so instead of linking to the different pages, I changed the navigation to link to the different sections.
As far as content goes, on Jim’s multipage website there was only one section on his homepage that had any written content. His content is his images.
Yes, converting his multipage site to a one-page website was the right decision.
I’ve become a big fan of one-page designs and have converted several clients multipage websites into a single page. All of them are for very specific industries and have minimal content. The websites are:
Florida Notary a Mobile Notary Service
Is a one-page website right for you?
Let’s explore your needs and find out what will work best for you.
0 Comments