Home pages are supposed to be a general overview of the service, meaning that there’s not much room for long copy anywhere on the page. The longest blocks of text only reach around one paragraph in length, with most text being in the form of a recurring pattern of heading, blurb, call to action.
Because you’ve got little to work with, the diction of the home page should maximize effect in minimal space. Most of the section headings use powerful verbs to emphasize the use to consumers while leaving out any more specific information that is usually placed behind a read more link, or in fine print.
There is a casual tone, with a consumer focused voice, servicing the idea that the company is approachable, especially to customers disillusioned with traditional banking, as well as the idea that consumers will be empowered by the company’s services.
Only the essentials are included, which is an important consideration for home page design in any industry, as too much information only serves to pull customers out of the cohesive experience a home page should aim for, overwhelming or confusing them [10].
The choice of words and paragraph structure serves our purpose of building brand confidence and maintaining audience attention, alongside other strategies we'll explore in the sections to come.
All brand assets of Stripe, Chime, Square, PayPal, Cash App, and Adyen are cited on this page and within a separate downloadable document. Each asset was acquired either through a Creative Commons license or via press kits, allowing permission for editorial/educational noncommercial use. The entire site was created without template, in Webflow, and exists as a visual representation of the patterns identified and analyzed in the aforementioned companies' desktop home pages.
Home is a genre analysis, not a financial technology company.
1
Stripe | Financial Infrastructure to Grow Your Revenue. Stripe, n.d., https://stripe.com/.
2
Chime - Banking with No Monthly Fees. Fee-Free Overdraft. Build Credit. Chime, n.d., https://www.chime.com/.
3
Power Your Entire Business | Square, Square, n.d., https://squareup.com/us/en.
4
Pay, Send and Save Money with PayPal | PayPal US. PayPal, n.d., https://www.paypal.com/us/home.
5
Cash App - Do More with Your Money. Cash App, n.d., https://cash.app/.
6
Engineered for Ambition - Adyen. Adyen, n.d., https://www.adyen.com/.
7
Geissler, Gary & Zinkhan, George & Watson, Richard. (2001). Web Home Page Complexity and Communication Effectiveness. J. AIS. 2. 0-. 10.17705/1jais.00014.
8
Sutcliffe, A., & Namoun, A. (2012). Predicting user attention in complex web pages. Behaviour & Information Technology, 31(7), 679–695. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929X.2012.692101
9
Doty, P. (1997). Selling the Home Page: An Essay on the World Wide Web and Rhetoric. Internet Reference Services Quarterly, 1(3), 99–105. https://doi.org/10.1300/J136v01n03_12
10
Geissler, G. L., Zinkhan, G. M., & Watson, R. T. (2006). The Influence of Home Page Complexity on Consumer Attention, Attitudes, and Purchase Intent. Journal of Advertising, 35(2), 69–80. https://doi.org/10.1080/00913367.2006.10639232
11
Singh, S. N., Dalal, N., & Spears, N. (2005). Understanding Web home page perception. European Journal of Information Systems, 14(3), 288–302. https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.ejis.3000525
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