There is a question on Quora : Why doesn't Quora show interesting questions/answers on their landing page? Why is it this?
not this?
Quora's product manage gives his answer to this question, it's agreed by many users in this community. Here is his answer:
The logged out homepage is pretty sparse now mostly because it hasn't been given much treatment since the initial product launch. But we have plans on redesigning it and testing different variations (some with less info on the page, some with more).
The goal of the homepage though is to drive the highest volume of signups. Typically what I've seen in the past though is that less on the homepage means more signups simply because users have fewer objects on the page that distract them from the primary action i.e. signup.
The natural tendency when designing a logged out homepage is to want to demonstrate the value of the product to convince the user that it is worth signing up. Somewhat counterintuitively though the best way you can convince the user that it is worth signing up is, well, to get them to signup and then give them a great first experience on the product and clearly demonstrate why it is valuable. Giving a user their "aha!" moment is very difficult to do on a logged out homepage because you don't have much information about them, therefore you can't personalize the product specifically to them and give them the optimal product experience.
For example, if there was a search box on the logged out homepage users could search for content. But when a user is logged in and uses the search box we can then tap into a suite of data services to personalize and improve the search results and increase the likelihood that they find what they're looking for. In many ways it is equivalent to being logged in or logged out of an e-commerce site. Amazon can give you better product recommendations when you're a registered, logged in user vs when you're a somewhat anonymous guest_id.
So it's part philosophy and part science. We'll test various components of the homepage to see what drives the most signups and we'll stick to that path because we believe we can offer the best experience to users who are logged in.
To see an example of this check out the progression of Twitter's logged out homepage over the last couple of years:
~2-3 years ago: it has EVERYTHING on it. Search box, popular accounts, top tweets, a video... and then finally a signup button.
~1-2 years ago: less on the page but still has a search box, a row of avatars for popular accounts, and then a more prominent signup form
Current version: A picture (that's non-clickable), a value statement, and then signup or login. Sends a clear message. Also increases signup rate substantially.
There are plenty of people who disagree with this approach. They think it is shortsighted and a poor user experience. Frankly, they don't know what they are talking about. Getting a user to register is the shortest path to showing them the value of the product especially if you've built a tremendous new user onboarding experience.
What you see on the logged out homepage right now isn't what you'll see in the future. I promise we'll make it better while keeping it simple and focused.
-- Andy Johns, Product Manager at Quora
Conclusion
1. Landing page is widely used, the optimization method of landing page is different for diferent products which have different focus
2. From operational perspective, landing page comes with mission, it should bring up the conversion rate, including registration conversion rate, subscription conversion rate and traffic conversion rate.
3. Strengthen on the importance, don't put all information on one page, it cannot bear it.
4. Simplicity, simplicity and still simplicity.
You can also refer one article about landing page optimization :101 Landing Page Optimization Tips
Source : http://www.eovon.com/3805
