In this next installment of my "Startups, fix your X" series, I present another issue that has irked me for some time, but I have finally been bothered to write it down.

Dear Startups,
Please add a link to your main homepage from your blog's navigation links.

There, was that so hard? It seems so simple, yet so many companies leave their readers stranded on their blog with no way to figure out what the company actually does.

Here is an example of Flattr's Blog, which I was linked to from Hacker News:

I'm not just picking on Flattr, they are just the last in a long line of blogs that have done this.

What is flattr? I guess I should go to their homepage. Clicking on the giant "FlattrBlog" logo leads me to blog.flattr.net. Ok, well, that makes sense. So I guess I'll click "Home," and that should lead me to the homepage. Nope, just another link to blog.flattr.net. There is not one link in the header of Flattr's blog that takes me to their homepage.

I'm a reasonable person, I could very well deduce that the homepage is at flattr.net, but I'm lazy and just want to click my way there, not spend the time manually editing the URL in the address bar. I'm sure most people are the same way.

Your company's blog is usually your main PR outlet. It's how you get links spread across the web. Articles you write are how you get linked on news sites, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Once users are on your blog, they are one short click away from learning more about your company or product. How could you possibly waste that opportunity by not adding a simple link?

Further discussion on Hacker News.

— Fin.

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