A member shared that they’d like to see Makes on the home page. What else would you like to have featured?
One way to increase interest and return visits is to have a “Maker of the Month” posting. This encourages users to do more than just download models. If you get the user/visitor engaged, they will come back and stay. By promoting your top users, you foster an atmosphere of involvement that results in more visitors and increased ad revenues. They will also post back-links to this site from other sites they post to. All of this increases traffic to your site and your revenues. It’s all about traffic and ads. The more people that visit your site, the more your ad space is worth and it also significantly increases the intellectual value of your product (the site). You can get away with charging for ad free premium service, memberships etc. but never charge for downloading models. Keep what makes your site popular free.
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Nice idea.
@rees @luis_cordoba Let’s feature a Maker of the Month on the homepage.
What do you think of “Monday Makes” campaigns to encourage people to share a picture of their weekend prints?
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If you do that you should have some reason for people to want to post makes that day… Say you randomly select someone who posted a make to win a month of premium on Thingiverse (if you implement that feature) or something of that sort.
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That’s a good idea, let’s do it and introduce rewards
I agree with this — the homepage design really plays a huge role, especially on a platform like Thingiverse where there are millions of designs to explore. If the layout isn’t clear or intuitive, it becomes hard to discover anything new, even if the content is great.
I think a good approach would be a mix of personalized recommendations + trending + well-organized categories, kind of like a “Discover” system. That would help both beginners and experienced users find useful models faster instead of just scrolling endlessly.
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Sounds good, let’s do it!
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Really interesting discussion about the homepage design! I think one of the biggest improvements would be better personalization—like showing trending models based on categories I actually follow instead of a generic feed. Also, improving load speed and reducing clutter would make a huge difference, especially for new users trying to explore designs.
Another idea could be highlighting creators more clearly—featured designers, top contributors, or even “new talent” sections could make the homepage feel more alive and community-driven.
By the way, if anyone here is into typography tools or creative resources alongside 3D work, I’ve been using this site: https://schriftenpro.de/ — it’s quite useful for generating and experimenting with fonts.
Curious to hear what others think—should the homepage focus more on discovery or personalization?
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