The latest Google Webmaster Central video from Matt Cutts talks about home page content. Given issues like content depth and site speed, which Google has brought up a great deal in recent memory, the content on your home page is worth considering with regard to these things as well.
The question from a user, which Matt addresses is: “More or less content on a homepage?”
“You can have too much,” says Cutts. “So I wouldn’t have a homepage that has 20MB. You know, that takes a long time to download, and users who are on a dial-up or a modem, a slow connection, they’ll get angry at you.”
“But in general, if you have more content on a home page, there’s more text for Googlebot to find, so rather than just pictures, for example, if you have pictures plus captions – a little bit of textual information can really go a long way,” he continues.
“If you look at my blog, I’ve had anywhere from 5 to 10 posts on my main page at any given time, so I tend to veer towards a little more content when possible,” he adds.
You can see Matt’s blog here, if you want a better idea of how he does it.