To put what Scrowler said another way, splash pages on any website are seen as a waste of time and can in fact cause you to fail to get accurate placement in search engines. Inherently there is no reason for them except to fill space and to look nice (unless it is a temporary fix to put something up there while you build the actual website).
As for the design, I keep saying this, but the text is the central and most important point of a design. The text looks like it was an afterthought here. It looks like you spent considerable time on the design (which looks good) and then slapped the first font you came to on there and added a slight bevel that doesn't match the rest of the design. The text should and can stand out, but not because it looks like it doesn't belong (although done correctly, that can be pretty effective too).
If you revisit the text please post the design here again, we'd love to see it (just not as a splash page

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