Vancouver Twestival FREE TICKET!

{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Davis Neable 02.11.09 at 1:02 pm

Adam,

Here are a few suggestions even without the lure of the ticket:
1. Search is way too far down on the site; it’s a hot, go-to place for users, so make it closer to the top!
2. If the purpose of the site is to sell your services, the current layout requires users to scroll to find the “What I can help with” section. Users take 0.4 seconds to decide if they want to hang out on a site, and that doesn’t leave much room to scroll. Move it up!
3. There’s a ton happening on the home page; not sure where to look first. Consider polling some customers to find out what’s the most important information they are looking for, and include only that on the home page. The rest of the fun stuff you can put on the other tabs/pages.

Good luck!

2 Adam Killam 02.11.09 at 1:19 pm

Davis,

Thank you very much for the feedback. I agree with each point and will be implementing your suggestions as I work on the site over the next week or so. It’s great to add social media buttons, blogrolls etc but if it defeats the point of communicating the site’s main message then it needs to go.

My first course of action will be to test moving the blog to a secondary page and beefing up the placement of “What I can help with” and re-writing it.

Thanks again.

Adam

3 rob 02.11.09 at 1:22 pm

Your site has a real “newspaper” feel. It’s simple and clean but I like a little more magazine feel (without the advertising of course!)

I wouldn’t do too much with flash as your website is not very iPhone friendly. (although I hear Apple is addressing the flash thing)

Imbedded Twitter updates can sometimes cause a page to not load or load very slowly. Watch out for this.

Hope that helps. It sounds like in your business you already know how to make your site get more hits so I guess you just have to keep them there, or at least want to come back.

4 Cynthia Perla 02.11.09 at 3:24 pm

Hey Adam,

I just RT-ed your contest on Twitter, even though it would make me sad if someone else on my Twitter list was picked instead of me. But I had to spread the word anyway

Aside from what Davis has already suggested, here are my three:

1. Catchy banner with your name and how you can help
That’s the one thing that I look at when I land on a page. A nice header with the name and what the person does, or what their site is about. “Helping companies generate MORE TRAFFIC, MORE LEADS, & MORE SALES!” should NOT be in grey. It’s the one thing that should stand out against everything on the site because that’s your value add.

2. Prominent headings to make scanning easier
It’s hard to scan your site because everything is in text, and they all look equally important. If you made the headings like Recent Posts bigger and bolder, it’s easier to scan and see which section I, or the visitor, wants to read further. Without any prominent headings, it forces visitors to read a bit of everything, instead of finding what they want to look for. As Davis already suggested, you should move your search bar up to the top.

3. Merge “what I can help you with” blurb with your picture
Perhaps you can minimize your picture by a half, and move the “what I can help you with” part immediately below it. So the first thing a visitor would scan is 1) your header 2) your picture and what you do 3) other headings they are interested in.

Good that you’re also planning on moving the blog to a secondary page. That would also make things clearer.

Good luck with your redesign. Let me know if you need anymore feedback.

– Cynthia
@cynthiaperla

PS – I would love to go to the Twestival tomorrow!

5 Andy 02.11.09 at 3:29 pm

Not sure I could make the Twitter event (and new to Twitter) but might need an Internet Marketing expert at some point, so he’s a few thoughts.

I agree with Davis’ comments.

I would suggest keeping the blog on the home/landing page but decreasing the number of entries that show up at once. Also shortening the text into catchy teasers that makes the user click through to the complete articles.

Choose either the Twitter logo box or the Twitter updates column, not both.

It’s a very good site though. Well-chosen theme. Looks active and informative.

6 Adam Killam 02.11.09 at 8:52 pm

Thank you for the great ideas everyone! I will be implementing many of them in the next week or two.

The winner of today’s mini contest is Cynthia! Congrats!

Adam

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