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Novice needs feedback
Old 03-06-2008, 12:39 PM Novice needs feedback
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Name: carl
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Hi

I do not cliam to be a professional web designer, I have done my own site in frontpage (please dont slam me for it) I do know basic HTML and have learnt a little Java (only a little, enough to get by) I would be grateful for any constructive comments on my site http://www.bakerfinancial.co.uk

I have struggled with the doctype (it currently doesn't have one!)
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Old 03-06-2008, 01:03 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Hi bakerc, I think you chose a great color scheme for your website. I would bring some more of that orange into play by accenting a few of the different parts of the page (though don't go overboard).

The links across the top of your page don't stand out as well as they could. I would suggest using a horizontal menu bar behind them, probably the orange or maybe even a lighter green, like a mint.

I would highly recommend getting someone to proofread your text. The links on the left have inconsistent capitalization (starting off with uppercase usually appears more professional, but not always). There are also a few other typos throughout. Hasty copy can be a huge turnoff, especially for sites dealing with money.

I love the fact that you have a form right on the front page. It's simple and easy, but you will have an even higher conversion rate if you use a custom image button, something that stands out from the background (probably the orange). If you don't know how to do this, try looking here: http://www.htmlcodetutorial.com/form...YPE_IMAGE.html. Also, if you can, shorten the form by removing any fields that really aren't necessary for a quick quote. You want to have your button (which is your call to action) above the fold (which is the area of the page first visible without scrolling down). You'd be surprised at the number of people that won't scroll down.

As for just a few other layout tips, the whitespace beneath your phone number might be a little too large. I'd suggest moving the green outlined box (to the right of the whitespace) there and stretching it out to fit in that area. Also, the links below the green outlined box should be separate links, not one big link. And finally, the gray lines on either side of your page are good, but they should extend around the top and bottom to form a box because it looks just a little funny the way it is now.

Hope this helps you...you have a great start, you just need a little fine tuning and you should be doing good. Good luck.
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Old 03-06-2008, 01:28 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Sorry, I had just one more suggestion that I forgot to write. Try swapping your bullet points and house picture with the big block of text above it. They should be the first thing your visitors see. The bullets provide quick info for the casual browser and if they want to read more in-depth, they can look below.
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Old 03-06-2008, 02:04 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Thanks VirtuosiMedia for the positive feedback.

I will look at changing the button at the bottom of the form (back to learning!!)

I use IE7 and thought the button was above the fold space, it probably depends on google toolbar etc which I dont use, will see if I can raise it up (will also check in mozilla etc),

I used all lower caps intentionally but can see how this could put some people off, I will change them to normal caps. I am unsure how to alter the links accross the top, Frontpage navigation link wont do it as they will only allow a certain number of letters and custom link bars slow the download time.

Please could you explain further on what you mean by one big link??

Thanks for the reply I appreciate it, more needed...
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Old 03-06-2008, 02:05 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Good point about the bullet points, I agree.
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Old 03-06-2008, 02:44 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bakerc View Post
Please could you explain further on what you mean by one big link??
No problem. Under your your green outlined box on the right hand side, you have the following code:
Code:
<a href="bad_credit_mortgage.htm"><span style="text-decoration: none"><font color="#666666">Bad Credit mortgage | Adverse Credit Mortgage | Bad Credit Remortgage Repossession Order | Debt Management Debt Consolidation | Credit Repair&nbsp;&nbsp; </font></span></a>
Instead of making all of that one link, you should make each of them separate links, even if they go to the same place (although, you might want to consider carefully if that's really what you want to do). If you really want to have all of those words pointing to the same page, you might try using an image rather than links.

As another suggestion, when I looked at your code, I saw that you weren't using a CSS stylesheet. If you're not familiar with CSS but are willing to learn, I would highly highly recommend learning it. It can be a little tricky to learn at first, but the benefits are almost incalculable. What it does is offer you the ability to control how all the pages on your site looks from a single file. So, for instance, if you wanted to change the color from green to blue sometime in the future, you would only edit the CSS stylesheet and not every single page on your site. The changes you make would then affect every page that uses that stylesheet. Another bonus is that it drastically cuts down on the amount of code you have to use so that you won't have to position everything using all of those tables.
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Old 03-06-2008, 02:51 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Thanks VirtuosiMedia

I must admit, that link is a mistake (oops!) it shouldn't be there but, as you say at the moment when I change one thing I have to do each page manually, I have had a quick look on the net for CSS info, could you recomend a decent learning zone for this (I have never used them before), would they be usable with Frontpage 03?
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Old 03-06-2008, 03:18 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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I have a few links I can share, though you also might think about getting a book too (your library should have one if you don't want to buy).

Learning CSS (Basics)
http://www.htmlcodetutorial.com/css/css.html
http://www.w3schools.com/css/css_intro.asp
http://www.tizag.com/cssT/

Advanced CSS
http://www.alistapart.com/topics/code/css/
http://www.peachpit.com/topics/topic.aspx?st=66632

CSS Demonstration (shows the power of CSS if you click on the different links)
http://www.csszengarden.com/

Hope that helps.
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Old 03-06-2008, 03:22 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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Oh, and to answer your question about Frontpage 03, you can use CSS with it.
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Old 03-06-2008, 03:43 PM Re: Novice needs feedback
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I have corrected the caps that you mentioned and moved the bullet points up.

I will have to do some reading about the submit image button and the links across the top.

Thanks for the links and comments, they are appreciated.
Please post some more comments, the more critics I get the better...
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