Website Review and Suggestions

**Tokbearing** · 07-28-2009, 06:34 AM

Hi all,

Please review my bearing sites.

Let us know about my site design and weight of on page optimization?

My site is Bearing Manufacturers

Thanks

**TWD** · 07-28-2009, 08:14 AM

I think it looks great.
Definately very professional looking.

A few things you can do to make it even better.

1) Get a favicon
2) On the main menu you have the drop down menus but the main menu items
dont change color or react in any way. Its kind of a convention on the web that menu items give some kind of rollover reaction.
3) Its also a convention that the logo has a clickable link back to the home page.
4) A bit too much white space on the larger screen resolutions. You might ask your webmaster to introduce a background gradient or something to frame your main content.
5) There is no validation on the contact form. You risk missing out on valuable details such as if a visitor inputs an invalid email address.
6) The product images on the main page should be clickable.
7) Needs a bit of space at the bottom of the page so its not flush with the bottom.
8) Fonts are a very small. You should increase them by about 20% at least.
9) Looks like you dont have Google Analytics. Why? Dont you want to know who is visiting your site?
10) A few social media icons. (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter) would be handy.

**MDwebdev85** · 07-28-2009, 08:30 AM

Looks great, very professional. I agree with some of the things mentioned about, Also, you may want to turn the borders off on your menu buttons. that just my preference though.

**TripleMoons** · 07-28-2009, 09:36 AM

I like the use of colors. The blue grey with the deep red is very attractive to me. I also think the type is too small and their is way too much white space. White space can be a good thing, but it also can be done inappropriately.

I would suggest reprogramming the site appropriately using XHTML and CSS (tables are a no-no) and after doing that, validating.

**golden14** · 07-28-2009, 10:24 AM

Very clean looking site - TWD has made all of the comments I would. So other than say "It's a nice clean looking site" I'd just make the changes TWD suggests.
Cheers
Dickie Boy

**TWD** · 07-28-2009, 11:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TripleMoons

I would suggest reprogramming the site appropriately using XHTML and CSS (tables are a no-no) and after doing that, validating.

Or HTML5...

(I'm getting out of here before LIR gets her gun out

!)

**TripleMoons** · 07-28-2009, 11:11 AM

I wouldn't suggest that. Get with the times.

**MDwebdev85** · 07-28-2009, 03:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TripleMoons

I like the use of colors. The blue grey with the deep red is very attractive to me. I also think the type is too small and their is way too much white space. White space can be a good thing, but it also can be done inappropriately.

I would suggest reprogramming the site appropriately using XHTML and CSS (tables are a no-no) and after doing that, validating.

Don't want to step on anyone's toes...but what is the issue with using tables? I don't see where using css is technically any better than using tables.... Just my feeling. I do agree with validating and coding appropriately.

**WebTraffic** · 07-28-2009, 04:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TWD

I think it looks great.
Definately very professional looking.

A few things you can do to make it even better.

1) Get a favicon
2) On the main menu you have the drop down menus but the main menu items
dont change color or react in any way. Its kind of a convention on the web that menu items give some kind of rollover reaction.
3) Its also a convention that the logo has a clickable link back to the home page.
4) A bit too much white space on the larger screen resolutions. You might ask your webmaster to introduce a background gradient or something to frame your main content.
5) There is no validation on the contact form. You risk missing out on valuable details such as if a visitor inputs an invalid email address.
6) The product images on the main page should be clickable.
7) Needs a bit of space at the bottom of the page so its not flush with the bottom.
8) Fonts are a very small. You should increase them by about 20% at least.
9) Looks like you dont have Google Analytics. Why? Dont you want to know who is visiting your site?
10) A few social media icons. (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter) would be handy.

I agree with all of this. The site looks great, but still a few things that could be done to it. Also, adding on to what TWD said, it may be easier for you to convert your pages to php and use an include('header.html'); and include('footer.html'); tags for each page just in case you ever have to edit the layout it will save you some time by not having to edit every single page (completely up to you).

One thing that stands out the most is that there is too much white space for higher resolutions. You may want to mess around with some darker background colors or putting in a background image.

Make the logo clickable back to the homepage, make the front page products clickable to the products... basically just repeating what TWD said.

A few minor adjustments and I think you have it

Hope this helps.

**TripleMoons** · 07-28-2009, 04:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MDwebdev85

Don't want to step on anyone's toes...but what is the issue with using tables? I don't see where using css is technically any better than using tables.... Just my feeling.

Tables weren't created to use for layout, but tabular data. It technically is incorrect use of code. It also creates an unnecessary amount of work to edit a website if you're using tables. I can edit a CSS website 10 x's as fast as one using tables.

I've always thought this article was neat: Why Tables for Layout is Stupid

Their are hundreds of articles describing why CSS is the correct way to do things. Google it.

**The-Pixel** · 07-28-2009, 04:39 PM

Neat website http://www.hotdesign.com/seybold/index.html I've never seen it before.

**MDwebdev85** · 07-28-2009, 04:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TripleMoons

Tables weren't created to use for layout, but tabular data. It technically is incorrect use of code. It also creates an unnecessary amount of work to edit a website if you're using tables. I can edit a CSS website 10 x's as fast as one using tables.

I've always thought this article was neat: Why Tables for Layout is Stupid

Their are hundreds of articles describing why CSS is the correct way to do things. Google it.

I absolutely agree with you, CSS is the "correct" way to do the site. However, the user may be more comfortable with using tables. Yes I know maybe that user should look into CSS or they don't know CSS well enough to convert the site over. I'm sure we could argue the differences on why use this or that all day long, but in the end, different people will code differently and use what works for them. There will always be the debate over tables & css, which is better or why use css if tables work etc etc.

I also browsed your two sites in your signature....you have some good work & projects up there.

**TripleMoons** · 07-28-2009, 05:01 PM

Their is no excuse for coding incorrectly. The information is available a Google search away. Laziness is the leading cause of it, imo. If Adobe, Macromedia and Microsoft hadn't developed the crap WYIWYG editors or the export to HTML functions, I think you wouldn't see as much as you do. If the user of the website doesn't know how to do things correctly or doesn't want to take the time to learn how to do it correctly, pay someone who knows what they're doing. Pretty simple, I think.

Thanks for the compliment.

**MDwebdev85** · 05:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TripleMoons

Their is no excuse for coding incorrectly. The information is available a Google search away. Laziness is the leading cause of it, imo. If Adobe, Macromedia and Microsoft hadn't developed the crap WYIWYG editors or the export to HTML functions, I think you wouldn't see as much as you do. If the user of the website doesn't know how to do things correctly or doesn't want to take the time to learn how to do it correctly, pay someone who knows what they're doing. Pretty simple, I think.

Thanks for the compliment.

NP, Totally agree with you there as well. Overall, other than the incorrect code the site does look pretty good. There are a few things that could change that were mentioned above. I will make sure that I NEVER EVER EVER EVER use tables on a site that I will list for review here lol. I also think, and by no means am I saying a template was used for this site, but when I first started in web design, I would play around with templates to familiarize myself back in the day. I think "a lot" not all, of the sites that have a table based layout were at some point a template. 99.9% of all templates I have seen, seem to be just psd's exported from PS.

**TripleMoons** · 07-28-2009, 05:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MDwebdev85

I also think, and by no means am I saying a template was used for this site, but when I first started in web design, I would play around with templates to familiarize myself back in the day. I think "a lot" not all, of the sites that have a table based layout were at some point a template. 99.9% of all templates I have seen, seem to be just pds exported from PS.

You're right. That's why you have to familiarize yourself with proper coding by doing the research. It is very discouraging that people that sell incorrectly coded templates to the unknowing. That's one of the reasons why places like this are so great...People can point you in the right direction.

**MDwebdev85** · 07-28-2009, 05:42 PM

Exactly....well don't want to hi-jack the users thread, so we'll leave it at that.

TokBearing - site looks pretty good.... work on your code some, not sure if your a coder or just happened to get the web site project. Good luck!

**WebTraffic** · 07-28-2009, 06:19 PM

Ha! Blame THAT on Photoshop allowing their images to be sliced and exported to HTML as one big table.

**TWD** · 07-28-2009, 07:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TripleMoons

I wouldn't suggest that. Get with the times.

Ummm...well actually HTML5 (notice I said five) is very much the cutting edge.

Its XHTML that will gradually look retro.

You might want to check this post:
http://www.webmaster-talk.com/html-f...ive-html5.html

Agree totally with you about tables and WYSIWYG editors by the way.
First piece of advice I would give to aspiring web designers is avoid both
like the plague.

I own a version of DreamWeaver but I only use it in coding view.

**Findurhost** · 07-29-2009, 01:48 AM

very professional.

**davemies** · 07-29-2009, 12:55 PM

very nice but text is too small AND resizing means it breaks out of its containers and the top white text overflows onto a white background...

logo looks a little ragged around the edges - check your anti-aliasing and try a less compressed jpeg