Mar
29
As you may have noticed, I have made some changes to site and e-newsletters. The changes were long overdue. One of my goal was to move from a traditional style-blog to a service-oriented website.
This blog was something I started long before I was an entrepreneur, with my own business. Its initial purpose was to share thoughts about online marketing. However, for over a year those thoughts have been a full-fledged business. A new site was needed to reflect that. It will still be a place to share many of those same marketing thoughts. I still have a lot to say and that will not stop.
What do you think?
I am the first to critique everyone’s website, now it’s my turn to take it. What do you think of my new design? Let me have.
Tags: landing pages, personal, site review« « Google AdWords Search Stories | Google +1 More Questions than Answers » »
April 5th, 2011 at 3:21 pm
Looks nice!! An clean! I love the big social media icons at the top
April 5th, 2011 at 3:25 pm
My immediate first impression:
would tweak the color combo
would remove the phone number from the header
Otherwise, it looks great. Nice use of white space; not too blingy.
Good luck!
April 5th, 2011 at 3:43 pm
Like the new design, here are my thoughts:
You’re branding the social networks more than yourself. Make your logo bigger and the others smaller. Also pop them in a new window so visitors don’t leave your site completely.
Maybe not using PPC Management say Paid Search Consulting or Management for those newbies and to re-enforce your bio that appears on the right side bar.
Add a little space white space below the bottom bar. Feels tight for me, everything else is spaced nice.
Not a bit fan of the word clouds they don’t help me decide to read further. Maybe a featured post bar that highlights your best posts.
Have you thought about using Disqus for comments? You can import your current comments and I seem to comment more often when someone is using that system.
Overall very nice, wish my site looked this good.
April 5th, 2011 at 4:56 pm
I never gave you my thoughts before, did I? So sorry. Here are some quick thoughts now.
I LOVE the new look. Fresh, clean, inviting. A big improvement over your previous design.
I’m not sure about your logo. What is it and what does it mean? I know sometimes logos are abstract (and that’s okay), I’m just not sure I get where you’re going with it. Maybe try something with your initials?
I agree with David on his points – the social icons are too large. They are bigger than your name. And, they take people AWAY from your site. That’s not what you want. Use the icons, but much smaller and NOT in the header.
I also agree that your target audience might not get what PPC is. David’s recommendations are great.
Agree on the word cloud. It makes the clean site feel cluttered and clunky. And, it’s not user friendly. Ditch it. I’d rather see something nicer in the footer – maybe your contact info? That would be a better place for your phone number than the navigation bar. It’s confusing that it’s there with your other navigational items. Besides, most people tend to look for addresses and phone numbers in the footer.
The scroll bar on the home page is nice. You might want to work on the copy a little bit. The Nashville Love one is a bit confusing. I’m not sure what that’s talking about or where that link takes me – blog posts about Nashville? I’m not sure why you would promote that.
On the speaking page, don’t make people leave comments to book you to speak. Link to your contact page. And, I think the bio on the contact page is a bit odd.
I’m not sure about the “About” page in the right sidebar. It gets lost there. I’d rather see it in the primary navigation at the top and have an entire page for it.
The fact that the “blog” link in the navigation just jumps you further down the page is a bit odd. If the home page IS the blog page, I would remove it from the navigation. Though, it might be better if the blog wasn’t the home page. But that’s just me.
The right side bar needs some cleaning up. I think the e-letter sign-up should be at the top. The twitter widget doesn’t look very nice. I’d look for a way to make that look nicer or ditch it. The share icons are great, but I don’t know if you need them on every page. I would just include them on the blog posts.
I like the idea of using your Twitter favorites for your testimonials (I do that too), but I would rather see them ON your website. You can see provide a link to that Twitter page, but I wouldn’t make that main navigational item take you to another site. You want to keep people on your site. I would rather see testimonials on your client page. Can you get testimonials from the logos you’ve got on that page? If so, you’ll knock it out of the park!
Overall, great work, John! I think your site is looking great!!!
April 5th, 2011 at 6:45 pm
Hello Everyone,
Thanks so much for the recommendations. I normally wouldn’t advocate “crowdsourcing” site design. However, since I have a whole series of site reviews it’s only fair that I open myself up to criticism.
Some of these changes I have implemented already. They seem so obvious now that you point them out. It goes to show you what another set of eyes can do, especially when you’ve been staring at something for days.
Like anything else, some changes I will go with, some I am passionate about not changing, and some I met half-way with the suggestions. I can guarantee that every suggestion was considered.
Many of the suggested changes will be rolled out over the next week.
-John
April 5th, 2011 at 7:25 pm
Not only am I new here but late too it seems. Here’s a few items I’ll add to the pile:
1. in your meta description, “advise” should be “advice” (spelling).
2. from an SEO perspective, PPC management may be the term you want to be found for. You know your space more than I do, but I have to wonder, is that what people are searching for?
3. with styles turned off, the site is doing exactly what you want it to do from an SEO perspective.
4. I’d get rid of or blank out the “home” tab. People know to click the logo to get back to “home” and the term only serves to confuse search engines about what you do (top-left placement is a pretty dominant place for a irrelevant noun).
5. Do NOT get rid of pointing out any channel people can use to contact you, including your phone number. But I would place these (email, phone, twitter, etc.) around copy where you offer your services. Hmmm… yeah, you need to bring the email and twitter out so people can see/click on them.
6. On your contact page, explain that completing the form will send you a private message. Just an assurance to those fearful of posting something public-facing.
7. I really like the mobile version of the site too. iwant
Joe
July 7th, 2011 at 12:05 pm
Nice, clean feel to the new site. Easy to navigate.
My only words of criticism are that you need real testimonials from your clients, that is what I was looking for when I hired you, John. Just running your Twitter feed is weak. You could run that alongside in a sidebar perhaps. But I really want to see “the meat” of what clients who have actually worked with you felt you delivered. That is what a testimonial is. I think it would serve you better and, if you get your clients to address different aspects of your services and your strengths, then you will show the diversity you bring to the table.
Rock on, man!
October 12th, 2011 at 5:12 pm
A couple of things, starting with the typography: I’d bump up the body size to 16 pixels.
I think having your phone number in the navigation is brilliant. If I’m looking at your site on my iPhone, I can just hit that and call you, right? Easy.
As for the “logo” in the title, I’d make it larger and track it in tighter. Helvetica Bold was made to be big and tight.
On the Speaking page, I’d move the photo of you speaking to the top, to serve as a visual hook so the first line of text won’t get lost like it does now. The last photo is hard to decipher.
I agree with Dave on the tag cloud and the space at the bottom (or lack thereof) and with Joanie about the testimonials.