Know-How Exchange : Website Critique

Hi Brion,

hope you're having a great day. If you offer an additional benefit I've found that people will participate but only to the degree that they believe that your form is worth their time. Offer something of value as a give away. To the degree that your free gift to them (for the work they are going to do for you) is worth it you will receive a return rate. If the rate is high they probably appreciate what you have given them. If the return rate is low or they do not see the value of what you are giving away you may see no return rate at all. I hope you can imagine what I am trying to communicate. For example give away a free gift offer, pdf document or other download that your customer can truly appreciate with the completion of each survey. REMEMBER... our only real problem in life is our failure to be "MORE Creative" than we’ve ever been. If you “Invent” your opportunity YOU WILL most definitely create your future. I'm only an email away from you if you need my help Steve. Is there anything else I can do for you?

Your Servant,

Deremiah, *CPE (Customer Passion Evangelist)

*Caring Promotes Exuberance

PS
include a link to the form and I'll share with you why some may not value the form. Thanks!

Hi, brion,

I didn't know it was a survey. Looks more like you are trying to hire someone. And I'll tell you that it's OK to try to hire someone, especially if it's your main goal and it looks like it's a main goal of your website. It's OK to hire, in the end you are offering someone the lifestyle they deserve and probably were looking for for a long time.

Regarding the website:

You did pretty good job, and with little changes you will make the website looking really professional and appealing.

Graphics

1. I would suggest changing colors. Now its color palette is like dusty green, dark brown and grayish blue, which are not really colors of a happy lifestyle. I would suggest light, clear palette with some matching bright accents, picked from warm palette - orange, red, yellowish green. If you want to use darker accents, go for dark bold green. And an ocean picture on the index page looks a little washed away. Bring some life in it! Black header really neither goes along with the contents nor with the whole website.

2. The menu looks a little funny to me, I mean that "our story" looks brighter than the other headers.

3. Font choice is good. Although you have some vertical padding issues here and there. You need a good graphic balance. For example, you have to make sure that distance between a picture and a header under it is not bigger than distance between header and text under it. Or vertical margin is the same size as horizontal margin. You also need to avoid using graphics for text. If you want to put text in another color, use style classes, you are using a style sheet anyway (and this is good!), now picture text looks blurry and even dirty. Besides, the text on a maroon background is not aligned the same way as text in a main paragraph, it looks bad. You may only put text as graphics if you are using some artistic fonts which you are not sure are installed on every PC. Tahoma and Verdana are system fonts, everyone has it. Another bad thing is to put text over a human face. Also watch white text on white background like that white shirt on an index. (looks like a doctor's coat, actually, you may want to replace it with some vibrant color shirt ;)

4. You have little issues in formatting. Some white bars between graphics are different width, some bad aligning of blocks (the top edges are not on the same line), there are also some artifacts. mystory.php is missing footer, on workfromhome.php you may see that some white stripe it covering an edge of text block on the right.

Coding

Main and major mistake is not to use keywords and description meta tags. You need to work on your title as well. These are all things you have to do in order to make your website well searchable by search engines. I remember how adding good meta tags put a website I was improving on the 6th (!!!) place in Google for a specific keywords within a week.

Marketing

Folks will probably tell you a lot about your "product placement" and other marketing stuff you need to correct on the website. I will point at some things which I was confused about

1. You need to make sure whom you are talking about. "We searched long and hard for a business that could give me what we were hoping for" is not really a proper way to say it. If it's two of you, say WE everywhere.

2. You really are not very specific, what it is all about. Lifestyle coaching? What the heck does it mean? Your website has to deliver precise information and answer several questions your visitor will ask himself. I will offer mine, but I am not a sacred cow, so, you will create your list. Here is mine:

1. OK, what is it? Is it for me?
2. Where is the proof (your personal example)?
3. And how you personally are making it happen? (the idea briefly)
4. How can I make it happen?
5. OK, sign me up.

You have most of the information on your website, but it is lacking some specifics, as well as is not well organized. It also seems like you know some secret. but not going to share it with us. And why are you asking me to fill out the form? What am I gonna get from filling it? You need your visitors be sure why they are filling it. Otherwise no one will. Your words "fill it out so we know more about you" are not convincing. What if your personal business is to collect our info and then sell it? You didn't give me your mailing address or phone number, shy would I tell you something about me? (That's like possible thoughts in your visitor's head)

So, make it clear in wording and in graphics, and

Good luck!

Natasha Chernyavskaya.

Some ideas/suggestions for the form that you can easily apply to shave a few points off your abandonment...

1. right hand column - remove the link "click here for info". Keep the page focused on the form and don't distract the user. You want them to fill in the form so refrain from offering other options.

2. Clearly state in the first block of copy that is only takes "5 minutes" or something... even in a large graphic.

3. I'd recommend removing the first three tick-box questions... everyone will click them. I know you are trying to set a certain tone, so add this to the intro copy... "if you are hard working and looking for a positive change, take the 5 minutes required to complete this questionaire".

4. There are a lot of ways to do this, but somehow you need to create more white space and a relaxed feeling to the form. Make it easier for the eye to follow. Try making the questions fit on one line with the drop downs directly below the question.

Possible solution:

Group the form into three sections with a chunk of white space between each section.

Example: Step 1: Introduce Yourself

Step 2: Tell us about yourself

etc, etc...

The "choose one" drop downs are a good idea, it's much easier for a user to select pre-defined answers then type something, so you are on the right track. Have them all like that.

Overall -- have your designer find a more suitable layout that makes it legible and relaxing.

If it was me... I'd go a step further and add some spice to it. Sex it up with a little color, graphics (purposeful), and some improvements to the copy. It's supposed to be exciting making the decision to work for yourself.

Instead of "submit"... why not "Get Started on Your New Life" (or whatever -- I am a designer not a copy writer!)

Hope this helped.