Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I`ve been in business for a little over a year.

I am a Virtual Assistant, providing administrative support to small business owners who are struggling to get it all done.

I came up with the color scheme and logo and worked with Kathy at Moxie Designs to build the shell.

From there, I have developed the content over the past year.

I`ve tweaked my site so many times that I have lost focus on the overall presentation.

I need your fresh perspective.

* Am I providing enough content, without being too brief?

* Do you like the overall presentation of the information?

I`m a huge advocate of being brief and to-the-point.

I want to effectively explain what I do, without too much blah, blah.

I appreciate your help.

ACUMEN VIRTUAL ASSISTANCE

Mia,

I don`t use a VA for my business, while I should, I have the bad habit of wanting to do everything myself. So, I have not looked into other VA websites and this is my first impression of the site.

The big "A" at the top left, and succeeding logo makes me feel like this is a larger-than-one-person business. It also made me stop for a second to figure out what the Large A was really representing. Why not keep the ac-u-men text above the circle, but replace the `A` with a Capital `VA`. If you do decide this, I would then enlarge the ac-u-men font to compensate. I understand your trying to brand the `acumen` while representing `Virtual Assistant`.

Minor technicality with the left side Testimonials. I would put quotes around the individual testimonials. Otherwise it briefly looks like your just putting fluff your business description. Good job with the random testimonial display though, that will make you look more established.

Your overall page layout and content seems good. Some functionality changes I would make are:

• Link at least one word/sentence in each page to another `most relevant` webpage. This helps the user go from one to another without thinking too much.
• For the FAQ page.
• Present each question title at the top in a short list, each linked to go to the part of the page with that question/answer.
• Fix your `What can a VA do for me?` answer. It`s so long I only read the first and last few sentences. I would try to & underline the key points you were trying to make in that essay. I like organization of information, and even though you split up the sentences nicely, it just looks way too long without any other Topic indicators.
• `impactful` is not a word according to MS and SuN, and the sentence sounds awkward. Try saying `Press about you and your business would be a powerful promotional tool for your website, etc.`
• Skip the personal first contact, and go straight to offering a `First Consultation Appointment Scheduler` where you can either use Google Calendar or another application to allow a user to setup an appointment that works for both your schedules and is confirmed by emailing them a message from your website.
• You could also later use this function for existing clients to setup lengthy meetings of say 30 minutes or longer.

I also noticed you`re using two domains for the same website. Be careful about pagerank transfer/link functionality. I`m assuming the change might have something to do with your spam problem? The easiest fix could be having a form on your contact page to only email to you, instead of offering a link (even `encrypted`) to your email. This relates to my suggestion of offering an appointment scheduler. This function might cost you a programmer/your time to make but it would definitely make you more professional.

In conclusion, your site appearance is fine. It`s unique, and not `too out there`. Content is fine, just be careful about writing about your own faults/failures (I read some of your blog). There`s a perfect balance between personal experience and professionalism.

Keep at it, your doing good. Good luck!

Regards



-------------------------

Colin Winter
Small Business Website Management and Marketing

Colin`s done an extensive review, wth a lot of great points. I`ll add my thoughts on the logo that you can lose the "VA" at the bottom of the circle. It unbalances the logo, and without the spell-out, serves no purpose. Since you have "Acumen Virtual Assistance" right there, the logo doesn`t need it. On business cards, your tagline or spelled name would also directly explain the company name.

I had a bit of a time reading the purple text on green background, although it does work in terms of colors. Perhaps a slightly lighter green to give the type more contrast, for those of us with dimming eyesight (and glowing scalps). :-)

On your home page, you say, "Let me manage your online presence." That tells me that you`re going to handle everything about my Web site--content, design, updates, and so forth. Then, reading the text, it seems you`re going to be more an administrative assistant.

Additionally, it sounds a bit pushy, in my opinion, to just say "let me manage." I dunno...could go either way, and I tend to opt for polite more often than not. So I`d have it read more like, "Let me help you manage your daily office work." Something like that, anyway. But it`s a personal judgement call.

I`m using FireFox 1.x, and tried clicking on your tabs for Services, FAQ, etc, and none of them worked, so I don`t know what they`re about. Oh....boy...I see you have major troubles!  I went to the same site in IE6, and it`s almost an entirely different site! The "blue" in your color scheme simply doesn`t exist in FF, and shows only in IE. Nor does your picture show at all in FireFox.

The picture and tabs work in IE, so it looks as if your site will simply not work on FireFox. Of course, it doesn`t have to work on FireFox, but you should consider that there are a lot of people who don`t use Internet Explorer.

Colin and Craig,

I emailed both of you privately but I wanted to publicly thank you for taking the time to seriously critique my website.

I cringed when I first read each of your points.

Why?

Well, because they`re things I didn`t see and the thought that my site is not making sense creates a sense of urgency.

Again, thank you, thank you!

You`re certainly welcome, but try not to cringe :-) A critique is just an outside view of something you`ve created, and exactly that---an opportunity to catch whatever it is that you didn`t, when you`re only on your own.