Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I`m currently looking for feedback on my site that relates to what I would call "Phase 1" of my website design. By that I mean I`ve completed the website to the extent that it is functional, but have not yet tackled the challenge of optimizing it for search engine results.

My customers are Realtors, which by and large are not the most tech savvy collection of people in the world. Many successful Realtors come from the "old school" and are having trouble keeping up with the technology learning curve. Because of this I set out to design a site that is as user friendly as possible. My strategy was "less is more" for my audience.

I will point out that I used a template with some flash and I`m aware that the imagery does not really convey "Real Estate/Virtual Tours/Photography". I would love to be able to change the imagery but my web designer (a family member) is not proficient in flash and thus far we`ve had to keep the images that came with the template. I`d like feedback on how big of a factor/detriment you think this is for the site. I will also mention that my family member who helps me with the site does all of the more complicated work with flash, databases & scripting type stuff and I do most of the simple html tweaks and design.

Another note, I also just recently changed the home page from displaying pricing to replacing that with a "Featured Tour" so that people can instantly see my work when visiting the site. I did so after reading the poll in this forum about whether or not to display pricing on your home page.

Also worth noting is that I`m currently only in the Phoenix Metropolitan area market so my traffic should all be local and when I do get around to search engine optimization I`ll be targeting Phoenix area Realtors searching for virtual tours.

I`m also interested in feedback if anyone views it on a mac as I have not tested it on a mac before because I don`t have access to one. I`ve tested it on IE & Firefox and all seems to be ok but please mention if you see any problems there either. I did happen once to see the site in IE on another pc that displayed the fonts much larger and overlapping which wasn`t the case for my pc at home in IE.

The website is http://www.onestoptours.com/

Thanks so much!

We need the site link!

Number one: I absolutely hate the music on every page load, and the auto-start of the sample movie.
Number two: Nowhere do you mention where you are located.

Your site is fairly easy to navigate and having been in the VT business myself a few years ago - good luck.

There is little text on your home page which is a key element of Search Engine Optimization.



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Steve Mann
Internet Videographer
MannMade Digital Video
My Email

It`s okay...I too would like an option to have no noise, but it`s not that bad. The example movie on the first page struck me as having a bit too much time between frames. I`ll agree, too, with Videography (Steve) that without any actual text on the pages, you won`t easily be found or indexed by the search engines.

I had no trouble finding the "service area," so I saw where you`re located that way, but it`d likely help to have something about your geographic area as a title or heading somewhere on the main page.

Main problem was that it took too long to view the tour. The other issue is the manual type of tour where you can click and drag on the screen to move the point of view around. I wonder if that`s a big seller? If so, it doesn`t seem to be one of your products.

Something else you might consider as a product line would be to write the "agent notes" that describe the house. I`m thinking a lot of agents don`t know how to write, or what to write, to help sell a house. Since you`re doing a tour for them, you might include the notes as an add-on value?

Overall, the site looks nice...it just doesn`t "sell" the product very well just yet. That`s a content issue, or if you do it elegantly, you might use one of those avatars and voice-overs....I can`t remember the company who does them.

A spider simulator shows this as your main page content:

"onestoptours com main page fail the browser should render some flash content not this virtual tours for the greater phoenix area phone 623 322 9824 email info onestoptours com ask about unlimited express tours for 25 month featured property 2944 n manor dr east mls 2945255 click to see full virtual tour slideshow size is larger in actual virtual tour 2008 one stop tours and imaging llc all rights reserved privacy policy"

That isn`t much for SEO. In fact, you basically have no SEO factors in place.



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M Hall
Website Critique Community
International Society of Curmudgeons

:)



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Bliz Lures Inshore & Offshore Tackle
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