Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

This is my second post for feedback on SmallBizExcel.com.  I REALLY appreciated the feedback I received after my first post a couple of weeks ago and have made significant changes to my website since then.  After reading posts in a couple of other forums I decided to add a basic introduction to business principles page 10 Principles for Small Businesses from which I will link to calculations and lessons covering specific topics.  Target group is small business owners and those who are just getting started.

I appreciate feedback on the following:

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

Jeff Moore
http://www.smallbizexcel.com

Hi Jeff.. :-) This is really starting to look "clean and mean." What I`m seeing has more to do with content, and the....I dunno...."linear flow" of the site, if that`s even an expression.

I found myself getting hooked on various points (or topics), but as I moved through the site I also would get a bit distracted. It`s the "eyes glazed" factor, I think. I don`t know if you remember, but in your last posting I mentioned I also have an interest in doing something about Excel, so your site is particularly interesting to me.

In the Totally Nit-Picking Department, your tagline on the main page is in passive voice. I think you could make it more powerful by just rearranging a couple of words. Currently, it`s:
I`m thinking along the lines of:
I`d also like it if I could click your main banner/logo and go back to the home page, rather than having to click "Home."

Where the distraction came, I think, has to do with your specific pricing, and the concept of pricing in general. Reading the first three bullet points on the main page, I clicked the "Find Out Now" button thinking I`d find out how much it would cost me to use your site. :-)

What I`d rather see would be for each of those top three points to be a link to their own lesson. They`re really strong, catch my attention, and incite me to action---to click and do things.

But I also think you should have a more clear presentation of what I`d have to do and/or pay in order to use this site. It looks as if it`s a training site, and you know as well as I do, that all over the Web are sites that get you started, then ask for money. I don`t want to settle in to learn something, then have to come up with money as a "surprise," in order to finish the lesson.

Of all the problems I`ve encountered in developing my own thing about Excel, organizing the information has been the hardest. I have an "almost sort-kinda" vision of how to do this, but it`s still not where I`d like it to be. The problem is the complexity of the tool, in addition to the concepts of numbers, then the complexity of each particular example.

That`s where I see a bit of a problem in something like "Vixed and Variable Cost Part 1." Small business owners usually don`t start with the corporate, formal "jargon" terms. They start with your subheading, "Or...What`s the Real Cost to sell my Thing."

Then you have a link to "please read this other thing first, instead of starting here."

Do you see how that`s a bit distracting? I go somewhere, expecting to get started right away, then I end up having to do this other thing first, then some other thing before that.

The best suggestion I ever got, back when I was learning how to make databases (really simple ones), was to put each "thing" on a piece of paper and lay it on the floor. Then literally walk through each step, reading each paper. When something didn`t make sense, I could move the paper. Then I could stack them all and start building. I`m thinking something like this might be useful on your site.

You might change it from "Ernie`s Story," to "An Example Small Business---Ernie`s Electrical Gizmo."

Remember, headings really stand out and attract attention, particularly on the web. Try to have them convey as much compressed information as possible.

All in all, the site loads well, reads pretty well, and isn`t too large or too small in terms of fonts and images. Technically, it`s working fine. So my focus has been the "what`s it saying" side of things. :-)

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

Jeff Moore
http://www.smallbizexcel.com
jeff@smallbizexcel.com

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

Jeff Moore
http://www.smallbizexcel.com

I`m glad the suggestions help. As I pondered Excel, I began to see that unlike any other application, a spreadsheet is actually a group of entirely different applications, all rolled in to one "thing."

What I came to see is that a spreadsheet has to explain the whole idea of "grids," for example. Anyone using a spreadsheet forgets just what went in to learning the idea of cell addresses, not to mention relative and absolute.

Then there are the differences between arithmetic and mathematics, and how those differ from logic and Boolean logic. Additionally, there`s a whole concept of negative and positive numbers.

I think part of your home-page content should bring to the front your initial idea (from the previous topic) that if you are a novice or beginner to spreadsheets, go to this other site. Make a bit more prominent that your site is for people who already understand spreadsheets on a general level.

Then you can rephrase financial lingo into regular-type people language. :-) As I went back of my own notes, I also remember that I decided to organize the book I`m working on along the lines of a Windows Help file. In other words, the whole advantage of an electronic book is the ability to jump around according to whatever is interesting or unknown.

If you do lay out your site in paper, on the floor, be sure to use a highlighter and Post-Its to make your link connections. It should be like Wikipedia, where each page has plenty of links to explain assumptions, new terms, definitions, and so forth. Some of the links will make pop-up definitions; other links will go to whole pages.

To that end, you`ll want a fast way to navigate back to main sections, and that would be along the left side of the site.