Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

My business is just getting started and I was hoping for some feedback from all the helpful people here, give my site a look and please be honest!  Thanks

http://mysite.verizon.net/res8zut5/propertydocumentationserv ices

Kurt

Hi Kurt,

   I like it so far. It is a nice business niche that has a lot of possibilities if marketed right.  Who are your potential clients?  Your site should be geared towards them.  So if I was to guess it would be towards senior citizens with the bigger fonts and 10% discount offered.  Maybe you could include a Google mashup w/ hurricane data etc.  I think that you could get someone to create one for you fairly cheap.  Hope this helps.

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

God Bless, Tom www.YoParts.com

here are my thoughts, brutal and to the point.

• Home Page
• kill the pen strip background.it`s too hard on the eyes.
• shrink your title so it all fits on one line
• align your menu to the left and add some treatment to it bullet points, icons something to show it`s a menu
• put your email in your body content as a link. it gets lost in the footer
• shrink you image and find someone to animate it.
• Our Services
• don`t bullet point your text. just write more of it and make them into paragraphs
• kill the boxes and make your level 1 - 3 heading and write paragrphs about each level and then provide the highlights as bullet points.
• Create a menu across the top of the page for your level 1 -3 and then link them as anchor points in your html page (bookmarks)
• Kill the wording "List Price" makes you sounds like you`ll drop the price as soon as i say hello. have confidence in your pricing
• need contact links here. i like what i see but there is no easy way for me to buy.
• Contact Us.
• Give me a phone number, fax number, email and mailing address. If you have to get a free fax number from e-fax or some place like that.
• figure out a way to have a web form. some people hate to click on email links and prefer forms, while others love the email links
• Give me some text on this page. tell me what i can expect when i contact you, or what i should ask / provide you to get things started asap.
• About US
• Put About Us as  a heading at the top of this page before your first paragraph
• Kill the 2 column layout here, it looks too much like you forced a print document into the web

Good start...

Good points and thanks for taking a look.  It is a work in progress and is done on my free site provided by my internet service so the format is somewhat limited.  I would love to have more options but I will try and tweak what I have to make it better, thanks for the input.

 

Kurt

Kurt,

If you have $13-15 a month...sign onto Network Solutions and get your own domain and a more substantial web editing ability. Or anyone of the other million out there that cost pennies a month to run a site (just look at mine...it costs me $13 a month at the moment thru Network Solutions).

I agree with jonese...the columns are killing the flow of the pages...and the picture on the home page takes up the whole first page...so unless I scroll...I miss the text all-together. For your services...think about a filing system when you design something like this. Columns and boxes are okay...but when I open a filing drawer I have 1 file with a heading and in that file I have all this information. Then I have file 2 with a heading and all that information in it. What you have right now is three files laying open on a table....not good for finding information quickly!

Great first go though! You have a good niche...if I were in hurricane area I would be interested.

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

Leah Tucker

Kurt, congrats on getting this far and on seeking feedback.

I feel the Home page needs lots of work. This is the most important page in your site and it needs to catch people`s attention.

 I would recommend the following:

-Get rid of the striped background. It`s overpowering the entire page and making it harder to make out your message

- Reduce the size of the hurricane satellite image. It`s simply too big and you`re forcing people to scroll down to know what your business is all about. Remember: make it as easy as possible on your visitors because they are always a click away from leaving your site.

- Get rid of the sound effects. It`s neat, sure, but does nothing to get you closer to the sale. Also, what if someone is in a workplace environment and that noise comes, on? Not good.

- Get your own domain name and hosting account. Don`t use Verizon, get a simple domain name that your customers can easily remember and type in. Having your own domain also gives you added professionalism. Registering a domain is less than $10 per year and hosting less than $10/month. It`s a no-brainer.

- "Are You Ready for Hurrican Season" is not a good eneough headline. Instead use the headline to underscore the #1 reason people should hire you.

- Implement a "Call to action" you have to prompt your visitors to take action. I can`t overstate the importance of that. Ask them to sign up for something, a newsletter, a FREE consultation, for a FREE gift, anything that will catch the attention of your target market. Ask them to take the first step and get them that much closer to the sale.

Hope that helps!

-Danny



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

-Danny E-Synthesis: Marketing + Web Design Web Design and E-Marketing Services for Small Business

I really like the niche.  I really dislike the sound effects, however.  I had to turn down my speakers because I got tired of listening to it loop as I was reviewing your site. 

I would recommend either showing pictures of hurricane damage or the types of pictures that you will be taking for customers on the main page.  The pictures of CDs doesn`t help sell what you are offering.

On your "About Us" page, I would include how long you have been doing this type of work, if you have any experience.  I assume that you have actually contacted insurance companies to find out what type of documentation they need in the event of hurricane disaster, so include information about how you have consulted with insurance companies to determine the appropriate documentation.

There is a free program called NVu that you can use to create your web pages.  You can also find quite a few free web page templates on the internet.

Good luck.


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

Helping new computer users have a safe and fun internet experience. www.newbiesecurity.com

I vote to lose the striped background too, and make it a fade or something if not solid. I`m on Firefox, and heard nothing...no sound effects, so can`t comment.

Also, the menu items on the left are WAY too small in relation to the rest of the site.

I love that I can actually read the damn thing without it being a 10-pt font! Somehow, everyone thinks that having this tiny font is cool, or modern, or whatever other nonsense. Try reading a book written entirely in an 8-pt font, or 20 pages of Word text in the same small size. This site, I can read!

I`d like to see some statistical reference as to how many people don`t have this service, and how much it ends up costing them. Not something scarey, but just a point of factual information.

Overall, a nice site...but not yet a grabber :-) It`s better than many, though.