Hi. I just launched a new website for a local business. Looking for any advice to improve it. http://www.leedsconversions.com Any Tips would be appreciated.
Ok first I see the words conversions, and my neck starts tingling as those hackles rub against my collar for the marketing scam... That isn't there. NOTHING to do with SEO scamming, ponzi schemes or any of the dozen marketspeak BS I associate with the word conversions... It's about converting lofts. HARD word to work against with the SEOtards pretty well having crapped all over it -- just having that word present in the URL could prevent some people from even clicking the link. Alright, bad word choice aside... The semi-fixed/elastic layout really isn't all that useful -- it's too big for not just netbooks but many laptops, the elastic version on a large fonts/120dpi system doesn't even fit a 1920 wide display, and really it should be modified to handle being fluid or semi-fluid, possibly with media queries to make it 'responsive' adjusting the layout once the screen gets even smaller. MUCH of the problem is that menu, which has too many items on it to be a one line menu on a modern website WITHOUT responsive design helping it out. Color choices are kinda iffy. It's very bland.... but more than that there are legibiilty issues -- the dark grey on dark cyan for the 'contact us' link is illegible, the dark grey text in the light grey 'convert me' banner type area is right on the edge of legibility issues, and those headings with the stripes next to them? More than likely effectively invisible for half the population. NOT a big fan of lucida sans as to be frank, it's not "sans-serif" enough for display use and always feels short, fat and heavy. Apart from that on a design standpoint, it is clean, clear... not really that bad as such things go. UNDER THE HOOD however... It's your typical turdpress train wreck, I'm seeing the use of Cufon (making me ask "What is this, 2003?"), and the typical white-space stripping in a futile attempt to hide how poorly it's coded -- being the HTML 5 nonsense and bloat on the outside, but rotten to the core with HTML 3.2 practices on the inside ranging from tags like CENTER that have no business on any website written after 1997, to things like complete gibberish use of heading tags, extra div around perfectly good block level containers like UL for no reason, and the typical wordpress "I can haz classez?" practice of slapping multiple classes on everything JUST because they can. Which is how it ends up blowing 16.5k of plaintext on 2.8k of plaintext and two content images -- likely twice the markup ACTUALLY needed to do the job. Given what you had to work with -- not bad... I'd just try finding something better to work with.
It looks like a very fitting design for the service. It's straightforward, clean and exudes trustworthiness. The only thing that I'd change if I were you, would be the logo. There's nothing wrong with the current one, I just know you can make it look more sophisticated. It looks like you're a designer yourself, you can create a logo free of charge using this site: http://logotypemaker.com/logo-design (click on Show Free Logos on the right to see your options).
Hi Leeds Conversion, Overall, nice website with a clean and clear layout, which is something most people have come to expect now. The colours could possibly do with a little change as some viewers may struggle to see wordings, the font size may need an increase too as it is a very small font size. As with 'DeathShadows' comment, I completely agree with the wording of 'conversion' but the words 'Covert Me' at the top right are making me tingle! I would certainly change it to just 'Contact Us' or 'Free Quote Here' a massive Call-To-Action button means a reader will know straight away what to do if they need to get in touch with your Company. I would also advice having a footer on your website with your © Copyright information, and Terms & Conditions if you have any. Also any social network or sites you link to, the footer is a good place for this to be placed. Hope this helps! Regards, Charlie www.fullycreative.co.uk