Website Concept/Design Review

W3BSIT3.com

I have been co-developing this project for about a week. It looks like we are on the verge of launching after we tweak a few things and add more content.

Right now I am feeling pretty good about our concept. As far as I know there isn’t an existing comprehensive website appraisal service. So I think we have a healthy growing niche to work with.

As far as the design goes there are things I really like and a few things I’m not so sure about. Even this isn’t entirely compatible with IE I like the scroll over feature available to FF and other browser users. (scroll over the top right images) I also really like how we display and sort data on this page.
http://w3bsit3.com/list.php

The one thing I’m sure about is the header. I like the tabbed navigation but to me it looks a little plain. Then the logo and bg for the header are alright I guess. We don’t want to come off as a flashy gimmick site but something about this isn’t working for me.

Any ideas on things we can do to improve the design or features we can add to the site?

 

First off, you have a nice concept. I like the web 2.0 look. I don't know how detailed you want, but, since it's only an opinion......

Logo..... The gray backround doesnt match. I would stay away from the logo W3 considering it is like stealing the M for McDonalds...... the entire picture looks very compressed and digitalized (not clean)..... I would reconsider the logo entireley. Also, I would consider putting a tag for the logo so you instantly know what the site is....

Branding...... Cute use of the 3's for E's but I have to admit it took me a while.

Layout (homepage)..... Way too much white space on a 1280 size monitor. It almost looks like one of those websites from the mid-90's... That's not a crack (I understand why you did it)...... Maybe consider putting a label over the websites you want us to roll over so we know what they are. At the small size, they don't look like websites... People probably won't read all that text........ the tutorials link doesn't seem to work.......

Overall, the concept is better than the design at this point. The inside pages all look different from each other so there doesn't seem to be a unity or consistency. I would reconsider using the black for the Interview... It's hard to read text off of a black background, especially if you have vision problems.

Also, are you using a Content Management System. If you were, everything would be automated. At the moment, each page seems completely separate from the other. Check out the content management section of DP.....

I'm sorry if this review seems doom and gloom, but, I feel the site is not professional enough for the amount of money you want people to spend. If you notice, most of the web 2.0 looking sites don't have a profit making model, they are normally free sites. People who buy from sites are used to looking at Ebay and Amazon, etc.......

The concept of your site is great and I wish you luck.

 

I don’t think the review is doom and gloom at all. If we all sit around patting each other on the back we wouldn’t get anywhere. I have to agree with most of your points.

Our logo is compressed too much and does not properly convey that the 3’s are supposed to be E’s. The initial logo had different color 3’s. I’m thinking about running a contest to develop a more brandable image.

As for the layout I have tried to make everything cross browser and resolution compatible. I ended up compromising the width a little to accommodate for 800x600 res. I have added a faded bg to the content on the homepage to offset the white space a little. It does seem to help when viewing from a 1280 res.

Right now all our blog pages are black. I can see how this could create a few problems for the viewer so I do plan to style the font to make it a little more readable today but as of right now I think we are going to keep the black bg for the blog.

We have been discussing our monetization model for about a week now. I would personally prefer using a advertising model in order to make all our content freely viewable. Sean is of the mind that the time required to produce the sites content (4+ hours per day) would not be adequately offset by ads so he is in favor of hiding a portion of the premium content to non-subscribers. This would mean all appraisals on sites currently up for auction would be viewable to only the subscribers and everything else is viewable to everyone.
I think I have talked him into using an advertising model initially and if that doesn’t work we can switch over to a subscription model later.

The site is not actually a 2.0 site in the true sense of the word. Users will not be able to submit appraisals though we are developing a commenting system.

Anyway, thanks for your comment.

 

I think we have now addressed most of earlier problems. Any other ideas?

 

I like the concept, but I worry about one of a kind appraisals. That said I don't hate the idea. Not huge fan of sites that trail off.. Not sure about the domain, not sure you would get much worl of mouth on that, took me a bit to figure out what it meant, guess not too bad, website with 3's not e's...

Regardless good luck with it, sure there is room for the service...

 

i like your concept and the website very much. at this point in time I am not in a position to say much as I have not reviewed it properly but I thought I let you know that you have done a wonderful job.

 

Hi,

i quite like the site, i like the idea with the tabs and the logo. One problem i found is that the text "successful web investing + management" has part of the bottom cut off, it isn't a major problem but you should consider changing it. One more think on the "web investor blog" link i think the grey bg on the left should be changed, it is a bit dull. How about the color used in the roll over state for the buttons?

PCHelpWorld

 

Thanks for the input everyone! We have taken everything into consideration and look forward to additional comments.

 

I tried changing the bg on the blog to a light peach color but I thought that was too much so I made it white and I think that looks pretty good.

Is the slogan still cutting off? If so what browser do you use?