Another site review

[Michael@PT]

Hello all,

I know some time ago i asked for people to give the my site a quick review and since then i have completly redesigned and come up with something new.

Would appreciate a few comments on the site which is www.purethoughts.co.uk

Issues i already know about are -
1. Paypal - soon going to be applying to Worldpay foran account with them. Got to be better than Paypal
2. Spam - got to get rid of my email address the bottom of the page as its a bullseye for spammers.

Please be honest with the comments. Let me know what you think good or bad.

Cheers

[jont]

Nice use of colour palate that really suits the products well and nice, simple navigation.

The text for the products and articles is a little on the small size - I was really having to focus hard to read the descriptions.

Each product really needs an image - the images that are there are great and a good selling feature. Is there any way you can somehow "combine" the products that are "as above but bigger" ... at the moment it is not immediately obvious they are part and parcel of the same product type especially when in a long list.

The default "new" image needs to be changed ASAP - the yellow and black really does not lend itself to the colour scheme.

Check the mouseover on the product description in Firefox - this is a common issue due to an <a> tag spanning the product name in the Act_ProductLine.html

Nice use of understated watermarks to copyright the images - very subtle

[acompton]

Good overall appearance and easy navigation. I liked the site and the products. Nice green colours - its a difficult palette to work with - I should know!

Jo will berate you for not displaying a telephone number.

No immediate indication of payment methods available (although I always feel that having a display of credit card logos spoils the aethesics of a well-designed site). There have been other discussions about not taking credit cards tends to look amateur.

No copyright notice.

No obvious sitemap - webcrawlers like these.

Anal moment: shouldn't "Dragon's Blood" have a apostrophe?

Alan Compton
www.greenknightgames.co.uk
Great board games and cards games you won't find in the High Street

[jont]

Jo will berate you for not displaying a telephone number.

Surf Wax does not display any contact details at all so Michael should be safe

[acompton]

Maybe I'm wrong but I though it was Jo that won't trust a site that doesn't have a phone no. on the front page?

[jont]

I know Jo has a dislike for sites that do not use a PSP.

Apologies for hijacking the thread

[pinbrook]

Jo will berate you for not displaying a telephone number.

I can't really, as Jonty points out Surf-wax doesn't display one. Its one of those mute issues, it will loose you business by not having one as there are always people who want to phone. I feel that Surf-wax has enough of the other credibility factors so can get away with it to a certain extent. The problem we have found when we have had a phone number is the number of time wasters who call ( ie to ask where is my order, on a daily basis, after we have posted it ) Costs go up having to pay staff to take these calls, we prefer to loose a few customers and ensure the business runs as smoothly as we can within our own criteria.

Yes my pet hates are

sites that only use Paypal
sites that look small and use SSL (as I fear my CC detail will be held on an unsecured PC/laptop)
badly designed sites
sites that haven't been thought through

the main reason for the above is simply that they are very unlikely to be a sucess unless they sell a very niche product.

[acompton]

it will loose you business by not having one as there are always people who want to phone

Agreed. Happened to me just the other day. However, it is rare.

The problem we have found when we have had a phone number is the number of time wasters who call

Not to mention internet advertising sales calls.

Alan

[Michael@PT]

[QUOTE=jont
Check the mouseover on the product description in Firefox - this is a common issue due to an <a> tag spanning the product name in the Act_ProductLine.html

[/QUOTE]

Thanks everyone for the comments. Going to sortout the finer points and issues that your've raised in the enxt two days.

Jont, you kinda lost me a little on this point. Whats seems to be wrong with the mouseover. Looks ok in IE and i dont seem to see anything wrong when i bring the pages up in Firefox,altho im no expert with FF.

Please could you tak a little further about this?

[jont]

If you look at this page http://www.purethoughts.co.uk/acatal...made_Soap.html and hover over the product name in Firefox you will see the change of font size and colour causing the famous "screen dance" ... in fact you need to standardise the way the product names are displayed as some have no mouseover effect, some change colour and the above layout changes size AND colour ... all depending on the product layout used

Best to set just the one style -probably best with no mouseover effect as this can cause people to sit and try and click what they think is a link but is actually used for locating the products in searches and direct URL links.

[Michael@PT]

Any other comments?

I appreciate the comments so far. Has anyone got any more feedback so far??

Not quite sure how to correct the differences between FF and IE. Seems to work fine in IE and i dont want to make any changes to make it work in FF and cause it to balls up!

Appreciate the help

[Duncan Rounding]

They look good enough to eat! And so they do too!
Well done on a very pleasing site. No real comments apart from what's been mentioned above. I too think twice about ordering from a site that doesn't have a phone number - why not get an 0870 number, people are not keen on them because they get charged a bit more than a normal call but at least they would feel they could call if need be.