website - Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum

gtmstang · 10-05-2008, 08:05 PM

Well here it is www.morganconstructionandremodeling.com. I know its a long name but I couldnt come up with anything else. If you have time give my site a look and tell me what you think. I think it still needs some work, but overall I'm happy.

**genecarp** · 10-05-2008, 08:29 PM

Not bad, basic, some of the photos dark and low quality, but in general i will do the job, not sure i like the coupon/ discount thing. G

gtmstang · 10-05-2008, 08:46 PM

My partners thought we should do the coupon. Discounts for seniors and Military. I met them half way. I'm not a fan of the coupon either. Should I get rid of it or make a real looking coupon maybe with monthly specials I get from my suppliers?

NJPainter · 10-05-2008, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by genecarp

Not bad, basic, some of the photos dark and low quality, but in general i will do the job, not sure i like the coupon/ discount thing. G

I like the Jim Morrison pic!

Some people like coupons- feel it out.

carlsore · 10-06-2008, 12:06 AM

I like the design of your site... It's a simple structure with lots of space to add more content in the future as you expand the site.

First thing - that jumped out at me was that you have some locations of work completed (in your pictures), but you don't clearly mention on your homepage the areas that you serve... This can be beneficial for you when it comes to showing up for local searches.

Second thing - the title on your homepage shouldn't be "Morgan Construction And Remodeling"

It needs to be more descriptive about the location of your business...

Like:

"South Carolina Construction And Remodeling Contractor | Morgan Construction And Remodeling"

It's a really simple change but will help you capture the potential traffic that doesn't search for you specifically. If people jump onto Google and type Morgan Construction And Remodeling you'll likely be found...

That's great... But we also want to be found when a searcher in South Carolina types "remodeling contractor" or "construction contractor" etc...

Third Thing - The link on your homepage leading to hire-contractors.com... What purpose does this serve? When clicked it goes to a page without any information about you, just more contractors.

3rd party credibility is a good thing, but only if it's promoting you! Maybe see if you can dig up some customer testimonials.

Hope this helps!

Carl Sorensen

gtmstang · 10-06-2008, 07:02 AM

Thanks for the input so far.

SethHoldren · 10-06-2008, 05:12 PM

Yeah, I agree about the title. And removing the weird link.

Most importantly though, you need some sort of offer and a call to action. On every page.

Your site should make it painfully obvious why your prospect should call you. What makes you unique? There is something that makes every business unique. Find yours, and spell it out so that an 8 year old could grasp it, within the first 5 seconds on your site. That's all the time you have!

You don't need a coupon, or a discount. But you do need to offer something of value, and call your reader to action.

Also, carlsore's advice to get testimonials is crucial.

Go get yourself some testimonials. Just ask. You probably already have some, right? Ask everyone. And post them prominently.

Good job so far! Now just give your visitors a reason to call you.

tinner666 · 10-09-2008, 06:46 AM

I would consider making all your pictures thumbnails. They load fast, and give prospects a chance to see close-ups. Be proud of your work and show it. Don't hide it behind long-range shots. Looks like your're hiding something.

Coptool · 10-09-2008, 07:33 AM

Some basic SEO advice would be to name each page (TITLE) individually and to include your locations in the title as well. That way when people search Google and use city names you are much more likely to show up.

gtmstang · 10-09-2008, 09:11 PM

Like this? <TITLE>South Carolina and Tennessee Construction And Remodeling Contractor | Morgan Construction And Remodeling Home Page</TITLE> and change the page name on each. Home, contact us, about us, services, etc.? My meta tags are messed up now. I cant get my old ones off and put up my new ones. I contacted my host for help taking them off and they dont know why they are still on there and told us we were on our own. If you look at the source it shows 2 sets of tags. The top ones are the ones I cant get rid of and thats what all search engines are looking at. I'm going to hire a SEO person as soon as I save a few hundred dollars but for now this is killing me. I'm also changing my host. Does anyone have any negatives on liquidweb.com. I called and talked to them and they seem good. My wife and I are building the site ourselves. We are working on thumbnails and links now. Those meta tags are killing me right now. Maybe we will stumble on a way to get rid of the old ones soon.

Tileworks · 10-10-2008, 07:56 PM

I use Windows Notepad to create my pages and scripts.

WSFTP_LE (the free version) to transfer files from my PC to my server.

www.hostgator.com is my host and for $9.95 per month I am using 11 of my unlimited domains :-)

- Bob

richard123 · 10-15-2008, 06:06 AM

quite a basic site, and maybe look for a shorter more web adress, otherwise very well structured and easy to use, plus some really nice work done!!!

tinner666 · 10-15-2008, 06:22 AM

If using FP, R.click the page and select properties. You'll see it's name and right above that is the word 'title'. CLick it and change it to what you want.

pcplumber · 10-15-2008, 08:30 AM

You guys really touch my heart! Every reply is great. This is great when you give honest opinions even when you think the site needs improvement. I did not see this great crisicism at other forums.

This is 'great'

Jack

Boogga · 10-18-2008, 05:41 AM

Are you scared of showing photos of the people behind your company?? Who are they, so far, they are called 'we'.

MattCoops · 10-18-2008, 10:47 AM

Nice looking site.
Easy on eyes. Crisp and clean.
Easy navigation. Although, I'd had some links to other areas within the middle content section. Or some sort of call to action at the end.

Great site though. Did you design yourself?

My only drawback is the use of tables to layout your page.

Tables are a thing of the past. And, URL="http://phrogz.net/css/WhyTablesAreBadForLayout.html"]tables are bad compared to more modern TML + CSS[/url].
You are already using a little bit of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) for styling your text. It would behoove you to utilize CSS for layout.
Anyone who has a screen size under 1024px wide is going to have to scroll to the right to see your last column. And even in 1024 resolutions, if the screen is resized (not fully maximized) you need to use horizontal scroll. That's kind of an aggrivation for some.

I'd use css to make your middle content column liquid so everything fits nicely inside everyones browser window.

gtmstang · 10-18-2008, 04:46 PM

Thanks for the input Matt. My wife designed the site for me. This was only our third attempt. We wanted something simple so I'm glad we got it. She is learning the CSS stuff now. And she completely agrees about the scrolling to the right to see the whole page. New site is in progress now and we are implementing several ideas we got here on it, the CSS layout is one of them.

Aiken Colon · 10-20-2008, 10:45 PM

You currently have no H tags on your pages. These are vital for SEO IMO. If you do a search in the forums for H tags, I have posted a couple messages on it.

You can also make your meta description tag 255 chars in length if you want. Some will say meta tags are no longer used by google, and I pretty much agree with that. But, I also think if your title bar, meta description, H tags, and use of bold/italics/underline flow right and show the SEs what a page is about it helps a ton.

Also, make a sig on here with your site in the sig. don't use the http address of your site though. Use something like your meta description (anchor text) just shorten it up. That helps with SEO as well.

And my biggest advice to all is patience and update your site often. As well as make sure you submit to dmoz.com (can take upwards of a year), and set up google webmaster tools and use it often. Google loves fresh content, and a good sitemap that shows the bots when you updated last will help a ton!
Good luck

JJ

richard123 · 10-21-2008, 03:51 AM

looking foward to seeing the new website

mullaman · 10-21-2008, 09:59 AM

If you're worried about the long name you can buy up similar shorter names and link them to your site if they're available. Or even a misspelled name. Site is nice though.