Website Feedback

bigchaz

Finally published my site to the web. I probably would end up working on it forever if I let myself, but I'm relatively satisfied with it now

Check it out and give me some feedback, suggestions, etc

www.apexdecksavers.com

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Charlie Soden
Apex DeckSavers
"New life for old wood"
Deck cleaning and staining Wake County

dougchips

Well written and nice pictures.

The only thing that I would change is maybe making your "hot buttons" on the first page , either larger font or some spacing between them or a different color.

(I had to find something to nit pick)

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To get the best replacement windows, or sun rooms contact the replacement windows experts at FHI Vinyl Window Company.

bigchaz

Anymore negatives? Lot of people have told me they like it, but what can be done to make it better?

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Charlie Soden
Apex DeckSavers
"New life for old wood"
Deck cleaning and staining Wake County

MarkNoV

OK to make it better ( good job BTW)

move the navigation buttons to the left of the page

make your contact info more prominent, maybe put it right under your logo. I had to look on the bottom to find your phone number, Also your number should be on every page.

I don't like links embedded in the text, prefer them in their own list.

Mark

DerrickVWS

I'll try my best to offer some constructive criticisms...

1. I just can't get over it... the watermark logo behind all the content on your site seems too bright. Maybe mute it a little more. I'd say try making it one color and mute it a little more. I'd stick with the brown color and make it look like a light wood burn.
2. I like the mouse-over photos. You implemented that very well. At first glance, I had no idea that I should mouse-over... I didn't read the first sentence on the page. Below, I gave an idea for improving the photos. Don't get me wrong! I think what you have is already effective.
   
3. Punctuation Police Alert! You have several sentences that are not closed with a period.
4. Make the paypal logo in the right nav column link to your payment page.
5. Add your phone number and address to the bottom of the right nav column. I believe this should appear on every page.
6. In your FAQ, you put your email address with a link. This is a huge no-no as spammers scrape websites for email addresses. You also have an email address on the Pay Online page. You could leave them there and just keep your fingers crossed.

Excellent website!

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Derrick Delliquadri
Vision Web Services | Contractor Websites

bigchaz

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. Went ahead and fixed some the grammar mistakes and added a phone number to each page. The links on the home page are unsightly, but supposed to help when search engines are indexing the site. Something about seeing different paths to each page helps.

I originally had the nav bar on the left, but almost every site I visited had it there. Decided i would switch it up so the first thing people start reading is my intro.

I like the idea on the mouseovers. I checked it the image files were huge which made load time on the mousover slower than it should have been. Made them the proper size so that if the mouse just touches a picture it should change. I may add something like you suggested on the first picture just as an added reminder to people

I'm going to play around with the watermark some more also. I'm gonna take the risk with the emails, but I removed it from being a clickable link. I think I have 500 email addresses, so ill just switch it up if the spam gets real bad.

Doug are the hot buttons you referring to the ones on the right? Or the ones in the text?

Thanks again for the feedback everyone

__________________
Charlie Soden
Apex DeckSavers
"New life for old wood"
Deck cleaning and staining Wake County

MOrcutt

I really like your websites. Very simple but gets the point across with some creativity included.

George Z

Search engines do like them, especially if links are keywords.

I like the website, it shows professionalism.
The constructive criticism here is great.
I don't like the watermark either, it takes away from the good copy.

I don't agree, we get straight e-mails all the time.
Not everyone wants to fill a form. You 'll get spam, so deal with it.

One thing I noticed is, you portray yourselves as scientists that do decks.
Great if that was the case and showed up with lab-coats at the sales call.
I would rather be the enabler for the consumer to make a great decision, a resource mostly, not the infallible experts, nobody is.
Also specifying oil based stains in your site is not necessary.
Get the sales call and make your case there.
You could be eliminating a part of your market that wants the new
wet application products like Cabot SPF, Flood Spa & Deck and others.
Demand for these new products is noticeable, why not accomodate it.

Other than that, I think it is a good website.
Now market it.

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Toronto Painters Commercial Painting Commercial Painting Toronto Toronto Office Painters
Painting Toronto Blog

floor instal

Great web sight. loved the mouse over. I'm woking on my web sight and will be using this concept in mine.

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floorinstallation@cox.net

bigchaz

Thanks for the comments

The reason for specifying oil based is because the incredible inadequacy of just about all water based stains. SPF and Spa/Deck have failed under most applications. Wet application is more of a convenience factor for homeowners looking to do a weekend job. Commercially, Woodtux fills the any needs that may arise for my company scheduling around a bad rain period, and still provides the excellent protection and quality being an oil based.
If the customer has a suggestion, I'm willing to work with them, but only after showing them photos of some failed finishes and explaining the products I use.

Hopefully it will become the biggest marketing piece for me now that im done. Goes on all printed ads and I'm really hoping to tap the search market with adwords and whatnot. Should be an interesting experiment time

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Charlie Soden
Apex DeckSavers
"New life for old wood"
Deck cleaning and staining Wake County

Second Look

I always considered it a big no-no simply because it just opens Outlook Express which not everyone uses, and is known to be a rather insecure mail client.

I put my email address in the copy and haven't had any major spam problems. I also advertise on Craigslist and provide my email address rather than hiding behind the Craigslist-generated address. Again, no major problems.

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Second Look home improvement www.SecondLookHome.com
Handyman and Home Repair Specialist in Rhode Island
RI Licensed Lead Safe Remodeler/Renovator, RI Registered & Insured Contractor

Second Look

If you're going to leave the links embedded in the text, you should make them brown. I like to color my links and NOT underline them, it enhances readability a bit. The blue really clashes with the nice earthtone pallette you have on the site.

If you go to the <style> section of the page, you can add the line:

a {text-decoration:none; color:#804000;}

That would make your links brown and not underlined. You could also bold them if it suits your fancy.

Since your style sheet isn't a separate file (normally a .CSS file), you would have to do this to every page. Style sheets are great when you want to change the font size, font color, paragraph spacing, object positioning and a slew of other fabulous options. You get to change every page by changing only one file.

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Second Look home improvement www.SecondLookHome.com
Handyman and Home Repair Specialist in Rhode Island
RI Licensed Lead Safe Remodeler/Renovator, RI Registered & Insured Contractor