Thread: New Updated Site needing feedback

Would love any and all feedback. Just updated my website. (whats new page is a work in progress)

www.casanelvineyards.com


Thanks in advance

A couple of quick comments and then I'll come back and have a closer look.

Because I'm on dial-up, I bypassed your entry page - thanks for the choice.
Your homepage took forever to load - perhaps you could knock your resolution of the photos down a bit? With the middle photo changing - nice touch by the way - I'd make them unique (i.e. don't include the same photos as what you are using in the other two panels) as when they double up the page suddenly looks lopsided.

I would also have a text menu at the bottom of the page. Apparently the search engines prefer them and anyone who has JavaScript turned off (i.e. me) can still see a menu without compromising my security.

Your menu is really nice though (worth compromising my security lol)

Okay, I had a closer look but unfortunately your site hates people with dial-up, so I've got to give up.

But before I go, a few observations:

1/ You have lovely images in your header and once you've got past your homepage they load fast everytime they reappear on a new page but then I come to a page with another big image right across the page (i.e "about us") and I have to go through the pain of waiting for that to load. Then when I get to "whatsnew" and see lots of new images....I give up (incidentally 5 minutes later they're still loading and it looks like I'll need at least 20 more minutes). I think you should try and be consistent across all your pages and use the same pictures and look carefully at the sizes of each.

2/ Your naming of pages - It doesn't matter what page you are on, they all have the same title "Casanel Vineyards" Try "Casanel Vineyards - About Us" , "Casanel Vineyards - Whats New", etc

3/ Your menu at the top of the page changes, depending on what page you're on. This can get a bit frustrating when I know there is a page I want to get to but I can't find the page that has the menu choice. If you had a pure text menu at the bottom with every option then that would keep your top menu tidy. Failing that a "sitemap" ?

4/ Your "About Us" page - you've changed the font, made it darker and crammed it together. You would have to be very determined to read it all.


Good luck, from what little I saw, if I was in the area, I'd be visiting, thats for sure

Hi

Lovely vineyards & nice site :)

What Muzza said above is all very good advice.

The flash intro doesn't really match with the rest of your site. It's a personal choice - but for me, I think it looks out of place.

It's great you have the story of your winery on your site - nice touch :)

Very nice site but i would definetely not have the 'Enter' page. It's just a waste of time.
Cheers,

Hi,
I love the colours and graphics flash intro........but.......I do not think it matches the site....which is looking really good. Congratulations. Great story about your parents...and everyone loves a good story..

Now IMO opinion the entry is not needed...
And your images need resizing.....some of the small ones are a bigger size than your large ones, which are too big. The best post to read is from Collectors-info and if my link does not work this is in the tips and shortcuts topic

Image/Photo Tips

I have a lot of images and used this info to help me (although I used Microsofts Image tool because I was already comfortable with it.)
Hope this helps

Thanks for all the feedback. When you say a text menu, do you just mean add the text for each "option" and then link them to the correct page?

Hi,
I think you already have what Muzza is referring to. The bottom of the page menu in text only, with each page in the same order (on each page.)
it was suggested to me when I first sbuilt my site that it was good practise to have you navigation buttons the same on each page. i understand the reasoning as sometimes you go to click on a button and it is in a different place and you can't find the page you are interested in. I chose not to do it but I still think it is a good idea.
When I checked out your site again I noticed that the white box that the story about your parents is on is a different size than the other pages. IMO it would work better if it matched your other pages.
Good Luck to you all for the 18th

Hi Again,
I think the naming of the pages that Muzza is talking about maybe your page titles. You do need some key words in the titles of your pages - they also need to be in the text on the page. The title of the page is the first space in page properties. (When you right click on an empty space on your page)

Have to agree with Sunchaser, Flash intro doesn't quite give the right impression of what is ahead. Removing it would also help the search engines find you too.

Ditto with all above. Dump the intro & resize the images.
But your still off to a good start. :)

Have a look at the bottom of my site for an example of "text only" menus. Unfortunately both menus on your home page are using JavaScript and are invisible if people have JavaScript turned off.

These text menus are not fancy menus which, I suspect, is the main reason people tuck them away at the bottom of the page but at least they are fail safe.

Justineo at http://www.myarizonaweddingphotographer.com/ has actually managed to fancy his text menu up a bit. Have a look at his menu at the bottom of the page with pink writing on a black background.

If people are curious about the effects I'm seeing, they need to have Firefox, download NoScript form www.noscript.net and run with the defaults. It keeps you reasonably protected from websites that might be trying to exploit Javascript to hack into your PC

Hi friend,

When naming your sub pages "for example" www.casanelvineyards.com/aboutus.html

you should ALWAYS separate multiple words with a _ underscore to look like this www.casanelvineyards.com/about_us.html

This is the case for all your pages with multiple wording. This is for SEO reasons.

I would also change the BG on the HP to match the rest of your pages. (the BG inside the box.

Hope this helps,
take care!
Pierre
www.yarpool.com

I also agree that th Flash intro doesn’t fit in, try placing some grapes a glass of wine or perhaps a bottle of wine to help the design intro flow with the rest of the site.
And just one quick thing: “Google and Yahoo spiders can now crawl through Flash sites”. Read more here.

Do the photo sizes at the top of the page seem to be better now? I have resized them all to a smaller size, not sure if I should go smaller.

Personally I feel that they load a hair to slow, but I sent this site to others (who have never been to it) and they said the photos loaded fine.

(im not concerened about the gallery of photos at this moment, just the ones at the top of each page)

Thanks again.

Hi, it’s all down to what connection your visitors have. I have broadband, but know of friends that have broadband of nearly 10 times the speed i have & many that are on dial up.
The http://www.casanelvineyards.com/vineyard.jpg image is a bit slow at 3/400kb. This can be reduced, but would also have to be cropped to match your other images without getting any distortion.
You should be able to get these images under 50kb each & still look fine.

The flash intro while nice looking, is totally wrong for the site. It's too techno for a winery. But the site looks good. A little tweaking as above and you've got something.