My company website, what do you guys think?

[spectracolor]

http://bit.ly/1gtPZXs

Starting from a scratch....Man, that is a lot of work for sure. Two thumbs up for them

 

[player]

Maybe not from zero and up... there might be some code that can be reused, but I would bet they don't download templates...

 

[Supergirl]

Thank you for the tip on the padding on the forms.
However, I lost you when you said debugging thingee....Which plug in do you think it is and what's the effect of it? (I obviously don't know this far )

Thanks in advance~!

From the log, it's the cycle2 (probably your banner slider).


so, the "web design" has thankfully split into web development and web design.
Somebody finally realized that most developers (number and logic people) have no sense for design (that would be artists and folks here). Exceptions exist, of course.

So, the skill set is completely different.

"writing" wordpress from scratch (functionality) is different than purchasing a template to make it look good or writing a style sheet from scratch.

on the other hand, if i can purchase a good looking template for $50, i sure as hell will do that, because i couldn't come up with one in an hour or two.
This has goods and bads, since no code is bug free and sometimes you spend more time fixing other people's code or template, than writing your own in the first place.


so, to recap, i would honestly remove the "web design" from the page, or outsource elsewhere, and focus on signs etc.
and make your own site look more appealing. It's not bad, don't get me wrong. it's just not good enough to be offering the services.

t.

 

[shoresigns]

Your design is all over the place. Needs more consistency. Too many colours, too many fonts, margins and whitespace are unbalanced.

 

[Dan Antonelli]

We use WordPress to run our backend, which our developers code into the back end, but all our design work and then integration is custom. We don't use templates ever.

 

[nikdoobs]

Well I certainly wouldn't go to you to design a website. That being said your website looks way better than ours! It's not terrible, but if you are going to offer web design, you need to have a great website yourself. Keep tweeking and maybe simplify it some. I like how you have little clips of screen printing on there. Nice touch!

 

[spectracolor]

We use WordPress to run our backend, which our developers code into the back end, but all our design work and then integration is custom. We don't use templates ever.

That is very impressive. I wish I get to that level eventually. I keep learning everyday
Thank you for your input.

 

[spectracolor]

Your design is all over the place. Needs more consistency. Too many colours, too many fonts, margins and whitespace are unbalanced.

Do you think there are too much white spaces? Should it be wordier? Any suggestions on what to fill in those white spaces?

Thanks for your input~

 

[spectracolor]

Well I certainly wouldn't go to you to design a website. That being said your website looks way better than ours! It's not terrible, but if you are going to offer web design, you need to have a great website yourself. Keep tweeking and maybe simplify it some. I like how you have little clips of screen printing on there. Nice touch!

I never realized how a little "positive comment" about the having clips would make me feel a lot better. haha. Thank you Gives me a boost and makes me want to be better designer.

I took a web design class for 6 weeks back in Jan. 2013 and that's what got me started on making my own and for my customers. One of these days, I wish I can be the top of the line firm like that website that was created from a scratch.]

Thank you for your input

 

[Dan Antonelli]

That is very impressive. I wish I get to that level eventually. I keep learning everyday
Thank you for your input.

I used to do a bunch of work back in the old days with Fireworks and Dreamweaver. Now its way too hard for someone like me to keep up without being engaged in it on a daily basis. I have 3 full time developers and we're nearly booked out until August. Its just very hard to know everything there is to know, and with responsive its another whole animal. Put me in a corner designing logos, web comps and wraps where I can do no damage!

 

[DesireeM]

It can definitely use some work. You need to simplify things and maybe come up with a color palette and a text hierarchy and use it consistently throughout the site. As well you can eliminate a lot of redundant text and info. For example - you have a drop-down to Web Design, then you have it listed as a link in a paragraph, then you have it on a photo even lower and a link. We get it....you offer web-design. Stop beating us over the head with it.

Your keywords blob(paragraph) at the bottom of your landing page is clearly not for the reader but for search engines. Comes off as desperate. The landing page should not be used as an information dump. Use it to present your business in a clean way. It should only contain bread-crumbs leading to the inner areas of your site. Let the reader decide where they want to go next. People like to feel like they had a choice in choosing to see something -but you have to make them WANT to look deeper.

Here are some examples of great wordpress sites. These are beautiful AND functional. http://www.creativebloq.com/web-design/examples-wordpress-11121165

In the world of 'Search Engine Optimization' repetition can actually hinder you. Prioritize your keywords and metatags in a nice neat little package and Google will love you. But if you have 800 keywords, meta tags, links (and repeat them 3 times each just in case) search engines will actually rank you lower because they recognize that garbage and phishing sites are more likely to do that and they want to give people real, concise results.

 

[spectracolor]

We use WordPress to run our backend, which our developers code into the back end, but all our design work and then integration is custom. We don't use templates ever.

I think you might be the person I can get this answer from...
Right now, my website is ranking fairly high on Alexa and seo is done pretty good so I come up on many search results.

Does changing wordpress theme have any effect on seo and ranking?
I don't want it to go down after I change the theme...

Any suggestion is appreciated.

Thank you

 

[Dan Antonelli]

I think you might be the person I can get this answer from...
Right now, my website is ranking fairly high on Alexa and seo is done pretty good so I come up on many search results.

Does changing wordpress theme have any effect on seo and ranking?
I don't want it to go down after I change the theme...

Any suggestion is appreciated.

Thank you

We redesigned our old site and launched the new one in January (after like 1200 man hours, no less). Our old site ranked very well. Just make sure you have all redirects in place for any old indexed pages. We had a couple hundred pages that needed to be redirected. It took a little while for Google to reindex, but we didn't miss a beat. You have to be very careful though, about content and trying to make sure you keep as much in place as possible. We lost a couple of rankings on some terms, but it was hard to say if those ones were from the redesign, or the latest google shakeup.

Bottom line-- content, content, content.

 

[spectracolor]

We redesigned our old site and launched the new one in January (after like 1200 man hours, no less). Our old site ranked very well. Just make sure you have all redirects in place for any old indexed pages. We had a couple hundred pages that needed to be redirected. It took a little while for Google to reindex, but we didn't miss a beat. You have to be very careful though, about content and trying to make sure you keep as much in place as possible. We lost a couple of rankings on some terms, but it was hard to say if those ones were from the redesign, or the latest google shakeup.

Bottom line-- content, content, content.

Man, I am too scared to change the theme now...

When you say content...

For example, say you want your banner printing to come up fairly high on search. Not in your local search but in general search without the city name.
I mean, what else is there to say about banners after few descriptions here and there to make it content rich?
Designing is one thing but man, seo is tricky too.

 

[Stanton]

Header turns over way to fast.

Didn't go any further.



Looks like you are selling used cars.


Everything is on sale all the time ?


I am not going back for another look.

 

[spectracolor]

Header turns over way to fast.

Didn't go any further.



Looks like you are selling used cars.


Everything is on sale all the time ?


I am not going back for another look.

I agree with the header rotating too fast. I should delay the interval. Thank you for your input

 

[davearama]

Show up on page 1?

Seems like everybody's a critic which is fine and that's why you put it up there right? Most of the ones I read it would be hard to disagree with. This is how you learn.

I Know it's too soon to tell and I didn't read all the comments but didn't see anything about how do you show in Google. You can have an award winning site and if the SEO stinks and you're on page two (and you might as well be on page 10 as far as that goes). A great looking site doesn't matter much on page 2 because hardly anyone will ever see it. I think I saw only about 4% of searches get to page 2.

I'd much rather have an average site and show well for my key words ON A LOCAL BASIS than an award winner on page 2. You're a local business so who cares about where you show up when someone googles "Signs". The big guys have too much money and smarts to beat them out. Now when you google "signs Columbus (or where ever you are) and show up at or near top of page one now you can make some money! I say all the time my site(s) aren't the web's finest moments (signaramacolumbus.com) but they show well when you take a number of keywords and put "Columbus OH behind them. The site gets me calls and clicks every day.

So fix the site, do the easy and obvious based on what you read here.

THEN read up on how to optimize your site as a local business. It's not that hard. Just google "SEO for a local business" and get to it. Keep at it, plugging away and you'll be surprised where you end up.

 

[spectracolor]

Seems like everybody's a critic which is fine and that's why you put it up there right? Most of the ones I read it would be hard to disagree with. This is how you learn.

I Know it's too soon to tell and I didn't read all the comments but didn't see anything about how do you show in Google. You can have an award winning site and if the SEO stinks and you're on page two (and you might as well be on page 10 as far as that goes). A great looking site doesn't matter much on page 2 because hardly anyone will ever see it. I think I saw only about 4% of searches get to page 2.

I'd much rather have an average site and show well for my key words ON A LOCAL BASIS than an award winner on page 2. You're a local business so who cares about where you show up when someone googles "Signs". The big guys have too much money and smarts to beat them out. Now when you google "signs Columbus (or where ever you are) and show up at or near top of page one now you can make some money! I say all the time my site(s) aren't the web's finest moments (signaramacolumbus.com) but they show well when you take a number of keywords and put "Columbus OH behind them. The site gets me calls and clicks every day.

So fix the site, do the easy and obvious based on what you read here.

THEN read up on how to optimize your site as a local business. It's not that hard. Just google "SEO for a local business" and get to it. Keep at it, plugging away and you'll be surprised where you end up.

Thank you for your input.

My site comes up on top of the first page on just about every single product we offer as long as you type in the city name which is Simi Valley CA.
My goal is to go broader...not just my town. I guess that's what everybody wants and is very hard to achieve...
Like you said, I might just focus on seo and getting calls from it instead of worrying too much on how perfect it looks.
But doesn't hurt to have both looks & seo done properly

I actually enjoyed the critic comments and makes me want to keep improving.

It's never ending learning process I tell you.

 

[WCSign]

We redesigned our old site and launched the new one in January (after like 1200 man hours, no less). Our old site ranked very well. Just make sure you have all redirects in place for any old indexed pages. We had a couple hundred pages that needed to be redirected. It took a little while for Google to reindex, but we didn't miss a beat. You have to be very careful though, about content and trying to make sure you keep as much in place as possible. We lost a couple of rankings on some terms, but it was hard to say if those ones were from the redesign, or the latest google shakeup.

Bottom line-- content, content, content.

I so want to go back to about a year ago on here when I said that and everyone shrugged.. new relevant content is KING

 

[WCSign]

Changing the theme does not affect ranking, just dont change any post names or pages