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tworiverstradingco · 10-04-2005, 07:19 PM

Hello all,

Please critique my site at http://www.tworiverstradingco.com

My company sells electronic for the outdoors, such as GPS units and marine electronics. I am somewhat limited to how the site can look as I am using Yahoo's Sitebuilder program. The site is pretty complete as it is now, but I am adding new products daily (that won't change the layout of the site as it is now, so any input you might have for me will still be usable).

Thanks in advance for any insight you all have for me.

Sharla Stevens

cheng · 10-05-2005, 02:22 AM

I am using Firefox and the page looks a bit off. Btw just curious, are you using CWR to dropship?

Fuzz · 10-05-2005, 03:05 PM

Sites alittle rough and not really very professional looking. Also doesn't work well in firefox.

tworiverstradingco · 10-05-2005, 05:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Sites alittle rough and not really very professional looking. Also doesn't work well in firefox.

Hello Fuzz,

I took a look at your site. Seeing the name made me think that it had to do with search engine optimization...then I get to your site and see that it is anything but! That was a bit of a surprise

GeekFest? Sorry, that just made me giggle a bit.

Anyhow, back to the topic at hand. Thanks for looking at the site. In your opinion, what would you do to make it look more "professional" looking? Please don't read anything negative into this...I truly do want to know what you think. I don't know that I can change anything to make it look better for Firefox users. I can ask the tech support folks at Yahoo about that I suppose. I guess, I just want to know what you think should be added or subtracted from the overall site layout.

Message to Cheng... Same thing from you (if you don't mind). If you have any ideas let me know. I've implemented a bunch from a Yahoo Stores Forum I belong to. I just wanted to get some ideas from a bunch of folks who don't necessarily own a Yahoo store.

Thanks in advance,
Sharla Stevens
http://www.tworiverstradingco.com

Fuzz · 10-06-2005, 05:13 PM

The inital layout looks fine, but the graphics and such need some refinement. You need some better looking buttons (buttons defently have to go). I would also suggest something on the background; it doesn't have to be anything fancy(look at the site in my sig). Other than the stuff just mentioned it looks fine. I hope that help you out some.

I might try to brew you up some buttons if i have some time.

tworiverstradingco · 10-06-2005, 07:46 PM

Hey Fuzz,

Thanks for the additional info. I know those buttons stink...I just don't have any way of making them wider (in the sitebuilder program) to fit the names of the links (like Chartplotters or Fishfinders). The initial button was smaller, I just widened them and that unfortunately made them appear fuzzy on the ends. It doesn't look incredibly bad on IE, but I understand that it really shows up on other browsers. Thanks for the offer to come up with some different ones!

As to the background, I'm a little bit hesitant to do that. I've checked all my competitors and they all have white backgrounds. However they do look more professionally done than my site does.

Once again Fuzz, I really appreciate your time and thanks for critiquing my site!

Sharla Stevens
http://www.tworiverstradingco.com

Fuzz · 10-08-2005, 11:11 PM

Do you want those buttons, I made you some. I also made you a wood texture for under you tabs at the top. Tell me if you are interested.

cheng · 10-09-2005, 07:21 AM

Was busy for the week. Well, i am going to be very straight forward.

Number of firefox users are increasing steadily so not having the page aligned properly will turn off many firefox viewers who come to your site. I also tried viewing your site using IE and i notice for some of your products (esp GPRS products) have a few extra buttons on the left panels. The privacy, about us.. buttons should be consistant and stay at the top panel. The product catagories should be at the left panel and this should be applied to ALL pages in your store. I have to agree something needs to be done with those buttons. My suggestion, visit as many stores selling related products so that you can get a rough idea of how your page design and butttons should look.

If you do not already have a statistic counter in your site, you should insert it in so that you can analyse where most of your viewers are coming from.

On the business side, i dont really suggest you selling mp3 players since your logo and site design looks very much "forest adventure". Your site design needs to suit the products you are selling. Unless you intend to have an electronic store selling all kinds of electronic gadgets, otherwise specialise in GPRS, chartplotters, radio and fishfinder. This products are more for adventure seekers who needs such products during their adventures.

If you find it hard getting sales, invest more money in the site design. Get a very professional look. Since you are using a dropshipper, there might be more than 10 stores selling the same product as you. Having a very professional site design would determine whether a viewer will turn into a customer. And of course, efficient marketing is also the key. You should target those impulse buyers who buy from you just because they like your site.

PM or post me your email if you need any more comments. See if i can think of any more.

tworiverstradingco · 10-13-2005, 09:23 AM

Cheng,

Sorry so late in replying. I've been busy with other things for a bit. Thanks for being straight forward - that's exactly what I wanted and asked for.

I understand that Firefox/Mozilla is getting more and more popular (especially with the computer geek crowd - NO offense meant!). I've been reading up on that very fact. I've been checking my statistics and they show that 97% of my "shoppers" use IE and 3% use Firefox/Mozilla. I do know that this can be somewhat misleading as you Mozilla users can change your settings to make it look like you are using IE to the tracker. I wish I knew HTML so that I could get the site to be up to web standards. This is one issue I will definitely bring up to Yahoo! about their sitebuilder program... that the code is too heavy and does not show right for all browsers. That being said, I visited a few sites about this very problem and some major companies have similar types of problems on their websites.

When you mention that on some of my pages (especially the GPS pages) that there are some additional buttons showing up, can you tell me which ones in particular? The reason I ask is that I had gone through (before my initial posting here) and changed it so that all pages were uniform in appearance. The only difference was that the initial page had a link to the links page and a link to my forums page. So that makes me curious as to whether there are some that were missed (and I've rechecked them) or if there is some other issue at hand here.

Your statement on the MP3 players is a good one. I had considered taking them off, but changed my mind because I know that some folks like taking their music with them when they are outdoors (not me I like the sound of nature). So I decided to keep it. I'll think on that some more.

Buttons... yeah, I know they have to go. The sitebuilder program has a one size button and like I told Fuzz, I had to re-size them to fit my longer words onto them. The effect is nasty. I have visited my competitors sites. The backgrounds on those sites is almost always white and is very professional looking , but they all lack the outdoors element in the design. That is why I chose the colors that I did and the pictures at the top. I know it needs to be more professionally done...money is definitely an issue with that. The site will probably need to be done with RTML (Yahoo!'s proprietary language) coders and there aren't as many of those folks as there are for HTML. I do have a company picked out for when I can afford it. So for the time being I am just trying to get by on my extremely limited skills.

Excuses, I know - but you just can't get around the money thing. A problem for many I think.

Well Cheng, I really want to thank you for taking the time to look into my site and addressing the issues that you see in it. When I can I will do something about those same issues. As to the MP3 players, as I mentioned before, I will reconsider my decision.

Thanks again,
Sharla Stevens
http://www.tworiverstradingco.com

tworiverstradingco · 10-13-2005, 09:28 AM

Fuzz,

Sorry for not responding sooner! Thanks for doing up some buttons and the wood texture for my top navigation bar! I'd sure like to see them. That is very kind of you to take the time to do. May I ask, what are you charging for this?

Let me know. And thanks again!

Sharla Stevens
http://www.tworiverstradingco.com