Hi all,

 

Ok here goes...I have reworked my website slightly with the aim of simplifying my homepage layout towards better SEO. I'm still fairly new to web design (previous life - marketer), so please be gentle to a point.

 

All banners and images are place points, not the finished imagery. If you find a 404, let me know.

 

Also if you have a problem accessing the website, just refresh your page. I'm on Siteground and the server used for this website is under a DDOS at the moment.

 

Thanks in advance, Baz.

 

Link to the site: CREATE / ENABLE

 

My other website: Baz Watkins

Aside from the tons of text that users will never read... the first part of the site is completely void. If I was a serious visitor, I would leave right away. Design for users first... not SEO first.

The header is huge for a logo like that.

 

Make logo smaller for starters and make header small.

 

I agree, if i was someone who new nothing about web design/development and seo and just wanted a website, i would leave, there is no info that appeals to me at first glance.

I don't mean to be picky, but

All our websites are:

* Built using the Joomla Content Management System

* Built to the clients exact wants and needs

Ok, I'd like a website that uses a more user friendly CMS please. Or just a simple video blog. Not all of your visitors will know what Joomla is, and of those who do, many of them will hate it as a CMS.

 

Design-wise, I think the site's inconsistency is a little off-putting. On the home page there's that huge header, which shrinks down to a tiny nav bar on the other pages. If a user lands on any page other than your home page, they're not going to know whose website they are viewing.

 

I really think those stock images need to go too. In favour of either examples of your work, or some more interesting, more unusual stock images. I've lost count of the number of times I've seen most of those images.

 

Ok I've just noticed you're editing the live site as I write this, so some of my criticisms may be invalid.

 

Typography: I think your headers could stand out more. Maybe pull out a more eye-catching colour from your palate as that blue is too similar to the body text grey.

 

Code: I would recommend reading up on web semantics as your HTML does not describe your document accurately at all. Body text in tables, all text in <strong> tags, line spaces in table rows are all major no-no's and will damage your SEO effort considerably. Use <h1> - <h6> tags for your headings, and <p> tags for your body text with <ul> <ol> <blockquote> etc where appropriate. Proper use of HTML means the tables are redundant, unless you're marking up tabular data.

 

Finally,the tag cloud in the footer serves no purpose that I can see and doesn't even look very good.

 

I may sound overly critical in this post, but I actually think if you corrected these niggles, you could have a nice, user friendly site there.

Great looking website, simple and elegant and header really works well.

 

Nice to see for a change a legally compliant website with Terms & Conditions and a robust Privacy Policy which every website that has an enquire/quote form should always have. Sadly many do not provide these or accessibility and legal statements.

 

Really think the site works well. Some people like to read some like a flashy single image that says what their site is about. This is different, tasteful and a pleasure to explore.

 

R

Ok, thanks for the input I have made some further changes, allthough it is still a work in progress.

I don't want to sound rude but it was very plain nothing grabbed my attention, add some flash or jQuery in there to get a little bit of animation and to grab people's attention.

As you are using joomla there are a number of extensions you can use to spice it up, I may have a few extensions you might be interested in.