Hey there, I have just created my 1st website. Tell me what you think. Constructive criticism welcomed. www.vorax-systems.co.uk
This could go in the Development forum, as it's a site critique. On first impressions, it looks good - I'm pleased to see both the HTML and CSS validate. One thing I'll point out though, on the web design page the image at the top has been resized using code and it looks horrible. Manually resize it in an image editing app prior to uploading it. Also, the url 'http://www.vorax-systems.co.uk/Web%20Design.html' - you could remove the space (%20) and opt for an underscore (_) or hyphen(-). But that's down to preference really. EDIT: Looking through, many of the pictures have been 'squished' instead of manually resized - the browser still loads the full size image, just in a smaller space. EDIT2: Another point, sorry if I come across as harsh - but you've used 'Click Here' a lot, which I've been told is bad practice many times. See the W3C tip about it.
<meta name="author" content="_your name goes here_ / Original design: Andreas Viklund - http://andreasviklund.com/" /> Nice one, I'd leave the notice at the bottom of the page that should be there in place if I was you, since passing someone else's hard work off as your own is fairly despicable when you're supposedly a webdesigner. So my conclusion would be that it's a fairly poor site.
Links, on some pages you have your links as "/upgrading and repair.html" rename to "/upgrading_and_repair.html" "Training" you don't provide much information about what kind of training, ie: do they go to you, do you go to them, what kind of teaching is it, hands on, classroom based, number of other students etc.. Also, don't link to other sites that offer cheap hardware/software. It'll distract them away from where you want to keep them.. Which is on YOUR site. Contact, nobody trusts just a mobile number. If you want to make people feel safe, you need a proper address, phone number and contact details. If (and I assume) this is some kind of bedroom operation, you might want to just make a little statement saying "the address is not a factory/shop outlet" or something alike. I myself wouldn't order from a website that just had a mobile telephone number as a means of contact, even if I was making a large saving. Website layout, apart from a few URL's that I would rename (as I pointed out above) I can't fault it, simple (basic), fast loading, not so much information your heading for a PC > laymans dictionary. Good. Links, I'd remove, as I said above, you want people on your site, not other peoples. Sign up for Googles AdSense, I earn about £80 a month from Googles Adsense on my website(s) Google gives you loads of ways of making the sites small and not in your face "OMG! CLICK ME NOW!" type of thing, from small text based ads to small (100x55 pixels) graphic ads. And let's face it, if you go to ANY online e-tailer, they have some sort of advertising.. Hope you didn't think I was putting you down! I'm from Notts also! As are quite a few members here
As Nath pointed out, the theme is stolen, but as a site selling your services, it isn't too bad Just give credit where credit is due.
Bland. Initial design ok, but then the details (or lack of) just suck. Oh, and like others said, if your going to use someone else's work, at least say so.
It's a goos start, it's still a little light on things but I'm sure that will be fixed as time goes on, I personally like it and would rather go to Vorax Systems than any places I know around here. Just one thing, on services>upgrades you notice it says "a older machine or a laptop" it needs to be "an older machine" but other than that not bad
Nice and professional, my 2 pieces of advice... 1) Do something with the logo, it looks kinda funny - maybe because its not quite centered properly - but I dont like it. 2) Links page - give a breif description of the links, or stack them all a bit tighter under headings listing their category. People wont go clicking on a big list of random links just to see what they all are edit: 2 - i see you have done, can you make a heading a bit more prominent? On first impressions all i saw was a big list of links Otherwise I like it Well done.
as will said, it's bland. of course, it's a business site, so this isn't necessarily a bad thing. my biggest problems is the headings: home page - yes, we know it's the home page. your visitors can read your intro paragraph, they don't need to be told it is the intro our aim - this is a relavent heading, it describes the content under it. this is good. thank you - again, repetitive. it doesn't need to be a heading. maybe put a thank you in your intro and remove this section the services page - the services heading and the instruction "click on the service..." have the same prominence. maybe emphasise the page heading, and remove the instruction, or else de-emphasize the instruction and remove the instruction at the end of each service. i'm not a professional or anything like that, and i don't pretend to know much about design, this is just what i see when i look at the site EDIT: and adamcsmith.org/trix is a 404
It looks good to me, my only criticisms being: - It looks a little like a ready-made template, a bit generic in style (not necessarily a bad thing). May benefit from slightly more stylised "buttons" for the links and maybe some subtle graphical elements placed around. - It's XHTML but served as text/html which is wrong. XHTML is pointless with the current state of IE.
