check out my new website and give me feedback, please

They have: 4 posts

Joined: Mar 2009

I just made my website myself. I don't know much about the process and I want some traffic. So I could really use some advice.
http://www.SprayFree4Me.com

greg's picture

He has: 1,581 posts

Joined: Nov 2005

Ok, I can give you a fantastic website critique. [come closer]
I can give you the best website critique you will EVER read. [come closer still]
Want to know the secrets of good web design? Want to DRIVE customers to your site and get a 95% sale-lead-visitor conversion rate?

I have graphs, charts, medical science degrees, other pointless stuff too.
My technique has made me a multi billionaire.
It's not a scam, all I do is tell YOU how to make a fantastic site and how to market it and YOU TOO will make millions of pounds each week...

Imagine sitting on a beach in blahblah land earning millions of pounds each nano second from doing nothing.
Let your website do the work, and I can tell you how!!!

Let me guess. You're bored already and just want the dammed website critique?
That's how your visitors feel when they read your site!
I've trawled through the site viewing each and every inch, and I STILL don't know what the hell you're offering me!

And when I read the "My service to you" page, all you tell me is you can help me stop using nose sprays. You expect me to believe on face value that your words and wisdom can help me, and I'm to send you $10 for this?
Why would I ever do that?

First impressions of the site is it appears to be a long scrolling spammy-ad type sales pitch. With the different colours and alternating fonts, and underlined and bold, it just cries out "spam-ad".

You WILL be losing visitors INSTANTLY. User hits on your site, sees "spam-ad-like" content and leaves within 3 seconds flat.

The text on the homepage is also spammy. You are trying to draw me in? Convince me I NEED this product, I NEED what you are about to offer me?
Well, newsflash, it doesn't work. All I, and most other people, think is "Yawn, another boring psychological marketing attempt. Spam, close page..."

You do the same thing on most pages, "Causes and Methods" does the same nonsense attempt to sell a product to me and draw me in without actually telling me what it is!
This does nothing other than frustrate the hell out of people.
Tell me what it is, THEN try to convince me its good and works, and why it worked for you!

I know this is difficult when you are selling "techniques" as if you list them, why would people buy them. But that's the problem with this site in general. You are trying to offer and sell worldwide through the internet what would normally be a one-to-one in-person situation. With a GP/Doctor or other medical trained person who can help with addictions.

The entire site requires better alignment. None of the images or text align in any way, and there's no continuity.

Your text has too much bold.
When you have as much bold text as you do, or any highlighting such as colours and underline, it no longer highlights anything.

For highlighted words to be effective, there should ONE or TWO words per paragraph in bold, underlined etc.

When I click the link for "sign in" and "guestbook" I get some really nasty URL. Is there any way around that?

On "My story" page, you need to resize the top image of your kids.
Its original size is 2304px × 1728px. then with HTML you resize it height="230" width="306".
The server still loads the FULL size image, then the users browser resizes it.

The purple text container on My Story needs some padding. The words are right up against the sides. And some of the images in there cover up the text.
Same with myservicetoyou.HTML

On your "contact" page, you might want to remove the testimonials, and stick it on a new page.
Also you have this text on the testimonials..

This is the testimonial form. Not sure how it works yet.

"Not sure how it works yet." I don't know what that means. Is that you stating you don't yet know how the system works?
Or aimed at me stating if I don't know how it works then read the following?
Confusing/not well explained.

What's with the "BUY THIS" links all over the site? What does that mean? Buy what? Do you mean: "Purchase spray4me now"?
And that still sounds like a product, a physical item rather than "some words of wisdom" which seemingly is all you are offering.

Not sure why your code imports CSS - @import url(http://www.homestead.com/~media/elements/Text/font_styles.css);
I see no advantage and it doesn't stop me accessing it (old ideas and hacks too, might want to get rid of this)
Although, looking at your CSS file, you might WANT to consider hiding it from people. It's very badly coded and you can't possibly use all the font classes declared in there.

In all, it's a spammy site trying to sell me something I probably already know.
It's badly designed with bad coding, and the functions and features are messy too.
Personally, I think 95% of people visiting this sort of site just run the other way in fear of being conned. The whole spammy-draw-me-in technique is truly cringe worthy.

To sell a service like this, you have to come across as a respectable professional who has been trained in dealing with addictions and personal issues.
Or at the very least be someone who has been in the same situation/predicament to others and has managed by your own techniques to resolve your addictions. Perhaps you are this person, and truly do have some good advice to give people.

If so, you really need to explain this in a friendly manner, not some large corporate company psycho babble.

Perhaps this idea would be better suited within your own local area so you can meet up with people in person. If you do have some good advice to offer people, and genuinely want to help them rather than just make a few $$ from some advice, then this might be the way to go.

There's nothing wrong of course with making a decent living from helping others from your own advice, sometimes a shove in the right direction is all people need.

If you need any help or advice with any of the comments and suggestions for design, I.E. HTML and CSS etc, just start a thread in the relevant forum Smiling

Sincerely, good luck

decibel.places's picture

He has: 1,494 posts

Joined: Jun 2008

greg wrote:
And when I read the "My service to you" page, all you tell me is you can help me stop using nose sprays.

I had a roommate in High School who was addicted to decongestant nosesprays - but that was not nearly his least appealing point, socially.

I think there are people who get hooked, but they don't want to try alternative methods, MDs got them hooked in the first place, so let the doctors fix them.

However, if you obtain enough traffic P.T. Barnum's axiom "There's a sucker born every minute" will lead to some sales.

I read that those Viagra spam emails are productive once in approximately 1.5 million and have a small profit margin - which is why we keep getting them.

greg's picture

He has: 1,581 posts

Joined: Nov 2005

I understand that spammy-scammy marketing ads work.

As do "Send £10, your bank details, photocopy of your drivers license and passport to this address in Bulgaria and we will send you your free XYZ"
XYZ being whatever you want, as it doesn't exist.

It being a successful method doesn't give any justification to doing it though, even if you have fallen trap to it yourself.
Everyone passing on the scam to others only makes it more likely to come back around to you again.
Perhaps better disguised next time.

But, alternatively, instead of being immoral and preying on lesser knowledgeable people, like the "suckers born every minute", one should be more diligent towards providing a sensible and honest list of services.

Which may well bring more sales, at the very least each sale would be genuine and honest. And if the "My Story" page has anything to go by, april3kids should want to avoid conning elderly folk, and ripping off those who think the gobbledygook psycho babble must be written by someone who knows more than them, rather than a con artist.

They have: 7 posts

Joined: Feb 2009

I looked at your site yesterday and was going to try to give a critique, but there was so much to say, I wanted to think about it a while. I'm glad I waited to post because now I'm in the wonderful position of just being backup. Smiling

The moment I landed on your site, I wanted to click away. I hadn't read a thing; it just "felt" wrong. It had "you know you're about to be attacked by a virus" written all over it. I resisted the urge and read a little bit, but I couldn't figure out what you were selling and still really wanted to get off there.

I did make myself click on your "My Story" page. It was an interesting story, but when I was done reading, I still didn't know what you were selling. Also, I think it looks like a personal blog. Maybe if you took out the big lines that break it up into sections that might help some.

I'm a transcriptionist, so the one area I can really help you is spelling/grammar errors, and you had several of those.

* You put breath where you meant to put breathe.
* You should have put "an over-the-counter" not "a over the counter."
* Half-hearted should be hyphenated.
* Doctor should be spelled out because when a person sees Dr., they expect to see a name after it.
* Psychologist and nutritionist don't need to be capitalized, but maybe you did that for effect...
* Near the bottom, you put took instead of taken.
* It should be "lay in bed," not "laid in bed."
* Most people make this mistake, but it should be "off it," not "off of it."
* The first word (so) in the next sentence should be capitalized, and you also put "have acknowledge" rather than "have to acknowledge."
* Your last sentence should say "you were in," not "you was in."

greg's picture

He has: 1,581 posts

Joined: Nov 2005

GSc wrote:
* Doctor should be spelled out because when a person sees Dr., they expect to see a name after it.
Interesting point as I did exactly that, and thought there was a name missing.
I re-read up to that point twice, and for a moment I even thought it might have been called from a DB or variable and something had gone wrong.

They have: 14 posts

Joined: Jan 2009

You have a lot of really good information but the design is really choppy and outdated. I think you need to focus on consistency and organization, because when I visit it right now, there are just too many colors and different text styles, that I am overwhelmed and don't know where to look first. I like how the navigation remains constant and how the titles are page headers are always in the same place, but there seems to be some brokenness to everything. You should get logo of some sort instead of just text for the title of your company.

They have: 9 posts

Joined: Mar 2009

Looks good. I would not display counter on the page which shows it is a very new site.

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