Please look at my site

Welcome aboard wolfweb,

We do ask that you review and participate in the critique of at least three other's sites before asking for one on your own. If you do this then I'm sure you'll get plenty of constructive critisism that'll help you revamp your site. By looking at other sites you'll also get some fresh ideas for yourself so it helps all round.

I'll take a look at the site in a bit for you

1. Too much black.
2. Lose the cheesy clip-art
3. Streamline the layout - a lot. There is way too much scrolling on here, it's hard to distinguish what's what, and the navigation menu is waaaaaaay down the page. Your navbar should always be above the fold
4. Each page should have a consistent look which should include the logo (I'm noticing a bunch of different logo images on here - pick one and use it on every page).

Erm, I agree with Megan. I really think it's too dark and I don't like the tables over the background (I don't like backgrounds!). It all looks very disjointed and is hard to navigate around.

Here goes my opinion for what it's worth.

Black is not very inviting. I would go with a white bg and use the colors, blue and yellow, that are in the logo with the dog as your accent colors. The paw background is cute but just too much.

You have the dogseek search engine at the very top so the first thing you are doing is inviting your visitors to leave your site. Move it toward the middle or bottom.

The layout needs to be more organized. Things are just placed here and there.

I found several dead links. You can go to netmechanic.com and do a free HTML, and link check on your site to locate all dead links so that you can replace or fix them.

Be consistent with the layout and logo through out the site. I like the logo on the first page as opposed to the logo with the dalmatian and pink text.

Good luck!
disastermaster

Well, I don't normally go to (shudder) d*g sites...

My first impression is that it's just too busy. There are three animations on the first screen all vying for my attention. Where do I go? Am I supposed to use the drop-down menu, the paw links to the right, the links in the blue news flash box, the menu below that?

I agree with most everything that's been said so far. You need better and more consistent navigation, to lose the black, etc. That pawprint pattern was starting to give me a headache and I literally saw spots when I looked away from it.

speak/danger.html is completely illegible to me because of the white text over the pawprint background.

Hi,

First up - I like dogs and I'm about to buy one. So I looked at your site with a purpose.

I agree with points raised above - particularly about lack of consistent navigation and layout. Way too much on the homepage and it all appears too jumbled.

Background - yep, it's cute, but it could be used as a visual perception test (ie stare at this for 30 seconds, then look away). Just a suggestion - swap colours around - white background, black or other colour pawprints, then fade out the intensity of the colour, so that the background is just that, a background, and not in your face. I like the way you have continued to use the pawprints in the nav buttons.

Love the cartoons. And the barking dog design cards. Might just have to bookmark that one.

Cheers,

Annette

PS Does appear that there are more and more Australians on this forum. We will have to start with a G'day soon.

It's an interesting site, and that comes from one who has no particular feelings about dogs. Don't love 'em, don't hate 'em.

My immediate impression was "ouch" as the paw background opened, and before the "overlay" came in.

I liked the graphic elements on the page (doggie logo with paws reaching skyward), the paw buttons etc ... but thought there was too much. I am a little of the "less is more" school personally.

Again, my personal opinion is that the "front" page of a website is like the cover of a book ... interesting, and gives you sufficient info to make you read on ... and then you can hit them with all the detail. It should also load quickly.

Generally I thought it would be good with a clean up, removing the background (I still have spots before my eyes , and have it more organised, rather than what *seems* to be a situation of "so much clipart, so little space".

Look forward to seeing your "revamp". Good luck.

John

Well methinks the site needs some work. Most of the work is in the layout of the site.

• Color - the black background is not too appealing to me. It is better suited towards a gaming or 'heavy metal' site.
• Background - I am no fan of backgrounds. The dog printed one didn't do anything for me either.
• Home page - the page is way too long. Remember that some people will not scroll down the page. I have a 19" monitor and I had to scroll down to see at least 3/4 of your content. Most everything that you have should show at 800x600.
• Little bothersome things - if I click on Forum Express, then I am told to "Please select from Menu". This is confusing. What you should have is something like ---Make Selection---, instead of listing something that I can't get to. I hate the dog bark sound on the page. I don't like the animated dog (or whatever that is) above your search button. There is no navbar. When I am on other pages, how do I get back

To me the worst thing about the site is that the layout is bad. Navigation, even getting back to the home page, is horrific. I would also strive to make the page easier to navigate. You should have some kind of navbar on every page. Changing the color, shortening the home page and being more consistent on how the pages look should be your goal.

Oh yeah, here are the rules for a web page. Somehow these kind of stick with me.

Web Design Rules
1) People hate to wait.
2) People hate to scroll.
3) People hate to read.
4) People would rather scroll than wait.
5) People would rather wait than read.
6) People are not necessarily rational or consistent, but sometimes they are.

G'day Dean,

Ive looked and also read the critiques from the knowledgable ones, I can understand what they are suggesting, your site looks very busy for a main page, to much info all at once in my opinion, as far as the use of animated giffs, that seems to be frowned upon here and again I can understand why, to many look "cheesy" and they take time to load, I know it's a dog site, but, way to many "doggy" symbols. To me the BG is a personal thing and as long as the text is readable and not a pain on the eyes, use whatever turns you on.....yes I know "not technically correct" but we do have to have some individualty out there, no use all being clones.

Good luck

Ickbar