Preview - Xcandy

Link now fixed

I really dislike the arrow with box next to it. Especially as it is the same color as the links

I have had quite a few comment on that and will remove the bullet points. Anything Else?

Thanks

Steve

Red + green = Christmas. Don't use them toegether in a design. ALso make sure your map's colours match the ones in the rest of the design. Also work on the placement of your photos - they seem almost randomly placed as they are. They have no relashionship between them. It would probably be easier to use one big photo rather than three smaller ones. The one at the very bottom is okay since it's too far away to have any relationship to the others.

I do like what you've done with the logo (minus the magnifying glass) and the navbar. The red looks good. The logo should definitely be much larger though.

Overall I'm a little disappointed with this. With a name like xCandy you could get away with doing some more wild things to the design. However, I'm not sure that that a funky image (or the name xCandy) would appeal to the audience here. Hard to explain why, but I'm associating xCandy with more of a teenage lifestyle.

Quote: Red + green = Christmas

Your the second person to say that we have had a HUGE debate about this and decided that we are keeping the colours and look chrismassy to certain people

Quote: Also make sure your map's colours match the ones in the rest of the design.

We are working on this as I type

Quote: lso work on the placement of your photos - they seem almost randomly placed as they are. They have no relashionship between them. It would probably be easier to use one big photo rather than three smaller ones. The one at the very bottom is okay since it's too far away to have any relationship to the others.

I totally agree with you I am not happy with the images and will be changing them very soon.

Quote: I do like what you've done with the logo (minus the magnifying glass) and the navbar. The red looks good. The logo should definitely be much larger though.

Thank you ! We decided to keep the header small so the user has a larger working space. We may change this if user opinion is largly against the current version.

Quote: Overall I'm a little disappointed with this

Oh.... urrrm.... Thinks about jumping off the nearest large building.. JK !

Quote: With a name like xCandy you could get away with doing some more wild things to the design. However, I'm not sure that that a funky image (or the name xCandy) would appeal to the audience here. Hard to explain why, but I'm associating xCandy with more of a teenage lifestyle.

Sorry I have to disagree with you on this one. We have tried to mix old with the new and think we have pulled it off quite well. But thats just our personal opinion and personal opinions wont get you far.

Thank you for your detailed views on Xcandy it has really helped.

Steve

Quote: Thank you ! We decided to keep the header small so the user has a larger working space. We may change this if user opinion is largly against the current version.

I don't think this one is a matter of what people do and do not like. It's a matter of branding. If your logo is tiny like that it's not as noticeable and people will be less likely to remember who you are. There are lots of ways of rearranging the layout to leave more space for a logo while still allowing lots of room for content.

What we are planning to do is to strategically place the logo in various places like the branding in the map.

We will review the header section and we will see what we can cunjure.

Thanks Again

Steve

Just an aside, what I'm noticing with a lot of big sites is that the logos aren't particularly big, but do have a fair amount of space around them to create visual impact. They still stand out without being huge (although I still think yours is a tad too small ..)

(I know, I know, you think I'm wrong... no need to comment again)

I only skimmed over some of the comments on your site, so I hope I am not repeating something. I just wanted to say the design looks good, but I did notice a problem with my higher resolution when viewing your page. My resolution is set at 1280x1024 and what happens is that your menu on the left is normally red and ends with a black line that divides it from everything on the right.

Well at my resolution when I have the window maximized your red starts to overlap and actually go on the right side of that black line as well, and it kind of looks tacky. I do not think that is what you intended, so you might want to look into that.

Hope that makes sense

I'm getting a slight horziontal scroll bar at 800x600
You need to add the width and height tags to most of your images, very jumpy loading on dialup.
I don't mind the red/green some how it kind of ties into UK but these shades aren't the most inviting.

I actually didn't think of Xmas when I looked at the site but didn't particularly like the two shades of red together. Also the 'search now' graphics are very blurry and hard to read.

I would make the areas of the maps links as well, as my first instinct was to click that rather than the text links.

I just clicked on South East from the main page and the graphic on the right on the woman & girl is all distorted as the width & height seem to be enlarging the picture!

I then click on Hampshire and I'm getting the same text about the South East, but what do the A-Z links mean - school names, towns?? So I click on G expecting to go through to a listing of place names but I get a list of schools instead, still with the text on the page for the South East. So I then go back a page and click on B as I went to Bay House - I get a page still with the South East text and nothing else. I give up!!

You need to make it clearer on how to get to people's final goal and sort out the text on each page so it's relevent. I would now give this site a miss and go back to Friends Reunited which is easy to navigate and has content.

Update:

Site will go live in the next couple of days pages which are live are:

http://www.xcandy.co.uk/
http://xcandy.co.uk/cgi-bin/members/pub9990125008942.cgi?categoryid=15409
http://xcandy.co.uk/cgi-bin/members/pub9990125008942.cgi?categoryid=14549
http://xcandy.co.uk/cgi-bin/members/pub9990125008942.cgi?categoryid=14569
http://xcandy.co.uk/cgi-bin/members/pub9990125008942.cgi?categoryid=464
http://xcandy.co.uk/cgi-bin/members/pub9990125008942.cgi?itemid=9980125316694&action=viewad&page=1&placeonpage=2&totaldisplayed=20&categoryid=4235

Please note I do still need to make quite a few adjustments to these and still have quite a lot of work to do.

Your advice is greatly welcome

Thanks

Steve

I think it looks pretty sweet... would it really hurt to add scotland and wales to the database? the map on the homepage isnt really recognisable without the rest of the uk on it...

Also, I don't think its really relevent having the creators details on the homepage, maybe on the about page or something. (you dont see bill gates personal details on the homepage of microsoft.com now do you...?)

Apart from that i think its great.

friendsreunited.co.uk offers this service too, so you can't put 'Welcome to the Xcandy Friend Finder website, the one place you can find your old friends from your old schools, colleges and universities.'

"www.friendsreunited.co.uk offers this service too, so you can't put 'Welcome to the Xcandy Friend Finder website, the one place you can find your old friends from your old schools, colleges and universities.' "

I havn't worked on the frontpage text as yet and that will change later today.

I am going to add scotland and wales soon. And I will remove the creators details soon as well.

Thanks I really appreciate your input

how are going to fund this site, should it get popular? you'll have a high bandwidth usage etc. to pay for.

Non intrusive Banner and textual adverts. I have built the site so its very low cost so it will be free for the users.

Steve

I have also managed to throw in some very nifty features :

Personal Polls
Personal friends list navigation
Different descriptions available for multiple listings
Free image uploads which enlarge when clicked

And lots more to come !

Thanks

Steve

should be good if it includes every school and everything

I have to admit my favourite page is the 404 error you get when clicking on "contact," I've never met a web server which is both apologetic, and tries to chat the user up as well!

I'm not a huge fan of the colour scheme on this one (although it'd be wrong for me moan about it, as colour schemes aren't my strongpoint ), but the green just doesn't seem to go with the red.

Going back to a previous point about branding...This isn't just about the size of your logo! Your site has to reflect the tastes of its users, at the moment you are attempting to both be professional and funky (correct me if I'm wrong?), this seems to have ended up with a slightly middle-of-the-road brand which isn't necessarily going to appeal to anyone, IMO you need to decide on your target market and then change things around to appeal to them.

Hope this helps!
Jeeves

I think your links on the left are too spaced out. They whould be closer together.

Also, it seems kind of amateur (no offense) to put info about yourself on the side of your site.

too wide @ 8x6

tried searching for "sarah" got no one? no one in UK is named sarah? geez.

how do you handle requests to opt out of this great service? I personally wouldnt want my contact info on some search for lost friends site. Im sure there are others who are equally reclusive/paranoid. why not just call the site "friend finder" xcandy makes no sense. -Josh

I still get a horizontal scrollbar at 800*600, I still don't think it looks professional enough to be taken too seriously, especially when you have so much competition from the established Friends Reunited and the colours are still wrong IMO. You have to think about all colours that go into the site and on the first page that map just stands out like a sore thumb as the colours just don't go with the site, it looks like you pinched the map from another site or something, although I prefer the colours of the map to those on the site.

Please Please Remember the site is NOT yet finished Nor is it live ! that is why pages are not there and no-one is in the database.

I know about the horizontal scroll as well. Please bear with me ! As I said before I am removing my details from the side bar as that was just something I put there until I finish a help ME ! image

I have a great response from the design and structure of the site ( colours and all ) and I am pleased with the output.

I am going to change the map with Xcandy colours ( even though u dont like them ) and make them clickable.

Also the logo is being re-done totally.

Please read my earlier posts before posting everyone !

Thanks

Steve

sister sarah huh. single? likes grey goose vodka? can she drive stick? -Josh

PS you really do need to make it possible to opt out of being listed, or have your listing removed.

What about the competition ?

There are a couple of Friend search services on the internet but we are committed in making Xcandy to be one of the if not THE best friend search site on the net.
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Hello, one thing that springs to mind with that statement is:

"there are a couple" "Xcandy to be one of the if not THE best"
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If only a "couple" why not be more positive and state we are committed to become THE" best.
And as pointed out earlier, if your a uk friendfinder, then why only england, it should be england friendfinder

The Christmas color scheme is a bit distracting, but in general it looks relatively nice. The left nav area is excellent.

There are a few rough spots, like the white line above the "Welcome to XCandy" header, and the useless gray rectangle between the two boxes on the right.

Also, you might work on refining the margins/padding in some areas. The ratios don't seem right, and some of the text seems crowded.