How's my website looking? If you got a moment! Thanks

wow man nice website! you will always get hits with music reviews and whatnot.

a few gripes: i dont like the background, its too 'busy'.

"who we are" not "who is skarphop"

the main page is a bit too long. i dont really like scrolling for an eternity to reach the bottom.

the links up the top are probably a bit too basic.

other then that, i like the reviews, including youtube vids will always get more people coming to look.

nice job goodluck with it!

joecommisso said:

thank you for the review! i really appreciate it I'm glad you pointing out a lot of good things for me! I will def. put them into consideration as I revise and build upon what I have.

Thanks!

Click to expand...

no problems i hope it helps you out a bit. ill have a further look later and might write a few more suggestions

Really cool! nice design... the background though (is it gravel?) takes a bit too long to load, and may become a problem for users with slow connections. But otherwise, I like it a lot.

cheers!

Is it possible that I'm the last honest person posting at MR?

That site is a train wreck.

I have no idea what the other posters were looking at.

diazj3 said:

Really cool! nice design... the background though (is it gravel?) takes a bit too long to load, and may become a problem for users with slow connections. But otherwise, I like it a lot.

cheers!

Click to expand...

it took a very long time to load for me too, especially since i am in australia! i dont really like the gravel background

citizenzen said:

Is it possible that I'm the last honest person posting at MR?

That site is a train wreck.

I have no idea what the other posters were looking at.

Click to expand...

lol. the OP has said himself that he is still learning, and i can see a lot of the basic principles are there

The colors didn't seem to go with the site imo

DoFoT9 said:

lol. the OP has said himself that he is still learning, and i can see a lot of the basic principles are there

Click to expand...

We're all still learning.

I just wonder if this is supposed to be about back-slapping and self-esteem boosting, or if its an actual, honest critique.

Here. Let me give the back-slapping a go...

Dude! Way to display those basic principles! You sure did display a lot of them!

joecommisso said:

http://www.sparkhop.com

I officially launched 3 months ago yesterday. Just wondering what you guys think of it. Opinions, ideas, rants, raves, etc.

Also according to analytics I'm receiving an average of 88 unique hits a day. Is that decent for 3 months running with low amounts of advertisement?

Also those of you who own websites what avenues have proven successful advertisement wise for you?

Thanks!

Click to expand...

You want it, you'll get it.

First of all, you really need to learn about consistency, accessibility, KISS and color scheme. They are very important and key features of any design and the first thing that needs to be learned.

Secondly, you really need optimize the site for the slowest internet speed as possible, the faster your site is, the more likely people will stay. Therefore you need to learn about user interface and human tendency. Read studies about them.

Thirdly, you need to seriously learn that too much can be a bad thing. You need to pretend that people have very short attention span on the internet. Limit your article views to 5 per page, don't list them all on the same main page.

I'll come back when you get those done.

citizenzen said:

We're all still learning.

I just wonder if this is supposed to be about back-slapping and self-esteem boosting, or if its an actual, honest critique.

Here. Let me give the back-slapping a go...

Dude! Way to display those basic principles! You sure did display a lot of them!

Click to expand...

lol touche´! i think the OP is after honest critique, and possibly ways to make it better, not just the critique itself.

Just some quick notes.

1. It's too wide. I have a bit of scrolling horizontally. Just see a sliver of the right column.
2. The contrast is too high in the header and navigation area. It bugs my eyes.
3. You've got 165 validation errors.
4. 55 CSS errors.

Its way to wide and it is hard for me to read the text.
While i can see where your going with the design and in some circles it would be nice, for me its to busy and hard to read.

MikhailT said:

You want it, you'll get it.

First of all, you really need to learn about consistency, accessibility, KISS and color scheme. They are very important and key features of any design and the first thing that needs to be learned.

Secondly, you really need optimize the site for the slowest internet speed as possible, the faster your site is, the more likely people will stay. Therefore you need to learn about user interface and human tendency. Read studies about them.

Thirdly, you need to seriously learn that too much can be a bad thing. You need to pretend that people have very short attention span on the internet. Limit your article views to 5 per page, don't list them all on the same main page.

I'll come back when you get those done.

Click to expand...

Everything said above is gospel. Just a few short notes to add:

1.) Create a "theme" - You have a lot of content from a lot of different sources - and it shows. Try to restyle things to make everything more co-hesive. Research a little about complimentary colors and work up a palette of maybe 3 "main" colors that you're going to focus on. Then try and create a look or "brand" for your site - right now you have the beginnings but it's rough and needs some tweaking.

2.) I've also found it easier to clean up layout by sketching them out on paper. Mock everything up and play with your color and see what you like before you commit time to coding.

3.) Get inspired - browse some "competitors" - just some other sites that cover similar topics to your site. Try and spot any trends, make a list of things you like about other sites, make a list of things you don't like. See what the sites you like are doing differently than you. Then put all of that together and make a to-do list for changing/updating your own site.

4.) Efficiency - Go through your code and if you're not using something, take it out. When you save your images for web really check file sizes and see if you're getting the smallest file size you can. Don't be afraid to try different formats and color depths. Sometimes you don't need millions of colors. If you're using photoshop the 4-Up preview panel can really help.

Hope something in all that helps you out! Good luck!

citizenzen said:

Is it possible that I'm the last honest person posting at MR?

That site is a train wreck.

I have no idea what the other posters were looking at.

Click to expand...

citizenzen said:

We're all still learning.

I just wonder if this is supposed to be about back-slapping and self-esteem boosting, or if its an actual, honest critique.

Here. Let me give the back-slapping a go...

Dude! Way to display those basic principles! You sure did display a lot of them!

Click to expand...

Of course were all still learning... But you might of forgot how hard it is to get going when your first starting out.. Its really not "hey <html> blahahsdbuwe</html>" and thats a site. More than that and its HARD to pick up at first.

That is sooo much better!

My only quibble... don't center this... align-left instead...



It looks waaay more professional.

Now git out there and make some money!

joecommisso said:

Thanks for all the criticism!!! Good & bad! It helps out a lot, or at least I hope so!

I've reworked the site around & pretty much went a new direction, I used some of the advice above. So anyone who might have view my site before if you could let me know if it's improved I would greatly appreciate it. Otherwise its back to the drawing board.

Thanks again!!

-Joe

http://www.sparkhop.com

Click to expand...

Much better, it's more professional, straight to the point, simple and more consistent than the previous one. You are learning in the right direction though. Good job, but you still got more to go.

1) Don't use the new window icons (the one on Releases/Store), very ugly and doesn't fit in with the theme. Consistency is once again key.

2) You need to pick better typography for your headings, navigation and body article. If your heading doesn't fit on a single line, it's no good. You also need to reword them better. || is not good, it's a cheap copout.

3) You still have way too much information on a single page, it's very distracting and not organized. First, don't list full articles on the single main page, use the <more> tags for the "click here to view full articles". Don't use multiple flash videos on same site or otherwise many Mac/Linux users as well as some if not most Windows users will experience a lot of lags since Flash takes up too much CPU just to draw ONE video. Remember what i said last time, anything slowing down the site loading will only serve to piss people off and less likely to convince them to spend more time or coming back.

4) The black headers is too dark and so is the background on the side, you should lighten them up to fit with the overall color scheme. Black against white is not that good of a color contrast, you should read that link and use it well. It's part of the accessibility that I told you about.

Good work. Lots of good stuff in there.

It looks good for the most part. Just make sure that the side bars don't get too cluttered with things that you don't need. This can draw the visitors eyes away from the actual content.