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Feedback please on my health/fitness/news site

H

hideoshi

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 19, 2010
13
19
I'm looking for feedback/critiques on my website BodyGeeks.com. It's been through a few different design iterations already but I'm pretty happy with it now.

The site is divided into 5 main sections:

News - which is just general stuff in the media, things that I thought were interesting

Workouts - which, unsurprisingly is workout videos

BodyGeeks TV - which is something I'm still figuring out but is basically a place for me to record details of experiments related to the body that I do

Knowledge - Information, how to and general, well researched education about how the body works

Skills - A showcase for people doing amazing things with their bodies.

I'd really appreciate comments on functionality and usability and layout. Oh, and obviously if anything's broken! I'm still reasonably new to CSS...

Thanks :)
 
hey there!

I actually LOVE the content you have on the site. I watched a couple of vids and found some of it inspirational.

I think if anything you just want to make your site look less busy and more clean. Remember people are coming there to see the content, not the ads, etc.

I would love to see the square ads to be on one side and towards the bottom. when it is on the top I just feel distracted and I am not sure where to look.

I think you also want the left column to say photostream, or something to explain what it is for. I automatically assumed it was more ads because of the ad on top.

Also I think the #48 and other tips are AWESOME. They are simple clean and effective. Bring that to the top right or the top left so people know they are tips! I thought once again it was an ad!

I realize you need to make money so no worries on the ads, but make them less in your face and more out of the way! Perhaps Google Ad words that are text based and more effective? Just a thought.

Keep it up, you have some great articles on there! :)
 
Hi boohoowoofoo. Thanks very much for the kind words!

I actually agree with all your points, I've been trying to figure out what to do with the ads for a while but still haven't quite figured out the best way to arrange them. It's good to hear from another source that they may be distracting though as I probably don't really notice them anymore as I'm used to their placement.

Same for the left hand column. That's actually a featured post area, but I've had trouble figuring out where to put the header (actually that's largely because there's an ad at the top of the column, so i guess it's time to move that somewhere else!)

As far as the site looking busy, if it's not too much trouble, would you mind giving me some examples of what you mean? What do you think should be highlighted that isn't? What gets lost? Is it mainly due to the ads or is it something else?

Again, really appreciate the feedback, I was having a bit of a bad day yesterday and this cheered me up no end! So thankyou!!:)

Oh, also great advice about Adwords, looking into it now...
 
Very nice site and I agree with the previous poster. It's very difficult to focus on anything on your site. You need to create some hierarchy in your content. As it is right now, NOTHING grabs my attention immediately; everything is trying to grab it.

A couple of suggestions:
I would simplify your navigation - you don't need the image background on the navigation.

One thing I would do in small text is put "advertisement" over the ones that are ads so it's clear what your content and what are ads.

Place a header title on your right sidebar as to what those items are which look like recent posts?

Increase the font-size of the main content as well as the title.

My 2cents and btw..great job!
 
You seemed to have nailed something which alot of people forget when making a site and that is good well written content, so on that front you get top marks :)

As for the design, I think that having loading your ads AND having large images on the left hand side can seem a bit much, I know they contain your content but they are kinda advert sized so my brain seems to naturally think they are getting in the way (probably just me) Still have a look at how sites like engadget do it. Enough room for lots of content and ads.
 
Thanks very much guys, your advice and kind words are much appreciated. I think that your comments are leading me to consider a two column layout rather than three columns.

That way, the content is more dominant on the page, ads can be moved to one side, and I can still have a featured area elsewhere, maybe at the top of the page. Also, a two column layout with a larger content area makes a larger font make look better.

I'll do some tinkering on my test site and see what I can come up with...
 
hideoshi said:
As far as the site looking busy, if it's not too much trouble, would you mind giving me some examples of what you mean? What do you think should be highlighted that isn't? What gets lost? Is it mainly due to the ads or is it something else?
Click to expand...

Hi there!

Sorry for the late reply, I do not browse this section often here on MR.

Anyway I am looking at your updates and I am happy to see improvements! Now that I look at it more I just do not see the need for your photostream on the left hand side. White space is a VERY good thing. Right now you are not making use of your white space. I would remove the left column completely and see how it looks.

check out these two sites:
http://jontangerine.com/
http://www.subtraction.com/

See how they are not really using the entire width of their site? I understand from your perspective you want to fill the page with exciting content. Let the quality of your articles speak for themselves! I think you have a really good thing going with your blog and I would love to see the content take the forefront and the design be a compliment to your overall work, not a distraction.

I will come back and check your revisions when I get a chance! I do a lot of freelance graphic design work and I am busy this time of year, but I am motivated by the fact that you are a health expert and have great design sense!

Best,

sammy
 
Hey guys, your comments kind of sent me back to the drawing board but I think I've ended up with a better site because of it so thankyou!! As you can see, I've borrowed some design queues from the Gawker sites (hopefully not the bits everyone hates!) and gone with a two column layout rather than three.

Also I've removed the ads from the left side and stuck them in the post flow. Similarly, I've but the little body facts section into the flow of posts (coding that was a nightmare!) and taken the featured posts list from the left to the right.

I really wanted to feature the content more prominently so gave myself a few different post style options and tried to minimise the amount of other stuff on the page.

Please let me know what you think..

Bodygeeks.com
 
Last edited:
Looks good.

I think you need to space the posts out a bit. They are very close together, try adding a bigger margin on the top and bottom.

Max
 
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