Advice site needs advice!!!

[bowyer]

Hi, this site has been running for a few weeks now and I'm trying to tweak the faults and see what could be done better. I'm not an expert webmaster so I'd be grateful if you could point out all the faults.

In return, I promise to take it all on the chin, thank you all and, where necessary, smile through gritted teeth.

The site itself is in an 'agony aunt' style, where people with personal problems can seek advice from 'aunts and uncles' (me and my friends/colleagues), with a guaranteed personal and confidential email response in 24 hours. I think that in those senses we're pretty unique on the web. Please check us out!

www.agonyadvice.co.uk

[fisicx]

Hi Bowyer,

I was a bit worried when I saw your post - most of these sites tend to be vehicles for adsense and other banner junk. But it turns out not to be so - which was nice.

First off - get rid of that horrid animated banner - it cheapens the whole site. You need an image that sell the idea of people bonding and sharing.

The menu is javascript driven so it won't be indexed by the search engines. And you are linking to an external site for your images which will really slow things down for you (remember over 50% of the population is still on dial up).

The quote of the day is naff - and takes visitors off site which you don't want.

It's not free! I understand why you charge but I don't want to - I can search the internet for all sorts of advice for free. You need to convince me that you are qualified to help me. Show me your pictures and tell me about yourself, make me feel wanted.

Provide examples of how you helped people, provide real life stories. You do have a resources page but there is not a lot of concrete advice, just lots of wooly generic waffle.

If I wanted help I'm not sure I'm would use you. For example: I'd go to my bank for financial advice - they are regulated by the FSA. All you offer is unbiased advice and I can do that: In debt? Stop spending money. Show me examples!

Note: retract my earlier comment regarding adsense - they are all over the site and they will take potential customers away. You don't need the income - you are already charging for your advice.

Coding issues: Rethink your design. There are no headers, the titles repeat, the metatags are spammy, you use tables for structure, HTML styles, javascript menus and external images/code. And the page doesn't validate but that's of lesser importance.

Graham

[stjepan]

Well, I'm not British, so I don't know your local customs, but why 'agony'? Why not "happiness advice", 'life advice', something happier than word agony? It seems that I'll get an advice how to get into agony.

[fisicx]

Obviously bowyer wasn't that keen on getting any advice...

[bowyer]

Hi fisicx, thanks for your feedback. I am actually keen on getting advice, but I had hoped to get at least three or four replies before replying, rather than 'spamming' this thread by replying to each. Also, more replies would give me a clearer idea of which way the wind of opinion was blowing, before making any rash decisions based on a limited amount of feedback. However, as a) you bothered to give me a decent critique, and b) you clearly aren't a person who likes to feel that they are being ignored, I thank you for your observations, and this is how I have now acted based on your feedback (and on feedback from a couple of other sites):

1) The banner has changed, what do you all think? This new banner represents two people sharing something, with a smile, and the idea of crossing a bridge, metaphorically. does this feel too cryptic/hard to spot?

2) Yes, the menu is javascript: I use an online website builder provided by the host. This makes the website easy for me to use and change, but has the downside of preventing complete control over design. I have countered this by writing in HTML a 'menu with descriptions' on the main part of the page.

3) I thought the quote was naff too, but people keep tellling me that fresh content is key, so i stuck it in. Glad you didn't like it, needed an excuse to get rid of it.

4) It's too long to go into now, but essentailly, 'free' advice is rarely free (there's always a cost somewhere), and even more rarely, is it good and well-written advice. For a full explanation, please go to the 'Why Ask Us' page, which explains why we charge, and why it makes more sense than free advice.

5) There's no benefit to telling people about ourselves any further - we freely say that we aren't expert counsellors (although there are several uni degrees, including psychology; not that a degree is necessary, but we all write in good, clear, well-constructed English). Most importantly, we like the sense of anomynity created: clients don't know us, we don't know them, they therefore feel secure in the sense that their problem will be dealt with by a completely objective stranger. We don't want to be 'best friends' with our clients: we want to be objective, unbiased, non-partisan advisors. We also hope that the site creates a sense of trust and professionalism. We will, however, review this, depending on feedback.

6) We will shortly introduce a GENUINE testimonials page. In order to do this, we have to receive enough GENUINE feedback. I hate those sites which make up BS testimonials, so we ask all of our clients to give us feedback. If they choose to (it's up to them), I won't print any personal info or problem details. This takes time (I want to get about 20 good, interesting pieces of feedback). You suggest how we've helped people? Unfortunately for us, because we guarantee absolute confidentiality and privacy, I won't reveal how we've helped people because this would necessitate telling someone's 'story': this would be morally wrong based on what we make claim to do.

7) We don't give specific financial advice(you correctly identify that we aren't regulated by the FSA), but ironically, if you asked me, your own bank is the last place I'd recommend you go to, if you want the best rate and/or service. Historically, the place you hold your account offers the worst rates of interest on deposits, loans and mortgages. I'd recommend that you shopped around, probably visit the Motley Fool website or asked an IFA who charges the bank rather than you for recommending where to go for the best deal. As to your comment, 'In debt? Stop spending money', that's just a ridiculously churlish (shameful, even) comment which you know overly simplifies the desperate situation that many people find themselves in. In fact, many peole who are in debt find themselves there through no clear fault of their own, and certainly not through being a spendthrift, and would be deeply insulted if you made that comment to them.

8) Adsense is making me money, but I have cut down on the rather unnecessary banners linked to affiliate programs - they aren't making me any money anyway.

9) Coding issues: sorry, I don't have a clue about most of this. I will cut down the meta tags, I realise these are spammy, but using the website builder I can't make the pages validate ( I think). What do you mean by 'There are no headers, the titles repeat, you use tables for structure, HTML styles'?

Also, I've changed the pink at the top to a much lighter colour, so it doesn't glare so much.

The rest I'm working on.And for stjepan, an 'agony aunt' is someone who gives advice on personal problems, normally in a print column (now online too). 'Agony advice' is what is given as a result. It is primarily a British terminology, but aliteral translation exists in may languages, and the concept is global.

Thanks for reading this marathon post - I waned to be comprehensive in my reply, and make the point that I never ignore the courtesy of someone who takes the time to give me advice, especially when it is so useful. Regards, Bowyer.

[fisicx]

One of the main problems with many of the sites offered for review is that they fail to meet the fundamental accessibility and usability criteria.

It is often the case that the owner of the site has used a template or commercial software to create the site and is hamstrung by the limitations of the template or software.

The same it true with this site. It is impossible to 'tweak' the site to make it effective. The problems stem from the general design in that it fails the most basic accessibility and usability criteria.

But I shall attempt to detail the sort of changes required to improved the chances of the site being successful.

Page Structure. Do not use tables to position elements on the page. Tables make the site inaccessible to screen readers and PDAs. They can cause the robots to loose the continuity of the information flow and incorrectly index the documents. They will also cause your printouts to overspill the paper. Make sure the information on the page follows a logical structure then use CSS to position each bit.

Page Titles. The search engines put the page title at the top of each result. If all your titles are identical, the search engines will often regard the pages as being 'similar' and not show them on the SERP. Make sure your page titles are unique to each page and describe the contents of the page. Maximum length is 60 characters.

Navigation. Make sure your primary navigation is text based. Do not use javascript rollovers, drop downs or any other fancy devices. Screen readers, PDAs, the search engines and many others will not be able to access your site if you use javascript as your exclusive navigation medium. If you really want images then use CSS.

Header. The first piece of meaningful text on each page should be the main header <H1>. Only have one <H1> on the page. Make sure the header connects with the page title and describes the content of the page.

Paragraph One. Describe the contents of the page. Make sure you tell the visitor what so special about the site - do not tell them about you.

Get these right and you will be halfway there.

Now obviously this is just scratching the surface of effective web design but should give you something to think about.

The specifics of the agonyaunt site relate to the service offered.

You need to sell your services from the onset. Get rid of all the waffle and sell, sell, sell.

Make sure the central link on the home page takes the visitor to the 'help me' page. Make sure the procedure is painless: 1: what sort of help do you want. 2: how are you going to pay, 3: tell me your problem.

I can understand your reluctance to tell me about yourself but background information is always useful. For example, if I am going to tell you all about my desire to bath in jam I would want to know I'm talking to someone who has a little experience in the subject. At least tell me your names, it's much more friendly.

Make sure you explain why you charge. And make sure you do it in 1 or 2 sentences. People who need help what to talk not read. Explain on another page in detail why free advice is not free - why are you betther that the CAB, Relate or the Samaritans.

You are providing a service to those who need help. So provide help. Make it easy for them to get that help. Make them feel safe - use comforting words on your pages - do not make it sound like a business, make it personal, as if your really care about them.

Hope this helps

Graham

[bowyer]

Graham,

Thanks for your recent post, I've done a lot of reviewing and tweaking as a result of feedback from the rest of the team (who only answer questions, the site is 'my' baby!), and from many people on various forums in the last few days and your advice has been among the most helpful.

I have now put a more central, direct link to 'help me' on the home page.

I've reviewed and simplified the procedure for payment.

We still prefer to maintain as high a degree of anonymity as possible on all sides, and we would never make up fake stuff to mislead people as to who we are, so things will stay as they are at the moment. If relate doesn't print the names of its counsellors, with CVs, on its website, and CAB doesn't do it either, then why should we? We passionately believe that we give fantastic, intelligent, balanced advice that is carefully written by educated, literate, worldly and empathetic individuals. We clearly state that we ARE NOT experts with PHDs in psychology or counselling, but ordinary people with a range of careers and life experience and our prices reflect that. We absolutely refuse to mislead anyone, and if that means saying less rather than more, so be it. Having said that, feedback on the advice that I and my colleagues have given has been exceptionally well received, as our genuine testimonials page shows. There has been no negative feedback on our advice so far (and there won't for a while, touch wood). But I still understand your concerns. Perhaps, as we gain professional qualifications in this field (two of us are currently studying) or we take on more aunts/uncles with qualifications, this may change.

Hmm, yes I think I need to review the language used to make it less 'businessy'. I'm just worried about losing the professional edge and us appearing like so many of those badly-thrown-together advice sites, all pretty flowers and saccharine-sweet platitudes. We don't offer 'it'll be alright in the end' emotional hugs, we offer clear, honest advice: sometimes, that advice is cold and hard and bloody unpleasant to hear. We hate writing those ones, where someone has written us an email virtually begging us to agree with him or her that something can or won't happen, but the whole narrative of the (often long) email tells the opposite story. Killing someone's hope (even with kind words) is a horrible thing, but that's what you pay us for: compassionate honesty.

However, I think I can probably move to a more central ground on this one. Also, I will soon develop the site to give a clearer (as you say, one or two line) explanation on why use us, especially with the link on the 'ask our advice' page.

Thanks again Graham. When we are better established with a decent profit volume, I will come to you to see if you can help maybe develop the site in a professional capacity as I have been very impressed with your help.

[squalid]

with regard to page structure - there is nothing wrong with a site made in a table based layout. search engines certainly dont penalise for table base sites, nor do they penalise you if your site doesnt meet w3c standards.

if you want to target PDA's etc then you could put up pages especially for hand held devices. but alot of sites warn against using CSS for PDA's etc as most only support HTML 3.2 - so tables okay there as well

[fisicx]

Disagree with you there.

The W3C accessibiliy guidelines specifically state that you should not use tables for structure: Guideline 5 - Create tables that transform gracefully..

But I do agree that google will not penalise you for using tables. On the other hand, google also advises you produce pages that render correctly using a text browser. Structural tables will fail that particular guidline as the text browser will display the information row by row. This means that keywords may be indexed out of context thereby loosing you ranking.

Note: nothing wrong with using data tables, that's what they were introduced to do.

[squalid]

the w3c guidelines may state that you should 'Create tables that transform gracefully' - not that you shouldnt use them full stop. The w3c arent the internet police and whilst it may be nice to have a site fully validate - its not essential and for a new site start up time could be spent better elsewhere.

the w3c doesnt control the browsers or the search engines. putting your site through a lynx viewer will confirm that it doesnt fall apart in the search engines view and so okay.