I'm a total amateur, any help very welcome.

[freeswinging.co.uk]

Hiya,

firstly, let me state upfront, that the site I have is of an adult nature, though there is no pornography on my site. If this kind of site isn't allowed on here, then fair enough, I'll gracefully bow out. (link to my site at end of this post)

After looking at a fair few threads where you've helped others with websites, both design and SEO, I thought I'd join here and ask for your advice purely on how to make my site useful.

OK, small bit of background info. I can muck about making websites, and tweek things now and again, and I'm not a total numpty when it comes to websites, though I know that there's a lot I need to learn. Which is where you guys come in...

My site was set up, to help people find the forum I use, as we were dying a death from lack of new members. We left a different site, that used to be free, because it was bought out and became pay to use. So, we're not a business and there is an absolute rule that nothing can be charged for.

So, in a nutshell, we're a free swinging forum that refuses to charge, but we weren't getting found and it was dying. I set up my, more aptly named site, in the hope I could help people find us via Google. To some degree that has worked. My site was offline for a month earlier this year, and the amount joining dropped to almost zero.

In the scheme of things, it should be a guaranteed winner. A site, where you get something for absolutely free, where other similar UK sites charge £50+ for a years membership.

I've set up my index page to look just like the main site, though this was partly to do with trying to convince the site Admin, that they need to alter how their index page should look. But the rest of my site is a tip to be honest!
Though I have this weekend free to tidy it up... and with any info from you lovely people, I wont just be stumbling in the dark.

On Google. If you search for "100% free swinging" I seem to come up as #1. But for most other searches, I'm not really getting found at all. Not even for "free swinging". I''m getting about 60 - 70 hits a day :? So, what's going wrong there?

Anyhows, thanks in advance for any advice. This isn't just to plug an adult site, it is a real request for some advice. If I was just plugging, I'd have not typed so much!

Thanks!

Oh, you can find my site at http://www.freeswinging.co.uk

[peterjhale]

Hi and welcome

I guess you need more incoming links with the anchor text "free swinging"

Additionally, your most important phrase, "free swinging" should start your <title> tag and starting have the "free swinging" together in your text.

Also, I would get rid of all the junk links at the bottom to your forums and free indexes etc etc

[freeswinging.co.uk]

Originally Posted by peterjhale

Hi and welcome

I guess you need more incoming links with the anchor text "free swinging"

Additionally, your most important phrase, "free swinging" should start your <title> tag and starting have the "free swinging" together in your text.

Also, I would get rid of all the junk links at the bottom to your forums and free indexes etc etc

Thanks for taking the time to have a look at my site... really appreciate it.

OK, I've just edited out the junk links at the bottom of the page, the ones with town locations and the link to another site that links into mine. I was getting very little traffic from it anyhows, so no loss.

I also edited the <title> tag to mention "free swinging" Can't believe i missed the obvious there .. thanks very much for that.

Any other pointers always welcome. I've been tidying things up all day, on other pages of the site .... though it's a work in progress still .

[dependx]

I liked the site upon first impresson. But, after going back to review some issues note in #2 -- I wasn't too excited. It's a nice site but no cigar!

Can I suggest something no more than crazy minded than a blog, you could offer background image to both sides of the text. See my blog link below. And the background could offer a subtle tip as to the theme of site. (a gentle tease for somebody not into reading the content)

Also, I think that some of you layout looks a tad amateurish at the bottom, but the main text almost looks too stiff -- like a encyclopedia site.

Your choice of font is too rigid for the words it uses.

However, I don't fear that it should take too long to get things straight under you belt, Im terrible with sites' building. You decide!

Thanks for you site, it is good stuff.

[freeswinging.co.uk]

Originally Posted by dependx

I liked the site upon first impresson. But, after going back to review some issues note in #2 -- I wasn't too excited. It's a nice site but no cigar!

Can I suggest something no more than crazy minded than a blog, you could offer background image to both sides of the text. See my blog link below. And the background could offer a subtle tip as to the theme of site. (a gentle tease for somebody not into reading the content)

Also, I think that some of you layout looks a tad amateurish at the bottom, but the main text almost looks too stiff -- like a encyclopedia site.

Your choice of font is too rigid for the words it uses.

However, I don't fear that it should take too long to get things straight under you belt, Im terrible with sites' building. You decide!

Thanks for you site, it is good stuff.

Thanks for the input ... yeah, I think you're right about the text style and writing being a tad wrong. I'm trying to correct it, by breaking the sections down into more user friendly "bite-sized" pages... that are more specific to what someone is looking for. Plus it gives me more options to use 'title' tags that are very specific.

I'm going to totally re-write the main page any time very soon, as I'm pretty sure no one gives a flying monkeys "why" we are a free site, they just want a free site.. if they're interested as to how we came to set up a free site, I can write that on some other page.

At the moment though, after reading some of the tutorials and advice on here, and with the input above, I've tidied up a lot of rubbish, got rid of no end of bad stuff (like those awful links I had at the bottom!) and generally just made it a much better site.... it's a work in progress though!