site for review

[thegiftco]

I’m dreading asking this in case it’s all negative, but please review my site www.theshropshiregiftcompany.com

It’s only a week or so old and is still having a few tweaks here and there, but other than that, it’s complete. The images aren’t the best , even though most are direct from the suppliers. This will be addressed in due course when we pay for photography.

As it’s in it’s infancy, there are few or no inbound links

Suggestions on the code would be welcome, but, to be honest, I won’t know terminologies, so layman terms only please.

We are targeting ABC1 socioeconomic groups of all nationalities and genders

Thanks

Chris

[Eagle]

That's one of the nicest looking sites I've seen for a long time. I usually tire very quickly when I arrive at this type of site and I go no further - but this was different - a real feeling of luxury.

Just goes to show that a start-up can reap rewards with good branding.

[thegiftco]

Thanks for that.

I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder and others may not like it, but we were aiming for a relaxed feel

as soon as we can get some pro photography, we can polish it a bit more

didn't you buy anything

[stratigen]

Originally Posted by thegiftco

I’m dreading asking this in case it’s all negative, but please review my site www.theshropshiregiftcompany.com

e are targeting ABC1 socioeconomic groups of all nationalities and genders

Thanks

Chris

Hi,

This is a good start.

I've got a couple of minor observations.

1. You could consider adding an 'about us' section, just to reveal a little about those involved. This'll make the site just that little bit more 'personal'.

2. The shopping cart function seems to get 'upset' if you enter an amount above 12. Here, of course, it's improbable people are going to be ordering in the dozens. Nonetheless, you might want to 'raise the bar' on the maximum number of units a little ...

Overall, though, well done - it's a nice, clean, simple website, etc.

Best of luck.

[thegiftco]

Hi SJ

Thanks for the feedback.

I have thought about an 'about us' page, just never got round to it... i was thinking if i had one, i could reduce the blurb on the front page and make it a bit more google adword friendly

On the shopping cart, it's set so you can only order up to the quantity in stock, so maybe the item you looked at had a qty of 12. (candles perhaps). it gives a message in red saying that you have ordered over the stock level, but i don't think it's clear enough... maybe it needs to be bolder and in the middle of the screen

Cheers

Chris

[fisicx]

Chris,

Agree with the other that it is a very nicy looking site. You asked for comments on the code so here we go.

1. The document head needs serious work. Remove the metatag keywords, it looks like spam and in any case is ignored by the search engines. Get rid of all the other metatags, they do nothing and just slow down your loadtimes. Write a description metatag for each product, this is the snippet that will appear below the page title on the search engine results page. Move the JavaScript to an external file.

2. Make sure every page has a main header <h1>. This is a vital piece of indexable content.

3. Delete, remove, expunge and destroy your navigation and replace it with text links. Until you do this the search engines will not be able to index the site.

4. Clean up all the HTML by moving the styles to your stylesheet.

5. Consider using CSS instead of tables. Your product pages have 20 tables, each takes a time to resolve slowing down the site and increasing your bandwidth.

Hope this helps.

[thegiftco]

Thanks for that.

The metatag keyword was mentioned to me yesterday also, so i take it on board as a valid point.

I have passed your comments onto the website designers and await thier comments.

cheers

[thegiftco]

The website designers have assured me that they are making the changes

Thanks for your input, i would have plodded along blindly trusting that everything was ok

Chris