Website Review - Tourism website

Mr. G

Hi Guys,

I've changed this website a lot, we had it originally in 2009 and kept it updated.
I have taken all the feedback we got for our website and done all the seo myself. I'm not a web designer, (I'd love to call me one, but I'm not) and would like any criticism and suggestions please.
Furthermore, the logo isn't great and were in the middle of getting that sorted, other then that? Is the twitter and facebook page a good idea?
Thanks in advance.

The website can be accessed at:
http://www.kilfenoraclare.com

p

I think the content is pretty good, but I really think you need to improve the visual design overall. The site just doesn't make me want to visit the place. It doesn't give me a sense of what's special about it, and it's purely functional.

More use of colour, better and more use of photography, maps to give you a sense of where you are. All needed to bring it up a level.

If you can't hire a designer, then I'd recommend buying a 'tourism' web template and customising to help give it some more life.

Hope that helps!

Mr. G

p wrote: »

I think the content is pretty good, but I really think you need to improve the visual design overall. The site just doesn't make me want to visit the place. It doesn't give me a sense of what's special about it, and it's purely functional.

More use of colour, better and more use of photography, maps to give you a sense of where you are. All needed to bring it up a level.

If you can't hire a designer, then I'd recommend buying a 'tourism' web template and customising to help give it some more life.

Hope that helps!

Thanks.
Yes, I've looked around the templates for wordpress and I'm stuck in the middle- I need to use a lot more colour, would the use of custom picture headers in the template a good idea?
Getting something like discoverireland.ie logo, as I hear they have helped out other towns?

Feedback much appreciated.

Procasinator

The design is a bit bland, but it's also fairly clean (which is nice).

One simple thing you could do to spice it up a little is to use photos direct under (and attached to the menu bar). The menu items could hover over this photo.

It wouldn't need to be a big photo; wide as the black bar and maybe 150 pixels high so you don't push content down to far.

You could change the picture per category (or maybe some particular sub pages).

Another small change you should make is lining up the pictures in articles/page better with the line of text. You can do this by moving the picture outside of the paragraph. For instance, looking at

[HTML]
<h1>The Band</h1>
<p>2009 was the centenary celebration of the formation of the Kilfenora band. Not only is this an historic milestone for the band itself but a reminder that Irish culture and traditions are thriving and have survived the test of time.

<img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-453" title="Kilfenora CB" src="http://www.kilfenoraclare.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Kilfenora-CB1-300x200.jpg&quot; alt="Kilfenora Ceili Band" width="300" height="200" />

</p>

<p>The twelve-piece band features five fiddles (Eimear Howley, Sinead Heagney, Anne Rynne, Pat Lynch and Annemarie McCormack), two flutes (Anthony Quigney and Garry Shannon), two sqeezeboxes (Tim Collins and his wife, Claire Griffin), banjo and leader (John Lynch), drums (Sean Griffin) and piano (Fintan McMahon).</p>
[/HTML]

it looks better as:

[HTML]
<h1>The Band</h1>
<p>2009 was the centenary celebration of the formation of the Kilfenora band. Not only is this an historic milestone for the band itself but a reminder that Irish culture and traditions are thriving and have survived the test of time.

</p>

<img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-453" title="Kilfenora CB" src="http://www.kilfenoraclare.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Kilfenora-CB1-300x200.jpg&quot; alt="Kilfenora Ceili Band" width="300" height="200" />

<p>The twelve-piece band features five fiddles (Eimear Howley, Sinead Heagney, Anne Rynne, Pat Lynch and Annemarie McCormack), two flutes (Anthony Quigney and Garry Shannon), two sqeezeboxes (Tim Collins and his wife, Claire Griffin), banjo and leader (John Lynch), drums (Sean Griffin) and piano (Fintan McMahon).</p>
[/HTML]

As the image now lines up with the first line of second paragraph instead of starting in the bottom of the first and reaching into the second.

Mr. G

Procasinator wrote: »

The design is a bit bland, but it's also fairly clean (which is nice).

One simple thing you could do to spice it up a little is to use photos direct under (and attached to the menu bar). The menu items could hover over this photo.

It wouldn't need to be a big photo; wide as the black bar and maybe 150 pixels high so you don't push content down to far.

You could change the picture per category (or maybe some particular sub pages).

Another small change you should make is lining up the pictures in articles/page better with the line of text. You can do this by moving the picture outside of the paragraph. For instance, looking at

[HTML]
<h1>The Band</h1>
<p>2009 was the centenary celebration of the formation of the Kilfenora band. Not only is this an historic milestone for the band itself but a reminder that Irish culture and traditions are thriving and have survived the test of time.

<img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-453" title="Kilfenora CB" src="http://www.kilfenoraclare.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Kilfenora-CB1-300x200.jpg"; alt="Kilfenora Ceili Band" width="300" height="200" />

</p>

<p>The twelve-piece band features five fiddles (Eimear Howley, Sinead Heagney, Anne Rynne, Pat Lynch and Annemarie McCormack), two flutes (Anthony Quigney and Garry Shannon), two sqeezeboxes (Tim Collins and his wife, Claire Griffin), banjo and leader (John Lynch), drums (Sean Griffin) and piano (Fintan McMahon).</p>
[/HTML]

it looks better as:

[HTML]
<h1>The Band</h1>
<p>2009 was the centenary celebration of the formation of the Kilfenora band. Not only is this an historic milestone for the band itself but a reminder that Irish culture and traditions are thriving and have survived the test of time.

</p>

<img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-453" title="Kilfenora CB" src="http://www.kilfenoraclare.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Kilfenora-CB1-300x200.jpg"; alt="Kilfenora Ceili Band" width="300" height="200" />

<p>The twelve-piece band features five fiddles (Eimear Howley, Sinead Heagney, Anne Rynne, Pat Lynch and Annemarie McCormack), two flutes (Anthony Quigney and Garry Shannon), two sqeezeboxes (Tim Collins and his wife, Claire Griffin), banjo and leader (John Lynch), drums (Sean Griffin) and piano (Fintan McMahon).</p>
[/HTML]

As the image now lines up with the first line of second paragraph instead of starting in the bottom of the first and reaching into the second.

Hello All,

First, many thanks for all your feedback- I really appreciate it. Sorry to drag this up but other things got on top of me

So what I've done as you can see is made it less bland and more modern. I didn't put any logo in just the town name and put a new template, background and updated pages along with sitemap etc etc

If you could take a look at it and see if you have any comments on it.


Many thanks

Procasinator

Mr_Grumpy wrote: »

Hello All,

First, many thanks for all your feedback- I really appreciate it. Sorry to drag this up but other things got on top of me

So what I've done as you can see is made it less bland and more modern. I didn't put any logo in just the town name and put a new template, background and updated pages along with sitemap etc etc

If you could take a look at it and see if you have any comments on it.


Many thanks

It's looking nice. Only criticism I would have is that there is a large distance between the top of the page to the actual content. The header is quite large (almost taking up a height of 500 px).

While I believe people sometimes worry too much about being 'over the fold', it is nice to see content quickly. This is particularly true when going from page to page, as the user might see the header as an obstacle to the content.

p

Just took a look over it now. It's much much better now, beter imagery and colour, better content, and generally better theme.

There's 2 more main suggestions I'd think about it you have more time to work on it.

1. Right now, the homepage is just a long bit of text. It should act as a teaser to get into the rest of the site. Try think of it as a unique page rather than just basic text.
2. The header is better now, but the header/logo/navigation could all do with more work to make it more custom. It works now, but if I had to spend any more time on the design, this would be the area I would look at.

Overall though, good work. You've probably taken it about as far as you can without hiring a professional designer. Nice work!

Mr. G

Procasinator wrote: »

Mr_Grumpy wrote: »

Hello All,

First, many thanks for all your feedback- I really appreciate it. Sorry to drag this up but other things got on top of me

So what I've done as you can see is made it less bland and more modern. I didn't put any logo in just the town name and put a new template, background and updated pages along with sitemap etc etc

If you could take a look at it and see if you have any comments on it.


Many thanks

It's looking nice. Only criticism I would have is that there is a large distance between the top of the page to the actual content. The header is quite large (almost taking up a height of 500 px).

While I believe people sometimes worry too much about being 'over the fold', it is nice to see content quickly. This is particularly true when going from page to page, as the user might see the header as an obstacle to the content.

Yes, I think I will just remove the image header all together.

Many thanks

tricky D

I'd rename Main menu 'Business Listings and Useful Links' to something nicer like 'Locality/Resources'.

Use something like highslide or lightbox for a better presentation of gallery content, with bigger photos. Some of the photos need some sharpening and other treatment.

Some of the pages have 2 h1's. One h1 per page is better.

Mr. G

Procasinator wrote: »

Only criticism I would have is that there is a large distance between the top of the page to the actual content. The header is quite large (almost taking up a height of 500 px).

While I believe people sometimes worry too much about being 'over the fold', it is nice to see content quickly. This is particularly true when going from page to page, as the user might see the header as an obstacle to the content.

Yes, that was actually one of my concerns me. I changed the theme so only the home page gets the image header and this stops it from being an obstacle for viewers.

p wrote: »

1. Right now, the homepage is just a long bit of text. It should act as a teaser to get into the rest of the site. Try think of it as a unique page rather than just basic text.
2. The header is better now, but the header/logo/navigation could all do with more work to make it more custom. It works now, but if I had to spend any more time on the design, this would be the area I would look at.

Overall though, good work. You've probably taken it about as far as you can without hiring a professional designer. Nice work!

Thanks for your reply. Maybe in the future I may put an events advert and a Latest News section there.

tricky D wrote: »

I'd rename Main menu 'Business Listings and Useful Links' to something nicer like 'Locality/Resources'.

Use something like highslide or lightbox for a better presentation of gallery content, with bigger photos. Some of the photos need some sharpening and other treatment.

Some of the pages have 2 h1's. One h1 per page is better.

I put Lightbox in the galleries as you suggested and will take a look there now for doubled h1's and will edit the images qualities and sharpening around the site also.

Many thanks for all your suggestions and feedback it is much appreciated.