Critique my employer’s website, please

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Critique my employer’s website, please

June 29, 2004

A little background: I work for muvee Technologies as a web developer. Much of what you see there isn’t my work though, since I’m only 3 weeks old in the company.

I’m coming up with a list of things to improve with regards to the website, in terms of making it persuasive and consequently generating more sales. Of course, things like layout, accessibility, design and look and feel are important as well, but secondary for this evaluation. Truth be told, this is something my boss asked me to look at, because I’ve a pair of fresh eyes undeadened by years of working on the same old (same old) pages.

Nope, I’m not going to be try and get away with hoping that everyone here will generate enough ideas for me to present to my boss. I have my own list and I’m coming up with more stuff (gradually), but I thought that while I had your attention, I might as well see what other minds can come up with and if they are so discordant from mine.

So there, if you could help me evaluate and recommend things that can be changed/improved, I’d be grateful to you, dear mister or missus reader. Focus on how the site could be more persuasive to prospective buyers, or conducive to buyers (transactors). Recommendations on design, layout, accessibility are also welcome, but secondary (I expect plenty of these, nevertheless).

I don’t have Gmail invites now, but I promise you I’ll send one over if you help me out. Those already with Gmail will instead receive my gratitude (really - a favor is worth something nowadays, right?)

Posted by Chu Yeow at June 29, 2004 SGT |

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| Category: Personal

10 Comments & TrackBacks ()

Just on the main page, I found it very visually uneasy. From years on the web I’ve become accustomed to phasing out anything that looks like an advertisement, no matter where it’s placed on the page. Everything on that page looks like an ad. Very little of the text isn’t in some way trying to grab my attention and the result is that none of it succeeds.

Since I’ve never been to the site before it would be advantageous to see something that’s clearly and unambiguously aimed at explaining the site to me. What is the company? What is the product? Why am I here and why should I stay?

The navigation bar isn’t productive. The top level menu items don’t link to anything (like an overall product page for ‘products’ etc.) and some of the menus have unmarked sub-menus (the second and third items in the ‘products’ menu).

The tour should be much more prominent, it should be clearly labeled as Flash (with the file-size listed) and it would benefit from a voice-over. A HTML tour would be a good idea.

Posted by: Rory Parle on June 30, 2004 12am

Everything above the main graphic is ok, but below that it seems little too busy.

Posted by: rich! on June 30, 2004 12am

It took a while to load on my crappy connection, but it then had the apple brushed metal look (only the background), and then the web site reminded me of real player.
Too much going on. Fonts are a bit cruddy / difficult to read quickly.

Posted by: Edward on June 30, 2004 1am

My first reaction was, “Where am I supposed to look?” There were what seemed like hundreds of separate elements all screaming, “Look at me!” (Okay, it might only have been a dozen.) My eyes were dragged all over the page, never settling on any one item long enough to understand what that item was before being distracted by something else.

At the moment, the piece that keeps screaming over and over again to “Look at me!” is the blinking “reviewed in” box, which is about the last thing that a potential customer cares about. The second most insistent piece are the two big graphics at the top, neither of which tells me anything about the company or its product. The third most eye-attracting piece is the big red text about “Get the latest styles”, something that is only of interest to existing customers. Finally my eyes settle on the repeated huge “Nokia 7610″ graphics, and I decide “Oh, that’s what the company does. Something with Nokia 7610 phones. I don’t have one of those.”

The page desperately needs a single central focus, something that makes a clear and simple statement of what the company does, and why I, as a potential customer, would be interested.

Sorry to be so harsh, but you asked :-)

Posted by: Doug on June 30, 2004 1am

Flash: Ugh. Otherwise, looks great.

Posted by: mc on June 30, 2004 1am

1) The text-below needs a larger line-height.

2) Get everything left-aligned in the text-below and make sure images don’t disrupt a straight left alignment.

3) Don’t switch between italics and non-italics for the headers.

4) Keep the headers at a consistent font size. No large “NEW!”s

5) Remove images from the Quick Links sidebar. Change the informal sentences to a category-esque, title case style. For example, “Get new styles here!” -> “Get New Styles”

6) Move the “See the muvee commercial) to the Quick Links.

7) Less ellipses.

8) Line break after all headers.

Posted by: hao2lian on June 30, 2004 4am

Looked at the page for 20 seconds, looks very busy and never quite figured out what is you are selling, something to do with video.
Maybe it is on the page, but I spent the 20 seconds looking at the bold and red text and the picures, and never got the intended message.
Have your employer bite the bullet and hire a professional design firm, at least for the front page.

Posted by: Tony BenBrahim on June 30, 2004 12pm

On my 1st visit to this site, the only thing that captured my attention is the big graphical advertisement over the top.

As what others have mentioned, its crucially important to have a central focus, probably the main product and a central “mental navigation” start point.

I noticed there is a small uninviting rectangular “I’m new, Tell me more!” button on the left center area. This button can be exploited to guide a new surfer to this site. Potential customer should also be introduced properly. Therefore there should be proper guidance for the new and existing customer.

Do less with flash. Minimise the usage.

Lead new customers to past user feedback and reviews on the products and the awards won by the products. Customer must trust the product especially something they have to buy online. Trust and capability of the product are foremost important.

For existing customer, plug-ins and supports are why they are here for. So develop in that way.

Posted by: Lemonshiverman on June 30, 2004 10pm