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Chilehead's Big Leap: PART II

4K views 15 replies 6 participants last post by  Chilehead 
#1 ·
For those of you who gave good advice on this thread (PART I) http://www.lawnsite.com/showthread.php?t=424929 , here is the resulting rework of my website. I still need to do Google/Bing validation, but went back to a multi-page site with better use of relative content, header tag hierarchy, navigation, and web-safe fonts.
The overall goal this time around was to be found in specific geographical locations for the specific services I want to advertise. Google will likely ding me 3-4 positions on their local search, but hopefully not too much because my domain has remained the same.
 
#3 ·
1. I have to scroll left/right

2. Until I scroll down to the bottom of the page, I have no idea what area you service. Even in the "About Us" block, after reading that, no idea.

3. There is no contact info at the top such as phone number, which could at least help me narrow it down based from Area Code

4. Use of H1 tags is not good, you have several on the home page, each page should have only 1 to help search engines figure out what the page is about.

5. Submitting the form takes me to another site with an ugly captcha to fill out... Multiple step forms for something like basic contact distract people away. When I submit it, there appears to be no validation, as I just entered a name only and it says it sent it. The result page says "Hit the Back Button", and well, at first didn't notice that on the opposite corner away from the text you are reading there is an actual button for the page labeled "back" which does work, but my first thought was it was telling me to use the browsers back button, which then in firefox takes me to a page telling me "Document Expired - This document is no longer available."

6. The big ol "Guaranteed" button, now I know a lot of people are different, and I'm an oddball with this, but for me, in the number of sites I hit in a day, that one just gives me a feeling of "trying to hard". I'm the type (and not to reflect on your service, just in general here), if you are claiming to be a professional company, guaranteed work is just implied. On the plus side, you are not one of these companies that says "200% guaranteed". Uggg!!

7. For your blog link, you are telling google that that link is about "here". For the most part link text should be meaningful of where you are going. This day in age, people get that "hey there in underlined text, it is probably a place to click". You would not have to specify it if you didn't underline things all over the place that are not links. There is a way to do things that can get past the item of links are underlined, but it takes having a very good deign that lets people easily see at first glance what links look like.

Onto the "Services" Page, some of the same issues as above.

8. Oh man, now this isn't about personal tastes here, that guarantee image just looks bad, check the edges around curved parts.

9. The faked lists (using asterisks) instead of actual lists just really takes away from the site to me (again, I look at way more than average amount of sites than most)

Employment Page:

10. You have that every item in the form must be filled out. One of those required is the person's SSN. Yet this form does NOT submit to a secured connection, which would lead me to believe you probably are not receiving that information securely. Form looking a the manual for the program you are using (sometimes I go too far in checking things LOL) there is no indication that their form system is set up for encrypting the data being sent on the form. Remove identity theft type items from the form, wait till you have a resume that you would actually consider, then give applicant a proper legal form to to sign and submit with their SSN (ie, form connecting to background check, tax paperwork, etc).

11. Also on the form, when you have a long form, many people will use the TAB key to go between fields to fill it out, you have one field it completely skips until the end.

12. The validation on the form, I was able to change it to say that you agree to pay me $50 just for filling out the form... here is my paypal address... Ok, I could keep going on and on, but lets just say, look into a service that can properly handle forms... Sorry I can't recommend a specific ones, being a programmer, I hand program all forms for my clients.

Well that is about it. I know this part will sting a bit, as I know you most likely put a lot into the site, but for me, when I see a site for place that would want me to spend the money to hire a "pro" to do a proper job instead of doing it myself, but then they themselves show that they choose to do things themselves instead of hiring a pro, just tends to steer me away from them. That is me on a "looking for a pro". But that being said, I know not everyone can hire someone to do it professionally, so hopefully the items I pointed out will help you improve the site.

-Greg
 
#4 ·
9. The faked lists (using asterisks) instead of actual lists just really takes away from the site to me (again, I look at way more than average amount of sites than most)

-Greg
What do you mean by "faked lists"? What I listed is a list of accurate information. Please elaborate. Thanks for the other critique.
 
#6 ·
That's a lot of good stuff from Greg.

Tough love time, but I really think you need to go back to the drawing board or get an assist from someone. For me, from a design, layout, and usability standpoint, it's a bit of a swing and a miss. From the fixed, over-sized, side scroll-requiring width to the over the top social bar (you reeeeally don't need a print button. or digg. or reddit. or livejournal. nobody is going to be using those.)

My two cents...

- Ax the social stuff.

- If you're going to have a link, right next to your main menu, do not have it send people away from your site. For the Greencare for Troops thing, while noble, you don't want to exit people from your site. At a minimum, pop window it. For me, there's zero chance I would recommend having it be a part of your main navigation.

- The chopped up content boxes are awkward and create the opposite of any kind of visual flow. This goes for each page. There's no reason to have your service areas box, and text, look exactly the same as the content that should be featured.

- "page2.html", for your lawn care services page, is not a good page name. "Services" is not remotely a good enough TITLE tag name. Those aren't going to be doing anything for you. "lawn-care-services.html" would be infinitely better. As for the TITLE tag, this has been covered enough that there are great examples in this forum. Or at your local lawndoctor.com landing page.

- You said your goal with this version of your site was to attract local search. I'm really not sure what you've done to support that, as I only see a list of cities on your services page (page2.html), but that's not going to cut it. Again, search the forum here or just visit lawndoctor.com. It's the easiest example there is.

- Unless you plan on adding security to your site, i'd highly recommend you yank some of those fields from your employment page. asking for social security and driver's license info, in the manner you are, is reckless and irresponsible.

If design isn't your thing, but you insist on DIY, I'd recommend you find a template that will give you a bit of a design guide. I think it will be of huge help to you, from giving it a bit more visually welcoming appeal to providing proper constraints and compartmentalization of your content.

Questions or additional clarifications needed, just yell.
 
#7 ·
Questions, comments?
Is it plain HTML?

I see no CMS of platform in the code of your site also it is not responsive theme, auto sizes to peoples display or mobile devices.
 
#9 ·
For the record, I am now NUMBER 1 in both organic search and Google Places when searching "lawn care in Stockbridge GA". Just saying.
Posted via Mobile Device
I think those are personalized results. I do have you on page 1 for maps and organic- but not #1 for either.

However, it seems to me that most of the suggestions have little to do with ranking and more to do with usability and conversions.
 
#10 ·
I think those are personalized results. I do have you on page 1 for maps and organic- but not #1 for either.
Correct. I'm seeing Chile's results as #3 in the 7 Pack and 2nd from last, Page 1 organic.

Those are great results, but...
However, it seems to me that most of the suggestions have little to do with ranking and more to do with usability and conversions.
...exactly. You can be #1 for every keyword you want, but if the site isn't set up to convert, and #2 is, what's the benefit in being #1.
 
#11 ·
For the record, I am now NUMBER 1 in both organic search and Google Places when searching "lawn care in Stockbridge GA". Just saying.
Posted via Mobile Device
This really isn't the metric you want to hold up as the trophy. The vast majority of the people do think it's the best, but those who know this inside out recognize that it's a vanity metric. A keyword #1 is waaaaay over-inflated. It's nice. It's shiny. It gets people to your door. It's the conversion that is what matters most.

I'm extremely pleased with the #1's I have, but I put just as much effort into engaging and converting the traffic those keywords bring. Your site has a good rank. At this moment, it just doesn't have what it takes to engage and convert. You might tell me otherwise, with other supporting detail, but I can only go with what my eyes and experience tell me.

Also, as an addendum to the search ranks that Headz and I see, the results I posted are the same whether I set my search as United States, Chicago (where I am now), Atlanta, or Stockbridge. Same goes for switching my IP address to Atlanta.
 
#12 ·
This really isn't the metric you want to hold up as the trophy. The vast majority of the people do think it's the best, but those who know this inside out recognize that it's a vanity metric. A keyword #1 is waaaaay over-inflated. It's nice. It's shiny. It gets people to your door. It's the conversion that is what matters most.

I'm extremely pleased with the #1's I have, but I put just as much effort into engaging and converting the traffic those keywords bring. Your site has a good rank. At this moment, it just doesn't have what it takes to engage and convert. You might tell me otherwise, with other supporting detail, but I can only go with what my eyes and experience tell me.

Also, as an addendum to the search ranks that Headz and I see, the results I posted are the same whether I set my search as United States, Chicago (where I am now), Atlanta, or Stockbridge. Same goes for switching my IP address to Atlanta.
I guess I still don't get what you mean.....like where the problem is with converting prospects to sales. The site has ultra-simple navigation. We quickly nail what we do, why one should choose us, a call to action (free quote), and where we serve. If it's merely a matter of flow, erasing the line divisions won't help, but I also don't want a page for every header/body that is "blocked together". I was also reading that having multiple h1 tags per page won't effect a page negatively as long as the hierarchy of h-tags is correct. Also, I don't have to scroll horizontally on my flatscreen......ultra high def 23".
Please advise.
 
#13 ·
As someone who is always checking laptop specs in looking for deals on something new, I find that most "consumer grade" laptops (ie what most "regular folks get") are usually at a resolution of 1366x768, heck even if you go with one with a larger physical screen, you are at 1600x900 (which is what mine is at), and even at that resolution, I still get a horizontal scroll bar.

In the web world, inches don't mean much in screen size. I have a 19" monitor that has lower resolution that my 17" laptop, and a I am looking at 15" laptop that has higher resolution (1920x1080) that both of them.

Now if you are checking your analytics stats, and seeing that an overwhelming majority of your traffic (80%+) are at 1400 width or higher, than no big deal, but if you don't know, you should be checking it out. While i don't have high traffic sites, I can say that most of my sites about 50% traffic comes from mobile devices now.
 
#14 ·
Also, I don't have to scroll horizontally on my flatscreen......ultra high def 23".
Please advise.
You should try it on other displays/devices/screen resolutions. You are not seeing what the large majority of your target market is seeing.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
#15 ·
I guess I still don't get what you mean.....like where the problem is with converting prospects to sales. The site has ultra-simple navigation. We quickly nail what we do, why one should choose us, a call to action (free quote), and where we serve. .
What's your bounce rate? How deep do visitors go in your site?
 
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