Upgrade of Website

[elite123]

We are soon to update our website www.elitecollections.net.

Any suggestions or comments ?

Thanks

Anthony

[Richard Conyard]

Lose the splash screen and reliance on flash (no not everyone has it despite what designers say).

Change the site content font to a san-serif to make it easier to read

Make sure the designer is standards aware and that the site is cross browser.

[JoyDivision]

I agree with what Richard said, I have a very fast connection (2mbps) and that site took several seconds to load, I am used to sites loading in less than second. Both my main sites I currently have online load in less than 0.2 seconds and have a lot of content.

At your moment your site is only working for 80% of viewers and probably annoying a good 50% of that 80%.

Drop the flash in favour of XHTML/CSS and it will be much better.

I hate Flash so much that my company is not going to offer flash for web development, we will use it for certain things but not for websites.

And that is quite telling since one of the services is going to be DVD authoring :).

[multilingual]

Joy

How can you not offer Flash to your customers?

If they want Flash then it is their concern, and if you don't offer it then they will just go somewhere else.

Talk to them by all means and explain why you feel that Flash is not the best way forward, but don't let your own feelings get in the way of a deal.

Give the customer what they want.

:)

JB

[Jayne]

Hi,

Is flash those moving bits...I quite liked them! I like the site too, as it is now! I'd tone the blue down, just a little though.

Note..none techy!

Jayne :D

[bwglaw]

We are soon to update our website www.elitecollections.net.

Any suggestions or comments ?

Thanks

Anthony

I concur with other comments made above.

I also wish to add a few.

Its irritating to click 'contact us' and was not informed that it would start my email client. All contact details should be on one page with an enquiry form (for web-based users) and an email address for those who wish to prompt their email client.

Have a look at one of our websites at http://www.handsonaccess.com and tell me how quick it loads etc.

Our Legal Services Directorate may be interested to work with you if you need any litigation support email jonathan@handsongroup.co.uk

[Agri-Hire]

Joy!


Both my main sites I currently have online load in less than 0.2 seconds and have a lot of content.


Give us the URLs of these two sites.

Come on, you talk a lot about building sites, lets see one.

It would be interesting for us all to look over a JD site.

:)

[bwglaw]

Joy

How can you not offer Flash to your customers?

If they want Flash then it is their concern, and if you don't offer it then they will just go somewhere else.

Talk to them by all means and explain why you feel that Flash is not the best way forward, but don't let your own feelings get in the way of a deal.

Give the customer what they want.

:)

JB

Agree, however Richard (for example) has suggested no flash because it poses accessibility problems. We used to develop flash based websites and stopped after discovering the problems it causes. Search engines don't pick up flash-based websites very well especially where text is concerned.

If you are offering a service to the public via your website you will then have a duty to make your site accessible as much as possible under the Disability Discrimination Act. Developers (like Richard) who are clued up on web accessibility are advising clients how to have an accessible and search-engine friendly website

[creospace]

I think flash is has become just eye candy, great looking granted but not really any greater use than a normal (X)html/css site.

Gary

[multilingual]

There is nothing wrong with eye candy.

When people arrive at your site, 90% of them don't have a clue what Flash, html or css is. All they know is whether they like the look of the site or not.

If they like the look of the site, then they are more inclined to read the content.

Sometimes it's good to take a step back from the technical viewpoint and try and see sites from a non techy angle.

If your site is built in Flash then search engines spiders may pass it by, but so long as you have the basic content in html then I see no problem in using a bit of Flash to make it more appealing.

JB

[JoyDivision]

If the site uses too much flash (a small flash animation won't do any harm) but titles, links etc really should not be done in flash. Its basicaly telling anybody eye sight problems to go away.

With good use of CSS/XHTML and Photoshop you can make a brilliant looking site without the use of flash and that is my biggest argument against flash.

I agree sites need eye candy and they need to look good, a boring looking website is enough to put anybody off.

To be honest I doubt anybody would ever come to me for a flash site just like you would not go to a graphics designer for a WCAG AA standard site.

In the late 90's early 00's people including me were making flash sites with all these fancy intros (with no text links to skip it!!) without giving it a second thought. But by 2002/3 most web developers started to really understand the difference between screen and print based media. Flash in many ways is from the print school of tought and in real terms is actually less multimedia and HTML as it cannot be manipulated.

In the fast majority of cases there is nothing flash can do that XHTML/CSS can't :).

I will shut up now becuase I am starting to sound like a double glazing salesman :D

[JustOneUK]

If the site uses too much flash (a small flash animation won't do any harm) but titles, links etc really should not be done in flash. Its basicaly telling anybody eye sight problems to go away.


actually it's telling the search engines to go away.
they will not follow your links as they cannot see them, you will generate NO search engine traffic and no one will want to link either to you, or from you.

the frames you are using do exaclty the same thing...so that's a double whammy!

I bet if you do a search for your site you won't find it, and neither will anyone else.

if you would like a £100 tutorial on how to get up to the top, PM me.

here's that search...

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=site%3Awww.elitecollections.net&btnG=Search&meta=

as you can see, your site has a few pages and none of them show up.

here's another one... similar result.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=%22www.elitecollections.net%22&meta=

:(

James










* = picture of it