Student Critique Request - Please review otherBULB website

They have: 4 posts

Joined: Mar 2008

This request for critique is for a school project. My e-commerce assignment was to build two pages of a website, a home page and product page, in which I attempt to entice a user to purchase my product.

Please review my website http://acadunix.algonquincollege.com/~nere0003/index.html

Our professor wants us to experience evaluation input not just from a scholarly level, from a peer and professional level as well. I am hoping some of you can offer constructive feedback on the overall effectiveness of my website in progress.

Note that only two pages ("home" and "products") of the website are complete, and any other links on these pages bring up an annoying pop-up (temporarily).

I'm particularly interested in whether or not you believe that my home page would persuade a visitor to either purchase the product for sale, or at least inquire for further information. Please keep in mind that the site is still under construction.

Thank you for your help!

Megan's picture

She has: 11,421 posts

Joined: Jun 1999

This looks really nice at first glance. It's layed out like a real eCommerce site. It doesn't look like a school project.

Some refinement is needed in the font sizes here and there. The text in the horizontal navigation bar is a little too big and the "Forgot your password" bit is messed up in some browsers (tested Opera and Firefox on Mac). I thought the orange text under featured product on the right was a link but it's not.

This site does a really good job of explaining the benefits of the product. It's a little text heavy, but there's a lot of information here to help the user understand the product. I love the extra touches that you've added, such as the articles on the home page and the suggstion to join the forum on the product page. These are both things that a real site would do to encourage visitors to come back. One thing you might want to include is information about shipping and currency (are those Canadian dollars?)

The bolding of the key phrase on the home page is very effective - you could do a tiny bit more of that on the site.

So, did your professor tell you to come to this forum specifically or did you just google for webmaster forums? Just wondering. A linkback from your class pages would be appreciated Laughing out loud

Great job! I'd give you an A Wink

They have: 6 posts

Joined: Apr 2008

Wow, I think it looks great! The layout is very professional and the articles and Featured Organizations add some helpful information for your readers. I had a couple of suggestions, probably just subjective, but you may want to move the 'Products' link right next to home. That way it is quickly identified and visitors can get to where they want to go right off the bat. The other item, again just my own taste, I would move the login and payment methods under the other 3 items, they seem to be more important so should take priority. Lastly, maybe you could place the "reduce your energy bills by 70%" right next to the title, then it no one could miss it and maybe you would retain more visitors. Just some thoughts and things to try out.

Otherwise, as first mentioned I thought you did a excellent job. Good luck.

JeevesBond's picture

He has: 3,956 posts

Joined: Jun 2002

I think this design is great, just great. You'll have no trouble getting a job doing Web design. Smiling

I'll second what Megan said about font sizes, some of the text is a little small in the 'Member login' box.

The dotted borders are superfluous in my opinion, you don't need to put boxes around everything, in fact you shouldn't as it leads to box-itis. Laughing out loud You can use white space to separate elements, this looks a lot better than lines.

I'd also make the otherBulb logo text and the left side of the menu line-up. So 'otherBulb' should be aligned with 'Home'.

a Padded Cell our articles site!

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