Site reviews

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Permalink Reply by Christine Schwerin on July 5, 2008 at 8:21am

Hi Adrienne...it's scary to ask for site critiques isn't it? We did this at a conference at Stanford last November and came back with a lot of great feedback. For your site, www.iimagazine.com having the search box front and center is helpful. I know that sounds very basic, but so many sites have a tiny search box or don't have one at all. I like this because I don't have to learn how to navigate the site, I can just search right away for what I want. I see your archives require a subscription, which I'm happy to see because you (we all!) have to make some money, right? Too many magazines are afraid to charge for access to their archives.

One flaw I see is that there is no tagline. I'm not 100% sure what your focus is and what sets your magazine apart from others.

From a usability standpoint, I was a little annoyed that the car ad switched from the right side to the left side depending on which page I was viewing.

I'm not sure if this is a digital-only magazine or if I can get a print version too. Looks like maybe only digital? If so, I'd want to know that when I hit the subscribe button, because that page only asks me for my email and I'm not sure I want to submit my email address without knowing what I'm getting myself into. I'd also like to see a price there before submitting my email address. (From a marketing standpoint, I understand you're gathering information, but as a potential subscriber, I want to know the deal before I give you my info.)

Hope that helps!

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Permalink Reply by Adrienne on July 7, 2008 at 9:43am

Great suggestions, all.
Nope, we don't have a tagline yet (after 40 years!). It is indeed a print publication that went online in 1997.
Some of those page templates I'm not too happy with. Bad user experience design. Nice to hear that feedback though.
And I agree that the registration process is flawed. Thank you for taking the time to jot down your thoughts!

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Permalink Reply by Charles Novick on August 13, 2008 at 3:36pm

Would love to get feedback on my site, wildfeed.com.

Please register. Our editorial mission is to discover and expose new talent on the internet and share breakthrough digital communication among members of our community.

Thoughts?

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Permalink Reply by Adrienne on August 22, 2008 at 4:15pm

Thank you for taking the time to reply.
Because we're using a CMS to post articles, the URLs are dynamically generated with an Article ID# -- not an ideal SEO scenario. It puts me in a bit of a jam and I'm not sure how to resolve it yet without a huge amount of development dollars.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Zingalis on August 22, 2008 at 4:42pm

***Note - I sell / build websites / Web o/s / Cms systems.***
My comment may be biased...or not...who knows.

See if the cms system can generate a series of web pages that change all links to user friendly links, and includes the metadata / keywords per story, which will then redirect without google think it is a spoofing attempt. Better yet, send a formatted / constantly updated xml feed of your content and links directly to google on a constant basis with google site maps. lol, wrong cms.

Try linkfreeze.

http://www.helicontech.com/

I don't know if it will be 100%, or how it will affect the site as a whole, but overall it was a product that we were 'almost' able to use for .asp, but no longer need with the advent of our systems .net release.

Sometimes you just have to patch a tire.

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Permalink Reply by Christina Pellett on November 12, 2008 at 2:08pm

I'd love any feedback on our site: www.AgentsSalesJournal.com.

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