Live store, feedback appreciated

[josh1r]

Hi. We recently moved our Handmade Jewelry store and would greatly appreciate any comments.

 

The store is live so please don't make any test purchases. Though feel free to create an account and go as far as you want through checkout w/o actually completing the order.

 

We're mainly looking for general comments about our store. Is there anything in particular that turns you off and makes you not want to purchase...? Of course any other comments regarding design, colors, etc... are appreciated as well.

 

Thank you very much for your input.

 

Regards,

 

-- Josh

[Guest]

Hi. We recently moved our Handmade Jewelry store and would greatly appreciate any comments.

 

The store is live so please don't make any test purchases. Though feel free to create an account and go as far as you want through checkout w/o actually completing the order.

 

We're mainly looking for general comments about our store. Is there anything in particular that turns you off and makes you not want to purchase...? Of course any other comments regarding design, colors, etc... are appreciated as well.

 

Thank you very much for your input.

 

Regards,

 

-- Josh

 

Josh;

 

1)Make the images the correct size

 

ie http://www.blueluxe.com/images/001216_1.jpg

 

should be 140 x 140

 

2) No sitemap? :blink: Use Chemos not the redirect one available it gets people banned by yahoo.

 

3) Love the directory for links. I really think this is a smart way to go BUT you should REALLY have this on a subdomain or it might really screw you later with search engines. Better safe than sorry.

 

www.directory.blueluxe.com

 

grants you immunity as it's seen as a seperate site.

 

4) I take it you want to remove this http://www.blueluxe.com/index.php the 'index.php' is seen as a seperate page than http://www.blueluxe.com/ this can really kill rankings. javaroasters wrote a good article on howto, a search should find it.

[MarthaD]

You purchased and installed a template. Congrats :)

[Chance]

There is no shame in purchasing a template- For people with little design experence its a quick and easy way to have a much more professional looking site than many of stock "live sites" on this forum.

 

Be clever or constructive when you are mean Martha. Otherwise you are just making people mad.

 

That said:

 

1. Install a thumbnail contribution. There are a couple listed in the post in my signature, or search the contributions section for "thumbnail". You are browser resizing images which obviously took some time to create- Don't ruin it by long load times and jagged edges.

 

2. Think about getting a 1-800 number. They really are pretty cheap and they go a long way toward making your company seem legit in the customers eyes.

[josh1r]

1)Make the images the correct size

ie http://www.blueluxe.com/images/001216_1.jpg

should be 140 x 140

Are you referring to a thumbnail contribution? I will definately be looking into that to help speed up my site.

 

2) No sitemap? :blink: Use Chemos not the redirect one available it gets people banned by yahoo.

I've actually got two right now: http://www.blueluxe.com/allprods.php (i know, it's showing dupes b/c of the way i have things categorized right now) and http://www.blueluxe.com/all_products.php

 

3) Love the directory for links. I really think this is a smart way to go BUT you should REALLY have this on a subdomain or it might really screw you later with search engines. Better safe than sorry.

www.directory.blueluxe.com

grants you immunity as it's seen as a seperate site.

I will definately look into this.

 

4) I take it you want to remove this http://www.blueluxe.com/index.php the 'index.php' is seen as a seperate page than http://www.blueluxe.com/ this can really kill rankings. javaroasters wrote a good article on howto, a search should find it.

Will look into this as well.

 

Thanks for the pointers!

 

There is no shame in purchasing a template- For people with little design experence its a quick and easy way to have a much more professional looking site than many of stock "live sites" on this forum.

Be clever or constructive when you are mean Martha. Otherwise you are just making people mad.

 

Thanks for backing me up! I've done a decent amount of changes and installed many contributions which took quite a lot of work (mopics, pwa, etc...), so it's not like I didn't do anything... And yes, I have very little design experience so this was a great way to go for me.

 

1. Install a thumbnail contribution. There are a couple listed in the post in my signature, or search the contributions section for "thumbnail". You are browser resizing images which obviously took some time to create- Don't ruin it by long load times and jagged edges.

Will definately check this out. Want my site as fast as possible.

 

2. Think about getting a 1-800 number. They really are pretty cheap and they go a long way toward making your company seem legit in the customers eyes.

Already on my 'to do' list and i should have one by the end of the week.

 

Thanks for the ideas!

[josh1r]

I went ahead and installed a thumbnail contribution which appears to have worked quite well. Thanks for that pointer!

 

Just wondering if anyone else has any suggestions, particularly regarding checkout. Is the procedure too long or is it ok? I was thinking of trying of the combined login/checkout contributions (or another fast easy checkout contribution).

 

Thanks again!

[josh1r]

Hi again. We've update the colors and home page layout and would greatly appreciate any further feedback. Thanks!

[Andrew Yuen]

I agree with Chance, there is no shame in using a template as long as you correctly modify it to fit your needs. After visiting your site I noticed that a) you should create a logo B) there is a log of empty space on the bottom of the page. Try taking away a few of the boxes on the left and moving them into the main page. Other then that site looks good.