joyces Posted June 10, 2009 Share Posted June 10, 2009 Hi Everyone This is my first attempt at an OSC site. I have always used "Off The Shelf" Shopping carts before so it's been a bit of a challenge - to put it mildly! hadn't even heard of PHP or mysql before I started. I would appreciate any comments on any issue eg design, functionality, security etc. It is live now, although I havent changed my Google Adwords links over to it yet, I hope to do that in the next couple of days but hoped to get some feedback first incase there is some horrendous problem I'm not aware of or if everyone else thinks it rubbish!! I've been doing it for so long it's like my baby so please be gentle, but honest. I would like to thank everyone who has ever posted on the forum or written a contribution, without them nothing would have been possible!! Visit: Click here! Thanks Andrea PS The only links which don't work are the ones under Companies. These are information pages which I will add bit by bit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gauravs Posted June 10, 2009 Share Posted June 10, 2009 It looks very neat and clean!!! Wish you the very best for your store. Thx Best Regards,Gaurav Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
playcraft Posted June 10, 2009 Share Posted June 10, 2009 It looks very neat and clean!!! Wish you the very best for your store. Thx Looks very busy to me. Maybe make the middle column a different color? It just seems like there is no dividers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joyces Posted June 10, 2009 Author Share Posted June 10, 2009 Thanks for having a look. I'm glad you like it Gary and I will certainly consider what you pointed out Austin. Thanks for taking the time Cheers Andrea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RhinoFish Posted June 10, 2009 Share Posted June 10, 2009 i suggest either borders for the boxes on the left and right, or a grey background for them, to make the stuff down the middle jump more off the page. you've got quick find on both the left and right, seems like overkill - if it's that important, move it up the page, i'd say upper right at the top, but these are just matters of taste. you've done an excellent job! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joyces Posted June 11, 2009 Author Share Posted June 11, 2009 i suggest either borders for the boxes on the left and right, or a grey background for them, to make the stuff down the middle jump more off the page. you've got quick find on both the left and right, seems like overkill - if it's that important, move it up the page, i'd say upper right at the top, but these are just matters of taste. you've done an excellent job! Thanks for having a look Patrick Austin said the same thing so if you both had the same impression then i think I will add the borders. Know what you mean about the search, this was my husbands input, I don't normally listen to him, I will show him your observation and see what he thinks - then ignore him !! LOL Thanks again Andrea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♥Biancoblu Posted June 11, 2009 Share Posted June 11, 2009 Hi, first of all well done, I like your layout as it fits your products. One thing I noticed, pages http://www.kingsandqueens.org.uk/catalog/form_help.php and http://www.kingsandqueens.org.uk/catalog/navigation_help.php don't display properly in Firefox, your text sort of overlaps your images. Always a good idea to check how your site shows in different broswers. I like the clear listing of shipping and payment methods on the right bar. If I were you I'd add search engine friendly URL's and some meta tags, have a look at this great contribution Header Tags SEO but there are others. Isabella ~ Don't mistake my kindness for weakness ~ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♥14steve14 Posted June 11, 2009 Share Posted June 11, 2009 Do you know what. I quite like it. I dont know why, but i do. It is a relatevly standard oscommerce site, but it looks good. You have spent time adding the right contributions, and altering a few things to make the site look good. The first thing i noticed is that on your login.php page, the buttons do not look right. It may be something to do with the arrows on different sides of the actual button. Your add to cart button is also different. Do you really need a shopping cart, and a checkout button in your right column. As others have said you have two search boxes. remove them both and put a search option in yout header, or at the top of every page. You also have the information box twice. Its a shame that when i click to enlarge a product image, they dont actually get any larger. It would be nice to see some of the detail in a bigger popup image. These are only small niggles which you may or may not alter. Thats your choice, as its your store. I do like it though. REMEMBER BACKUP, BACKUP AND BACKUP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joyces Posted June 11, 2009 Author Share Posted June 11, 2009 Hi Isabella Thanks for your input. I did check a lot of the pages in http://browsershots.org/ but missed these pages. It's taken me all afternoon to sort them out but i've now done them and reviewed in browsershot and they seem ok now. I had already added the Header Tag SEO but maybe i need to do some more work here. Thanks for taking the time to look, I've seen you around the forum its really great to get a post from someone I feel I almost know, hope I don't sound like a mad stalker! once again thanks for your suggestions. Hi Steve Your post made me laugh!! which was brilliant after the stress of getting through the first day of going live! I'm glad you liked it despite yourself ha ha. I have changed the buttons on the login page so all arrows face the same way and have unified their colour. It's strange that page has always slightly jarred on my eye but I didn't know why it's definately the arrow thing - good spot. I have removed one of the quick find searches, as I said before it was my husbands one and only idea, it must have been his birthday cos I don't usually listen to him! I have a shopping cart link and a checkout link in the left column so that impatient shoppers can go straight to checkout without having to go through the shopping cart. I have no idea if this is a good idea or not, I'll see how it goes Your right about the image thing. Unfortunately I get all my images from the manufacturers and they all tend to be the same size. resizing makes them fuzzy. The pottery industry is stubbonly stuck in the 18th century but I have noticed that at least some companies have started to acknowledge that the internet exists and the images are improving. Will keep this issue under review. Lastly not too sure what you mean about the add to cart button. Its meant to copy the column buttons. I thought the green blobby buttons looked a bit drab espesially on the products_listings page. Will have a think about it. thanks to both for your replies it is so fantastic to have such constructive feed back Cheers Andrea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♥Biancoblu Posted June 12, 2009 Share Posted June 12, 2009 Joyce, you're welcome. :) don't worry, you don't sound like a mad stalker, lol. About your store, of course you have meta tags already, my mistake, I apologize. However, your urls are not optimized, and although it's not necessary, optimized links really help search engines. The urls will be turned into .html pages instead of having "index.php?cPath=". Search for SEO URLs in the contribution section. Isabella ~ Don't mistake my kindness for weakness ~ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burt Posted June 12, 2009 Share Posted June 12, 2009 It is standard osCommerce layout, but you've added a few tweaks which make it a bit better than the usual stuff I see. My opinion only; it's not great, but it's not bad. Search google for "oscommerce hot 100" and see some of the sites on there. As it stands, your site wouldn't get on the list. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♥Biancoblu Posted June 12, 2009 Share Posted June 12, 2009 It is standard osCommerce layout, but you've added a few tweaks which make it a bit better than the usual stuff I see. My opinion only; it's not great, but it's not bad. Search google for "oscommerce hot 100" and see some of the sites on there. As it stands, your site wouldn't get on the list. What's the point of your being always so blunt and frankly, impolite? Has it occured to you that not everyone is the oscommerce wizard that you obviously are? Andrea has posted a perfectly legitimate thread following this forum's rules and showed us a shop that is much better than many, so I think she deserves at least a nice reply and possibly some contructive comments, especially from experienced members like yourself. Isabella ~ Don't mistake my kindness for weakness ~ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♥kymation Posted June 12, 2009 Share Posted June 12, 2009 I want to start by saying that you've got a nice, clean store here. You seem to have most everything taken care of, although I do have a few minor suggestions that might help you. Yes, I'm being polite, not rude. <_< The front page looks a bit busy. The products don't jump out (as somebody else stated.) You might consider giving the side columns a light background, or possibly everything except the center should have a background. Also, the center images are too close to the left edge. Giving the center section some whitespace around the edges will help it stand out more. The centered text on your Terms and Conditions page is hard to read. Left justifying this and putting some space between the paragraphs would help. Nobody likes to read this stuff, but many people do when it's their first time dealing with you. If your terms are too unfriendly, or just too hard to read, they may just leave. I've seen this happen. The boxes around the columns don't appear on all of the pages. It's usually best to keep the look of the pages as similar as possible. Now the technical part: Your pages declare a doctype of HTML 4.01 Transitional, which is standard for osCommerce. However, some of your markup is XHTML, and some is just plain wrong. This isn't a problem with most modern browsers, but some older ones may get confused. It's best to validate your pages with the w3.org validatror (or other reliable validation tool if you have one.) There is a rumor that search engines will penalize you for pages containing lots of errors, but I've never seen any proof of that. Lastly, and my apologies to Isabella if this is rude, but "optimized" URLs are anything but. Leave your dynamic URLs alone, they work just fine. Regards Jim See my profile for a list of my addons and ways to get support. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 12, 2009 Share Posted June 12, 2009 I like it too. I think if you change the font on the navigation bar to something closer to the rest of the site, it would make a big difference. Is it a specialty shop, where everyone who goes there will know the manufacturers? If not you might want to include a pic of what they sell so they know what they might be interested in. You could shrink the logos to be on top of the description and put a picture of one of their more delightful products in the bigger space instead. The images should be cropped to get rid of all the extra white. When I clicked to enlarge one of the teacups, I couldn't even see the pic. Which was the same size when I did find it... Can you get bigger images? Also, I found the font small for the product descriptions. But I might just be old... But you do sell tea cups so... Perhaps a little "font enhancement" might be in order... Cheers, Nicole Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burt Posted June 12, 2009 Share Posted June 12, 2009 What's the point of your being always so blunt and frankly, impolite?Has it occured to you that not everyone is the oscommerce wizard that you obviously are? Andrea has posted a perfectly legitimate thread following this forum's rules and showed us a shop that is much better than many, so I think she deserves at least a nice reply and possibly some contructive comments, especially from experienced members like yourself. Isabella Because, Isabella - I dont bullshit people like the majority of others do. If you deserve a pat on the back, I give it. If you don't, you don't. If everyone else stopped being bullshitters, we'd see a lot less crappy stores. As it stands, I complimented the poster on at least having a bit better store than the usual standard of store posted in this forum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
playcraft Posted June 13, 2009 Share Posted June 13, 2009 Thanks for having a look. I'm glad you like it Gary and I will certainly consider what you pointed out Austin.Thanks for taking the time Cheers Andrea Those borders that you added made a difference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joyces Posted June 13, 2009 Author Share Posted June 13, 2009 Austin Thanks for looking again - you were absolutely right the borders make the site better - great advice. Nicole Hi thanks for taking the time to have a look. When you say the font in the navigation bar are you referring to the bit in the green breadcrumbs bar? I've checked the stylesheet and all my fonts are set to Verdana, Arial so they should all be the same. I'm using IE are you using Firefox? I've noticed that text is always smaller in firefox if you use a font size of x-small or small. I often have to get the super powerful reading glasses on if I use firefox!! I have been through the stylesheet and reset the font sizes to an absolute size and have had a look and it seems better. if you have a chance can you have a quick look and see if it's better for you? The images are a problem and as the manufacturers send me improved images I will improve them. Again, thanks for taking the time to look it is much appreciated. Burt Thanks for taking the time to look at my site and posting. I felt quite honoured, and I understand your point of view about being honest and forthright. Isabella has a point though, many people, such as myself, who work fulltime running their businesses and develop their sites in evenings and weekends for months on end and aren't designers, coders etc are rarely going to produce sites which measure up to the fantastic work done in the OSC top 100. That doesn't mean we shouldn't strive for excellence, but maybe we need to be judged within this context. However I acknowledge you have the right to express yourself however you choose and your expertise in OSC is inspiring. Thanks again for your comments. Jim Thanks for looking and posting. I have tidied up the Terms and Conditions - it was a mess thanks for pointing that out. I went through the site last night and added the borders to all the pages - I think - but I may have missed some if you still see any pages without the border please let me know (Like you have the time to check my site!! - my job) I put the site through the validator on w3.org and 97 Errors and 50 warnings!! Oh My God! I think it's because the SEO meta and header tags cont is XHTML. Have spent the morning reading an XHTML tutorial and will spend the afternoon surfing the forum for postings - hopefully will be able to sort it out eventually. Thanks for pointing this out. I wasn't aware of the problem, now that I am I can start to deal with it. To everyone a huge thank you, you are the people that make the whole principle of OSC work. Cheers Andrea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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