Graphics Opinion, Irish Portal

Fergal C

I am currently updating my website, Proudirish.com. It is an Irish portal targeted at Irish Americans and will incorporate an ecommerce element, selling Irish products.

Please see a link below to a suggested template for the site.

Any feedback on the graphics would be greatly appreciated. Also, any opinions as to placement of buttons and links would be welcomed. Eg which links should appear on top margin and which should be included in left margin?

Proudirish.com Graphics Template

Thanks,

Henri

Figment

Looks like its for a sinn fein site.
Please calm down the overtly stereotypical American Oirishness.

ChicoMendez

Please calm down the overtly stereotypical American Oirishness.

if thats what appeal to americans then thats what appeal to them

Figment you should probably try looking at it from the target users point of view as opposed to your own!

Figment

I am. Its an irish stereotype not an american one.

mneylon

It's a lot nicer than the current design imho

tricky D

qwik suggestions:
colours are a bit too intense and blocky,
reduce saturation and maybe add gradients or other effects

piccies are all of places only, where's the craic! and other oirish stuff

perhaps group news into one column

otherwise grand

my 2c

Fergal C

Thanks folks for suggestions. All will be taken on board before design is finalised.

Additional comments / suggestions welcomed.

Any suggestions on button placement would be appreciated.

If there is a section that I really want to drive visitors to will the link get a greater number of click throughs if it is placed in the top margin as opposed to the left margin?

Proudirish.com Graphics Template

Thanks,

Henri

jmcc

The structure (rather than the graphics) needs a bit of work Henri,
You are wasting a lot of the screen with the top graphic and it overpowers the toolbar. The user's eyes would probably be more attracted to the scenic image as the toolbar is very low key.

You could cut the world news section as it is a bit out of character for the site. You also need to hammer home the ancestory thing (roots etc), perhaps by increasing the size of the text on those important links.

The Irish news section also wastes a valuable part of the screen that can be used for navigation or adverts. It also seems have no differentiation from the links section which means that you could be losing the audience off the site before they get to the links.

Regards...jmcc

Fergal C

jmcc, thanks a lot for your valuable comments and ideas.

WRT world news, I added it after Sept 11. As Proudirish news was all Irish, there was no mention of this major news item on the site, which I thought was a failing. Maybe I'll take out the content and include a link to World News on the home page.

The rest of your points are very relevant and will be seriously considered.

All comments have made me feel I've a lot of work to do before finalising design. I'll look around at other portal sites to try and get some ideas. Any suggestions as to good models would be welcomed.

Thanks,

Henri