GizmoWow...What do you think???

seanob43

Hey,so http://gizmowow.com/ is my first website and I want to know what you guys think.How can I improve it?I know it might look very amatuer but I just thought I would throw it out here before I fix spelling,grammer etc.
Any help would be great.
Thanks:)

BengaLover

The concept is a bit unoriginal, not a site I would visit or bookmark..sorry..
Plus side its nice and clean looking, I like that in a website.

seanob43

Get where you are coming from with the unoriginal bit but to be quite honest an original idea barely exists anymore with the amount of websites out there.I was trying to make it a tech site but not just about ordinary laptops or phones.Anymore thoughts?Would love to hear them:)

p

Try come up with original content be it analysis, commentary etc.... rather than just reposting links.

The more work you put into content, the more people will be interested in visiting it.

Overflow

Sorry to be harsh but this is just one of millions upon millions of WordPress blogs that are unoriginal, using an standard unoriginal theme and posting a rehash of content found elsewhere.

I mean anyone can setup a WordPress blog in less than 5 minutes, its nothing to be proud of. Work on your site some more, get some original content and get a unique design. Spend some time on it and then ask for a review.

seanob43

awww that hurt:(I spent about a month on this website.Do you think I should completely redesign the website?

Cianos

The design is fine really. It could do with some polishing but it's half way there at least.

The main issue is content. If you are comparable to hundreds of other sites then why should anyone choose you over those other hundreds of sites?

Try think of a way to present content in an original way. Maybe focus in on a particular type of technology or medium. Or think of an interesting way to review or comment on things that not many others are doing.

As a hobby site it looks fine and if you enjoy running it then that's value enough to keep going. But if you want it to get serious readership you have to be different and of value to an objective audience.

I'll finish on a positive by saying it's a great domain name

thirtythirty

It's certainly a good first go.

But the driving force behind a site is "why would people come here?".

So for instance, when you take your website and e.g. Gizmodo.com ,what differentiates yours from theirs? Content wise, not style wise.

For instance, what drives people to Gizmodo's is:

- wide variety of content that is updated almost hourly
- insight regarding the articles, not just the facts about a product etc
- opinion articles / product reviews
- competitions (no prizes except proudness!)


No harm on keeping at it though, you might get a "eureka moment" and realise 'the people love x'!

D Hayes

I don't really think it matters that it's a Wordpress installation and template. 99% of users won't know or care about that.

I think it looks clean and professional. The right hand column "real estate" is not being used to full potential though. Why is there a login featuring so prominently on the RHS? Why is there even a login for this type of site? Likewise with the Search The Web widget - no need for it and it's just going to take people out of the site. I'd prefer to see the social media links bumped up and maybe a signup for a newsletter there instead of Login.

I'd also increase the width of the left hand side column to fit more content in there. No need for RHS to be that wide - none of the widgets are making full use of the width.

Not a fan of the logo though, the blue clashes with the template colours.

seanob43

I think I might delete the site mainly due to the competetion from the bigger sites(gizmodo,engadget)that have a full staff that update the site every few minutes I am just never going to be able to match that.Any idea what to do with the domain??

lil_lisa

Well that's your problem, you shouldn't be trying to "match" anyones site or company. You should be unique in someway. Do you think Google thought, hey well there's already Yahoo search and AltaVista search, there's no point starting a search engine! Hell no! You just have to come up with one small piece of originality and draw people in to that and you have your audience!

Don't give up!

seanob43

Sorry I didn't get back sooner.
I think I will do that.
I will start brainstorming tomorrow.



Any ideas to start me off:o

en.r4cart

Website is not open now.

mbiking123

get rid of pop ups

seanob43

Okay guys,added new logo,new website color,added email sub,polls,gadget of the month and a new rating system called "Wow or No"
What do ya think I need to add now?

Sean

flashforward

I've just came across this video on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2TgdbWxulo&feature=player_embedded

GizmoWow.com is plugged and the video has over 65,000 views.

What was your thoughts with doing this in the video?
Has it generated much traffic?

A good idea though, fair play!

seanob43

Hey,yeah thats one of my YouTube channels and it has brought quite good traffic to the site,noting great only about 20 or 30 hits a day but it is from free advertising.It would be great if YouTube let include a clickable link but sadly they do not.Anyone interested in doing something similar to this please send me a PM.
SEan

kikel

There seems to be a problem registering to leave a comment. It asks for a username and email address. I supply those and it says that must supply a password. there is no space for a password. Also the register screen to different from the rest of the website. It would be cool if it was the same skin as site

DarkDusk

Haha I love it! I just keep reading and get even more laughs! I love the one with the slides in the school and future FPS! Great work keep it up. Have a look at my website it's still in dev. but give me any opinions you have, Thanks!
http://getfreepchelp.blogspot.com/

seanob43

@Kikel.....Thanks for pointing that out to me I will try and get it fixed as soon as possible and if you find anything else similar to this please point it out to me.I will tell you when the problem has been resolved.

@DarkDusk....Hi,Thanks for the comments please keep reading.As for your site it was very helpful and it helped me understand the whole megabytes and megabits which I never understood.Only problem I would have is that it's a Blogger blog which sometimes don't look all that professional due to the /blogspot after your url and can be quite hard to remember.A .com name will cost you about $10.00 a year and will let you be creative.

Thanks again for the comments,
Sean O'Brien

DarkDusk

Thanks Sean. Ya I was thinking about getting a domain for my website... Which website did you use to get yours?
Thanks,
James.

seanob43

Hey James,
I use iPage for both hosting and for domains.I can not fault them and their support is top notch.

Sean

DarkDusk

OK well I bought a domain with register365.com.. It's a Irish website and it only cost a tenner! They also have a lot of other features and like iPage an excellent support team. My new url is www.YourFreePCHelp.com - I'm surprised it was even availible!

seanob43

Hey kikel....no problem it seems...can you explain to me somemore nd @DarkDusk...New site looks great!

kikel

link

http://gizmowow.com/wp-login.php?action=register

See attached for screen show

dinneenp

Hi,
I like the content, some I haven't read before anywhere. The design, colours are fine but it's too cluttered. I think it has potential though.
Here's my review (I'd appreciate if you could review mine in return).

Homepage- the title logo and subscribe RSS/Email, follow twitter is WAY too big vertically.
-On the homepage there's too much information 'fighting' for me to view-
top 4 links, subscirbe, massive website logo, horizontal navigation & sub navigation bar, loads of articles, right hand side etc.

- 4 links on top; grand but why bother with the text popping up?
Also you have a title for them and category (is it?) below- concept, geeky stuff. Again why have the category?


- the search field doesn't display the word 'search' fully on the right hand side (i'm on IE8).

Right hand side column
- What's the difference between the four links on top and the 'featured articles' (on right hand side)? They're both featured aren't they but don't have the same content.

Why do you have a MASSIVE log in 'widget'/section in the rhside when you also have log in on the horizontal navigation?

you have a massive amount of content on the right hand side. on some pages but not as much on others. It's not consistent.

Tag cloud appears on some pages but not home.

Articles
The titles of each article is very big, could be smaller.

categories horizontal nagivation bar
have categories before the list maybe (only a very small thing)


About page.
the text seems very poor to me, it could do with a total re-vamp. It also seems very empty.
mention something like we'll have competitions, which should entice people to visit. Have a facebook group/page (look at the Cool Hunter, they do their facebook website group thingy very well.

-Advertising page shouldn't take up such a large space in your navigation- it's not something for most readers. I'd include it in the contact section.

you mention in a few places our/us but then say me- as in 'contact us' but 'feel free to contact me'. Stick to just us- it gives the impression that it's a company and not a 1 man show.

Future page
Futureis an odd title. This content could be in the about page.
The content on future page should be broken up to a few paragraphs.
check spelling and grammar (either , or . after readers below, cannot vs can not, )
Our plans for the future of this website are as follows,first and foremost we would like to get a good amount of daily readers without this we can not pay for the website and will have to shut it down.

-to me it sounds like you're desperate saying ...without this we can not pay...

you say our plans are as follows but only state one plan.

Log in page.-the text fields are MASSIVE
I'd move the log in away from the horizontal naviagation and decrease the text size for log in (look at the log in for boards.ie)

Why does someone have to be logged in to leave a comment? this would put off some people whom stumble accross the site but don't want to register.

Register page.
you have nothing stating that you won't pass on e-mail addresses, will people receive junk mail, regular e-mail from you etc.


Good luck with it anyway!
Pa.

seanob43

@dinneep....emm is there anything you like at all?It seems like you saw everything as a negative.

seanob43

@kikel...which link did you use?This is what is should look like...http://gizmowow.com/?page_id=4&action=register

kikel

I was reading this artilce

http://gizmowow.com/?p=185#more-185

Then was going to leave a comment down the bottom. I click the "Logged in" link

Then I click register.



Can't find it let me know and I'll make it clearer.

dinneenp

seanob43 wrote: »

@dinneep....emm is there anything you like at all?It seems like you saw everything as a negative.

No offence, but are you serious? I spent about 1/2 hour going through your site and no thanks or having a look through mine (as I kindly asked you, I'm presuming that you will when you have time....).
I took time to look at every main page and category on your site and gave CONSTRUCTIVE criticism/feedback with suggestions that I thought might help improve it. Don't look at my feedback as negative; it's comments that are trying to help your site. I have studied Web Design and worked in that area so when creating/working with a site I know the basic things to look for.

I also stated that I like the content- this is your core. No matter how good your design, layout etc is if the content isn't interesting you won't get repeat visitors and site won't suceed. I also said I like the design and colours.

Most of my comments/suggestions were what I'd call 'fine tuning' or 'tweaking'; things that shouldn't take too long to change (if you want to change them) and make the UI and visitor experience more pleasent and browsing seamless and easy.

Pa.

Trojan

seanob43: I think you need to be little be more appreciative of the time that people like dinneenp have taken to look at and give such useful constructive feedback on your site.

Seeing website owners ask for and receive great advice which the site owner then ignores or writes off is totally demotivating for those spending their valuable time giving that kind of feedback.

dinneenp, trickyD, Cianos, Liam Byrne, pixelcraft, and all the other regulars* are giving really valuable constructive information to website owners here. This is precisely the same** information that site owners willingly pay significant amounts of money to SEO/usability/website design consultants to learn & implement.

* forgive me folks for not listing every great contributor here but you know who you are

** The information is often packaged less tidily than in formal reports etc, but it's just as valuable.

netflix

I've used the same template for my tech blog.. but I spent almost a week customise-it. Take a look here: www.geek247.ie

Why I used this template? Because I think its layout is quite easy to read, because all the tech blogs used this kind of layout until recently… and because I thought I can make it look nicer than initiallly was.
Not trying to be original here, or make a fortune out of it… it's just a hobby.
Now I just realised I'll have to change those 3 links form the header: rss, twitter and email subscription.