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Hi all,
Vanilla are planning an update to the site on April 24th (next Wednesday). It is a major PHP8 update which is expected to boost performance across the site. The site will be down from 7pm and it is expected to take about an hour to complete. We appreciate your patience during the update.
Thanks all.

Website Review - pretty please

  • 12-02-2020 12:27pm
    #1
    ShaneLad
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭


    I'm a web designer who recently went freelance

    Finally have my site up and running, I think it's pretty sweet but I've been looking at it so long I can't really tell anymore:pac:

    I've tried to put my personlity & "style" in it - just wondering how it looks from a prospective clients POV

    https://www.pixelpupwebdesign.com/

    Any/All Feedback appreciated, thanks!


Comments

  • #2
    tricky D
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,700 ✭✭✭tricky D


    First paint takes too long so page load needs work: caching, compression, number of js/css calls, image sizes...

    SEO work is not evident and it too important to be tacked on later.

    Email and phone links are not links.

    A dog in the picture is a marmite thing for me and a turn off. However plenty users do like dog pix but whether this helps the right engagement is questionable imho.

    hth gl


  • #3
    ShaneLad
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭ShaneLad


    Thanks D

    Bang on with everything you siad

    I hadn't considered the dog pic like that before, something to think about

    Thanks again


  • #4
    S.M.B.
    Registered Users Posts: 9,348 ✭✭✭S.M.B.


    I'd echo the comment about performance above. Took a while to load and was even considering abandoning looking at it altogether.

    Visually I think it looks great though.

    Somewhat curious how you offer unlimited revisions and 24/7 support though. Maybe your fees cover this added effort.


  • #5
    DublinCJM
    Registered Users Posts: 826 ✭✭✭DublinCJM


    I'd a quick look. Looks nice.

    One the section where you've listed the below (and the others), just go with consistency. Use all capitals, or don't capitalise at all. Not a mixture of both.

    Fully custom Website Design
    Fully Responsive – Works on Phone , Tablet & Desktop
    Easy to Edit – Update your website yourself


  • #6
    ShaneLad
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭ShaneLad


    S.M.B. wrote: »
    I'd echo the comment about performance above. Took a while to load and was even considering abandoning looking at it altogether.

    Visually I think it looks great though.

    Somewhat curious how you offer unlimited revisions and 24/7 support though. Maybe your fees cover this added effort.

    Thanks SMB - for the review & compliment on the visuals

    The fact you were gonna abandone just put the ****s up me - thats top priority!

    On the revisions/support - I'll go a long way to please the client, I know from experience how to spot messers early on and there will be a cut off point at some stage, but it hasn't been an issue yet.

    Similar on the support - my clients so far are SME's, not multinationals on a 24hr cycle. I'm always available in terms of wkends, bank holidays etc.. and again, I'll go a long way to do whats needed in an emergency but as of yet I haven't gotten any calls at 4am :)

    Cheers SMB


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  • #7
    lawred2
    Registered Users Posts: 24,257 ✭✭✭✭lawred2


    tricky D wrote: »
    First paint takes too long so page load needs work: caching, compression, number of js/css calls, image sizes...

    SEO work is not evident and it too important to be tacked on later.

    Email and phone links are not links.

    A dog in the picture is a marmite thing for me and a turn off. However plenty users do like dog pix but whether this helps the right engagement is questionable imho.

    hth gl

    get rid immediately would be my advice


  • #8
    lawred2
    Registered Users Posts: 24,257 ✭✭✭✭lawred2


    I'd look at sticking it behind a free cloudflare plan - that site would definitely benefit from it


  • #9
    ShaneLad
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭ShaneLad


    DublinCJM wrote: »
    I'd a quick look. Looks nice.

    One the section where you've listed the below (and the others), just go with consistency. Use all capitals, or don't capitalise at all. Not a mixture of both.

    Fully custom Website Design
    Fully Responsive – Works on Phone , Tablet & Desktop
    Easy to Edit – Update your website yourself

    Thanks!!

    I try to be on point with that stuff so good shout - But I've been looking at it so much I can't see the woods for the trees :p


  • #10
    ShaneLad
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭ShaneLad


    lawred2 wrote: »
    I'd look at sticking it behind a free cloudflare plan - that site would definitely benefit from it

    YES!! - Excellent, thank you


  • #11
    S.M.B.
    Registered Users Posts: 9,348 ✭✭✭S.M.B.


    ShaneLad wrote: »
    Thanks SMB - for the review & compliment on the visuals

    The fact you were gonna abandone just put the ****s up me - thats top priority!
    I'm in the UK so not sure what you are using for hosting but as others have suggested, a CDN like cloud flare would work wonders.


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  • #12
    Graham
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 17,642 Mod ✭✭✭✭Graham


    Something seriously up with either the website or the hosting.

    Takes an absolute eternity before falling over completely with too many redirects. Tested using safari and chrome.

    Fix the redirection issue
    Move to a decent web host (ideally this side of the atlantic unless you're targetting the US)

    A CDN (like Cloudflare) should be implemented after you've fixed the underlying speed issues, not used to mask them.
    Use GTMetrix or similar to track performance as you fix things.


  • #13
    M.T.D
    Registered Users Posts: 396 ✭✭M.T.D


    Agree about the speed, if I had just been browsing I would not have waited for the page to load.
    You have over 6MB of images on the page. The church, houses, bubbles, and the icon sheet from the chat plugin are the biggest, also several of your pictures are png in stead of jpeg.
    Admin ajax is for some reason is over 6 secs.
    The bubbles video, 34 secs before it fully loaded for me, shows a dark grey background, so the testimonials text is not visible until after 34 secs.
    Dumping the video and optimising the images would drop the page size by a factor of 10


  • #14
    RiseToMe
    Registered Users Posts: 1,272 ✭✭✭RiseToMe


    From user POV the white text on yellow halfway down the mobile version is, for me, almost unreadable.


  • #15
    looksee
    Registered Users Posts: 28,008 ✭✭✭✭looksee


    I'm on google chrome, Windows 10 on a fairly feeble Rural Broadband connection and it opened very efficiently for me from the link, but a bit slow moving from one page to another by the menu.

    Agree about dumping the virtual dog (you can keep the real one!)

    I would be instantly turned off by the mish-mash of capitals and lower case, by the random division of the sentence on the yellow banner, and that sentence that isn't a sentence - 'Using my skills and knowledge online.'

    Otherwise I like it.


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