My website package was up for renewal with networksolutions, so I switched from a 'pay per page' model (which they are no longer offering) to a 'pay per amount of space' model. Got a great deal, but it required that I totally rebuild my web site. Well, not totally rebuild from scratch since I had access to the old while I was building the new and I used the same tools from network solutions to build both. I took advantage of the 'rebuild' to change my design template and took advantage of the additional pages to add a page.
So, here it is....www.michaelreimer.com One of the biggest changes from my perspective is my 'Other Gyotaku Examples' page - it is a place for me to put examples of my work that I've already sold. The advantage for me is the way I built it - my 'for sale' page is a photo album which doesn't seem to be able to be 'found' by search engines, if you search for images of 'gyotaku'. The pictures I had imbedded in my page (like the one on my main page) were found, but not the ones on the photo album. So, 'Other Gyotaku Examples' isn't an album. We'll see if that worked.
Let me know what you think www.michaelreimer.com
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Hey Michael-
Being a web savvy designer, I see that you've done a pretty good job with your pages. To really wow your first time visitors, you might want to consider thinking about your homepage being much like that of a magazine cover. Look at magazine covers your customers read (because you're designing for your customer, not you) and closely review the structure and formula of how its designed. There is sales psychology in everything we do beginning with answering the questions they might have:
If you can answer your customer's questions within 3 clicks, you're doing well.
Hope that helps!
Lisa is right about double space after periods. Since the advent of the Mac in the early eighties, there have been many typographic changes. Robin Williams' book, "The Mac is not a Typewriter" covers most of the new rules nicely -- it's an old standard now.
The site looks great. Simple, clean, gives a good look at your work. Like the page of media coverage, too. Nice touch.
Scott's suggestion for an email sign-up form is a good one. Be sure to use some sort of human recognition device, like Captcha, or you will get tons of spam submissions. Using a third-party email aggregrator, like Vertical Response or Constant Contact, will let your subscribers manage their own data, and input it directly into your mailing list. Highly recommended, and pretty much spam-free that way. Vertical Response lets you build the form on their site and embed it in your HTML, along with the Captcha code.
OK, double spaces are gone. It is funny, I was applying to a show last night and had 256 characters in a 'describe your art work' and they only allowed 255 characters - turned my only double space into a single space! At that point I decided to go back and change my site (even found a triple space!)
Of course, as I re-read this, all double spaces. Will be a hard habit to break. 30+ years of double spacing since Miss Gorndt's typing class in 10th grade.
I take out unnecessary words, like articles and prepositions. Substitute & for "and". Things like that. Now we're really off course...
Heck, when I'm limited to the number of characters like that I'll even skip spaces if I need to, like for the 100 characters zapp used to give you (and some shows still do.) It's not correct, but you do what you gotta.
Oh boy, I tried to reply on my new iPhone -- anyone have any tips on using those babies for writing an actual coherent reply??
Sorry, Michael, not to hijack this thread -- love the look of the site and the gyotaku is really nice! Good job on the site. You definitely have all the essentials in place. You have to be pleased. Now I'd say you are ready for the next phase -- flushing it out getting the bells and whistles in place for SEO and helping people find the site. Here's an article that can help you organize for traffic: http://www.scottfox.com/2009/02/how-search-engines-work-seo.html
And do have an email signup box. Collecting emails is an important part of building an online business.
And yep, I double space after at the end of a sentence also. Old school here.
Thanks connie. I have addressed SEO - I was the builder of my old site also. The tool I use from Network Solutions (Image Cafe) has a place to put keywords and what not for SEO. They also have a link to submit to search engines. My old site did pretty well from a search perspective. The only change from my old site to my new one was I updated some of my key words.
I'll look over the link you provided.
What do you mean about email signup box? I do mention for 'lookers' to send me an email if they want to be on my distribution list for when I post new images. Are you talking about instructions along with place for them to type and a 'submit' button? I think I can do that.
Beautiful work, Michael! It is A wonderful feeling to be able to take over your own site, isn't it? This is a very nice start. Where to next? Have you thought about SEO? How about an email sign up box for visitors? At scottfox.com he has lots of good suggestions for the next step.
This is me trying to work with the iPhone... not so good.
The design is clean and simple, which I like. You might want to put some links in the text on the home page, like where you mention items for sale or for your blog page, rather than making the reader look for it in the sidebar. I like the color, but it might be nice to try a color from the photo you have on the home page... like a greenish grey (for the inner grey). Maybe you already tried this or maybe it wouldn't go with the other pages. The grey is neutral and safe.
This is so nit-picky I almost don't want to mention it, but it was pounded into my head so much in my graphic design classes that I can't help myself :). It looks like you double space after a period on your webpage. In general, when typing on a computer you should only use one space at the end of a sentence. This is something left over from typewriter days. For computer fonts some extra space is already built into the period. It will look and flow better if you take out the extra spaces.
Your work is beautiful!
Lisa - thanks for the feedback. Great input on the links - I just updated per your suggestion (that's how quick I can update my web page via network solutions!). I tried to go with somehting to match the photo on the home page - couldn't find anything I was happy with - just tried again.
Yes, I'm a typewriter learned typist. I didn't know the 1 versus 2 space was a debate, but I do notice I am annoyed by 1 space. You'll notice this is all 2 space. I'll really have to think that one over, but thanks for pointing it out.
Michael
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