Do you think my simple design website reflects my product better or worse?
-
Its been suggested my holiday cottage letting website maybe could do with a professional polish up and maybe restructure and navigation and if it would improve bookings I wouldn't hesitate. My only thought pattern is that this particular website is certainly not high-tech (this website was designed by me in Dreamweaver) I have a great guy working for me which is much better web design than me and technically more capable of producing a professional standard website, but with this new sideline I'm presently a small home-based company currently only letting eight old cottages. My thinking was keep the website simple, personal and homely for the moment.
http://www.endeavourcottage.co.uk/
The website tends to be competing against large agencies which have often hundreds of properties on their books and you have to go through their filtering system to find the small number of properties that might be of interest.
I can see that if I was selling large quantities of electrical equipment or something similar you just in a very polished well-designed website.
The feedback I get from customers is that like the website and they like to know they can get hold of the person behind it.
Which direction would you go? polished professional company styled WordPress website or simple design website with lots of pictures and descriptions.
If I ever hit the big time and have hundreds of cottages I would have to join the design and more complicated navigation of the other agencies websites but whilst I’m small maybe not?
Thanks for reading Alan
-
There are sitewide links to http://www.whitby-holiday-cottage.com/ and http://www.northyorkmoorscottages.co.uk/ in the left navigation.
I would not do that. I would have a page on the site that received traffic from those links and then one link on that page to the other domain.
-
Excuse my lack of knowledge EGOL but don't understand what you mean about promoting cottages on other domains?
-
Thank you Dana for your points, and was discussing a few weeks back with a web designer the idea of making the site completely compatible with mobiles and the other small devices, but thanks for reaffirming this idea. The website is working as it is at the moment so there's no rush but I do understand your points about tidying up. I was just asking if other people thought I should make the website look more businesslike and streamlined even at its small stage of representing only several properties. I personally at this moment in time felt I didn't want to make it too cold and impersonal like some of the larger companies website, until I become one of those larger companies
-
Yes I can see the logic of the quick company statement making a first impression but I'm not sure about the side links, I'll think about it.
-
Missing is a strong, short, clear and convincing statement at the top that communicates your value proposition.
Can you come up with a way to promote cottages on other domains without giving them sitewide links?
-
For the most part Alan, I'm with you. I like the "homey" low-tech nature of the site. The only thing I would say you could improve would be making it easier to read (maybe larger fonts on a white background as opposed to light blue)....maybe keep your layout but improve the quality of your header image, fix some spacing issues in your CSS. These are all just little "housekeeping" details that really wouldn't change the overall look and feel, but would just tidy it up a bit.
You might also want to consider an update because a lot of platforms like WP include some nice built-in functionality that make your website easier to read and navigate on mobile devices.
I'd address the housekeeping issues first (for example, you have the Google+ like button twice at the bottom of this page http://www.endeavourcottage.co.uk/endeavour-cottage.html). You might find that alone produces more bookings, simply because it's easier for your visitors to read your information and they'll be more inclined to trust the site if it appears to be well cared for.
Hope that's helpful! The cottages look really cute!
Dana
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Why is Google appending a different website's brand name to the end of SERP title?
I've recently been shown some SERP results where Google is appending a different website's brand name to the end of the SERP title. It's actually rewriting the brand's name to that of the other website. (This is obviously not ideal.) Why would this be? The other website doesn't even stock the same product, so there shouldn't be any confusion there. But even if it did, many websites stock the same products. Just confusing...
Branding | | Ria_1 -
Re-Branding Website
Hi everyone! I'm currently in the process of re-branding a website, and am really worried about the SEO consequences of doing so... The site I'm working on has recently been seeing a large increase of organic search traffic (almost 25% each month for the past 3 months) and I want to do my best to avoid screwing that up in the process of changing the aesthetic of the site. A couple specific questions I have are: Does changing the stylesheet, but none of the on-page content affect SEO? Would condensing menu items (i.e. putting all services under 1 item named "services") have a positive or negative effect? Neither? Any advice, tips, or previous experiences on this would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Branding | | Derrald0 -
Website Name Before Search String in Google SERP
I'm curious to hear whether it's better to have your company name before the Search String, or after it?When I search for Church Management Software in Google, some results place the company before the string.
Branding | | ChurchCommunityBuilder
**In attached image
(Pink Squares : Company Name)
(Blue Squares : Search String) Please indicate in your response if there is any study, experiment, or evidence to back your answer. Thanks for your help! NameOrStringNameOrString cmsSerp.jpg0 -
Adwords alternative for beauty products
I was wondering if anybody knew of a good display network group for beauty products/anti-aging/wellness Adwords is doing okay but we would like to expand to other networks.
Branding | | Atomicx0 -
US Based Website Wanting to Sell in Canada
Hi All, I work for an small e-commerce company that is looking to expand our customer base to include Canadian customers. At the moment, we do serve some Canadian customers, but haven't made a concerted effort to capture this market and are looking to lay the groundwork for this new venture. With this in mind I have a few questions I am hoping to get some help on. Please see below. 1. From the viewpoint of a potential Canadian customer, how is it best to them know that we sell and ship to Canada? If you have examples of companies that do this well, please share! 2. From an SEO standpoint, how is it best for a US company to target Canadian customers? In the past, our websites have relied heavily on organic search results to drive traffic and we would like to continue this trend as we venture into Canada. If you have any other feedback, tips or suggestions of questions we should be asking ourselves before starting this, please feel free to add them! Thank you for your help!
Branding | | airnwater0 -
High authority brand expanding product line, domain question
Hi MOZers, I've been given a handy little domain puzzle to deal with and would love insight from the community. Here's the situation: We're retailers of one specific, big, nationally known product. Let's pretend it's the Snuggee (IT'S NOT). People search for it and buy it from our site, or from Amazon or other retailers that we distribute it to. We're about to expand to carry a bunch of related, but different products - so from a one-product brand to 5 or 6 different items, relating to different keyword searches. Imagine Snuggee people want to start selling a whole bunch of products that solve the same needs of warming the front of your body and making you look silly. The owners want to change the main domain from [specific product] to [name similar to specific product, but is more general]. What concerns me is how to handle the fame of the branded product in terms of domain names. Current domain, based on that product, has a ton of links and a decent age. Owners are thinking to redirect everything to fresh new unestablished domain. While I know 301s will pass most link value, it will also be a home page that will be about a bunch of products - not just that main known one. In fact, we're considering making a URL for each product as landing page, of which old famous product would be one of 5 or 6 pages. Two main options we're considering right now: Keep old domain as a doorway page featuring just old product, with same look and feel, and from which any links would point to the new domain. Try to keep this as ranking for top result for this search, which should be easy. Unify everything under new domain, with old product being featured on a separate page / subdirectory. Hope that new home page still can rank pretty well for our old product, even though it will be talking about other products now as well. What we'd stand to lose would be the SERP for old products featuring too many big box retailers that sell our stuff and take a chunk out of our margins. The goal is to help us become known for many things, while still being always the best search result for what we're already known for. Which of those two options seem best, or is there another I'm missing altogether? Thank you!
Branding | | advancedSemiotics0 -
Infographic Design
Hi Guys I am looking to outsource some design work to have infogrpahics designed, this will also include the gathering of data and distrubution etc... Can anyone recommend any agency's, specialist infographic design company's? Matthew
Branding | | EwanFisher0