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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46911

  • Blaine67@gmail.com
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Like Steve said, I want the positives, but I also want to improve over time.

I am VERY NEW to FTH, and 6 months ago, our club had NO online presence at all. So, I'm not looking for perfection.

My two goals are; 1) to be warm and personable in order to attract new members, and 2) to be completely DIFFERENT from anyone else in our Division, or even District.

With that said, please be brutally honest! I think we keep getting better the more ideas we hear.

TM #1757; heartoftennessee.toastmastersclubs.org/ heartoftennessee.toastmastersclubs.org/

Thank you in advance for your time. :cheer:
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46919

  • GeorgeMarshall
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Hi Blaine, nice job!

Suggestions:
For the search engines, add a couple more bits of text with your town name close to "Toastmasters". You already have it twice, a couple of times more won't hurt :-)

For potential visitors, add the location right up there at the top with the next meeting. I think you might eventually want to change from next meeting date to meeting schedule, to avoid the need to update so often. Yes, you do have a directions page, but I think it helps to engage the visitor right away.

Also, there's a typo: promation

George
Last edit: by GeorgeMarshall. Reason: Typo
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46924

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I agree completely with George's evaluation.

Here is mine, also.

What I like:

1. Use of color.

2. Home page photos.

3. Good verbiage on home page. ("elevator pitch" / value proposition)

4. Google map and location synopsis on Meeting Info / Directions page

5. Custom Contact Us greeting. Contact Us has phone numbers.

6. You have a link to the recent newsletter on your menu.

7. Tabbed menu presents a prospect with just the relevant public menu items.

Areas for potential improvement.

8. Color - I like that you matched the menu color hues to the color hues in the banner, but you may want use slightly lighter color shades (same hues) in the left side. Just my personal preference for lighter background colors... others may have different opinions.

9. Home page - you could just put a link in your home page content to the Meeting Information page.

10. Meeting Info page - I suggest you include an exterior photo of your meeting venue there to make it easy for meeting guests to find your venue.

11. Meet our Members page - if you can get all of your officers listed there with photos and bios that would be great.

Overall, it looks good -- you are off to a great start!
Regards,

Steve James, DTM
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Officer Emeritus, Mindful Communicators (Club 1966, District 52) A President's Distinguished Club for each of the last 10 years.

>>> Please put your club number in your forum profile. CLICK here to edit your profile.
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46928

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Thanks, gentlemen! That's all advice I can use. :)

George, I actually threw in the references to Murfreesboro, on YOUR advice. I will throw in some more, and perhaps mention some surrounding areas too. I didn't know that! Every time I hear what google wants in terms of SEO, it's completely different from what they wanted a couple of years ago, so thanks for keeping me current! Any other easy ideas for SEO?
The "Meeting box" usually has a generic message, but we were thrown off schedule with our contests due to snow last week. I'll change it back on Tuesday.

Steve, I actually just changed the menus from standard to tabbed this week. The members menu board was maroon, and yes, it is sort of depressing... so, I tabbed them to make everything blue. Originally, I wanted to alternating colors so visitors would see distinctions as they navigate. But, yeah, you're right, the colors are a bit gloomy. I can lighten them up and still look uniform with the Toastmasters banner.
So, a meeting link INSIDE the content? In addition to the menu? Is that just to reiterate it, or do you think a visitor might LEAVE before they do a little "exploring"?
An actual photo of our meeting place below the map. That's a great idea!
It's like pulling teeth to get members to update their profiles, but I can definitely get the officers on board.

See, that's why I asked. Thanks, guys!

Blaine
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46929

  • LindaMann
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Hello Blaine;

I is alright to repeat on home page what you have on another page, or you can just put Members/direction page and make that a link and explain to viewers on the page to click it, to go over to that page. You need to explain what to do, in as short a way as possible. People don't have time to read a whole lot....

Linda
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46930

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If you are going to use that color blue, try making the words white and bold so that people can see it and make it bigger as well... It is a little dark and some may shy away if they can't read it right away.

Linda
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46932

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Hi Linda!

Thanks for the critique. I did just lighten up the colors. If I go any more, I'm going to wind up with pink and baby blue. That won't fly with the guys. :P Yeah, I can embolden. I just have to figure how to do that out. But I will! Good idea.

Thanks,
Blaine
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46934

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The way you make it bigger is in appearance, you will see that right now it might be on like 50%

I have put my websites at 125%... You don't want it big but you also don't want it to small...

You can also make any of the pages links another color, such as the officers pages, to differentiate from the others.

Linda
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46935

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Blaine & all,
SEO as a general topic is complex, and changing, as Google constantly adjusts their algorithms [My company designs websites and online ad campaigns for local businesses, so we try to stay on top of this area].

However, the SEO we need for clubs is a much, much, simpler problem, so we can get some success with relatively simple methods.

First, why is our problem simpler? It's because when someone finally decides to visit a club, they are basically doing a geographical search: where is a Toastmasters club near me?
So our SEO goal for our website is simply to be really, really sure that Google understands that our website is all about (a) Toastmasters and (b) our club location: the town or city. Content is one important way to do that.

Google nowadays tends to discount (somewhat) bulleted lists and headlines, they seem to prefer to find the terms in natural language sentences. So, having the word Toastmasters and your city in a headline is not quite as "valuable" as weaving it into a sentence - a few times.

I always ask our visitors how they found us, and most say "internet search". Then I ask if they remember what terms they searched on. The last dozen or so visitors I asked said the same identical thing:
Toastmasters fremont
:)
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46937

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You are correct GeorgeMarshall!

I am a web developer and when I designed several Toastmasters FTH sites I inputted the towns, toastmasters, public speaking, communication, toastmasters international in the spaces as SEO words...

They all help, because you never know what someone will type in google

Linda
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46940

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Thanks! I was just coming back to ask you that.
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #46948

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You are welcome! :0)

Linda
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47024

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Blaine,

In order to continue to have this forum section be useful into the future, we need to request that everyone contribute to it.

Therefore, we are implementing "Get an evaluation, give an evaluation." . Basically, we are requesting those who have received a website evaluation give a Toastmasters style website evaluation for at least one other club that has requested an evaluation in this forum section. (You get to choose which club website to do the website evaluation for.) Just post your impressions: things you like about the website, and areas for improvement. Everyone has something to offer... just trust your instincts. :)
Regards,

Steve James, DTM
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Officer Emeritus, Mindful Communicators (Club 1966, District 52) A President's Distinguished Club for each of the last 10 years.

>>> Please put your club number in your forum profile. CLICK here to edit your profile.
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47049

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Steve,
That certainly sounds FAIR, and like most Toastmasters, I am always willing to help someone achieve their goals. But, at my infancy stage with FTH, I fear the only thing I might be able to impart would be.... bad advice. I will however, take a look around, and offer words of encouragement.

Blaine
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47050

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Hello Blaine;

Even tough you are a new Toastmaster, just keep it short and sweet and treat it like you are evaluating someone's speech. You can do it! :0)

Linda
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47053

  • GeorgeMarshall
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LInda, I agree. Giving feedback on websites is a lot like giving feedback to speakers. We need not be experts to help the speaker (webmaster), since we are simply sharing our impressions.

So Blaine, you don't need to come up with detailed recipes for improvement - just say how you reacted, and the receiver can decide what to do about it.

We can comment on content (was the important info readily visible), colors (helpful vs distracting), organization & structure (did the pictures get in the way or were they helpful) and anything else.

So engage with the community, and don't worry about your level of expertise :-)

George
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47101

  • RDOwens
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I like that I know immediately where you are and when the next meeting is.

The Main Heading is "Welcome to the Heart of Tennessee Toastmasters in Murfreesboro, TN!" That text is the first text in the body in the welcome part. I like it as the main heading; I would drop the welcome part.

I like the photographs and the text on the homepage.

The link to the directions doesn't need to show the entire path, just use the word "directions" and make it linkable.

Meeting Information/Directions
Nicely done.

Meet Our Members
You need to have more members participate.

How Does Toastmasters work?
I like the page. Place border space between the image and the text. As it is now, the next is right at the edge of the photograph.

Nice job on the newsletter. The link, however, has stars and capital letters. It is out of balance with the rest of the menu links.

Menu
I like the blue, but the text is not contrasted enough with the blue, leaving it with a muted look, imo.

Social
FB page is replete with current content. Nice.
Twitter has current content. Good.
Google+ has no posts. Also, the logo on the blue background does not look right.

Good job. I think the site looks good.
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47137

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Thanks, RD!

Yes, I have had a lot of alignment issues with FTH! I am use to other templates where I create several text boxes, and I get everything where I want it. Then it doesn't move. You'll also notice at the bottom of the home page, there is a big horizontal gap above the bottom pictures. That's just as close as I can get it to everything in the panel. I've played with alignment settings on the PHOTOS, but that just makes everything else JUMP around, and not landing where I want it. There might be (and probably is) a simple fix, but I have not yet discovered it. Any guidance on that would be appreciated!

I tried white in the menu, but it was too much on the eyes, so I softened it. What do you think if I used the maroon I currently have set up as the "Officers Only" text? I would then REALLY ghost their text.

Yes, getting the members to go public is a bit of a challenge. I am convening a website committee in March for ANYONE in the club to participate. This will be a task completion on page 34 of the CL manual. Hopefully, the site will get more internal use, once everyone actually visits it. Some of the officers haven't even been there in months.

Thanks!
Blaine
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 1 month ago #47139

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You'll also notice at the bottom of the home page, there is a big horizontal gap above the bottom pictures. That's just as close as I can get it to everything in the panel.


I just fixed that for you. How? In Source View. Some things are just easier to fix in Source View.

The key thing to understand about the photos is that there are really two alignment options, right and left, that fix the photos and set up word wrapping. If you do not set those, your photo is treated like a huge text item that moves with text--if you want a centered photo, don't set the alignment option, but use the text centering icon. If you need more advanced layout, put your photos and text in tables. Tables are pretty well supported in the HTML editor and allow you to do some advanced layout stuff.

I did not create the editor (third party plug-in), but believe me, it is much better than a lot of the other ones out there. (e.g., the Joomla editor we used for support site updates is a big pain.)
Regards,

Steve James, DTM
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Officer Emeritus, Mindful Communicators (Club 1966, District 52) A President's Distinguished Club for each of the last 10 years.

>>> Please put your club number in your forum profile. CLICK here to edit your profile.
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 4 weeks ago #47167

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Sweet! :silly: That just looks a whole lot better. Thanks, Steve!

I pressed a button in the admin panel that said "source". It took me to a bunch of CODE. :oops: So, I promptly hit the button again. But thank you for doing that.

So, when I first saw the icon labeled "Table", I just assumed it was for creating a pie chart or bar graph. See, my head is still in Microsoft Word. Apparently, that puts the page in a grid system! Very nice. I'm too afraid to experiment with existing pages, but the next time I create a custom page, I will play around.

I've learned some things here today. B)

Thanks again,
Blaine
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 4 weeks ago #47169

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The source is the code.

After you read it for a while, you can figure out what the code creates. Sometimes when you make an error in the editor screen, it is easier to correct in the source code. The best thing you can do is to copy the source code to a text file...just in case.
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Evaluate my website - Comments, please. 9 years 4 weeks ago #47183

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Also, the WYSIWYG editor is really just a visual representation of the code and tries to "approximate" what you will actually see on the actual page when it is viewed. When you use the editor, you are essentially manipulating the code, albeit with an easier (usually) interface. However, you will find over time that while the WYSIWYG interface is pretty good, it is not perfect... It doesn't allow you set every setting for HTML that is possible (just the most popular ones), and sometimes it is just easier to fiddle with the HTML code in the Source View once you get used to that. In the Source view, you can manipulate any setting for the underlying HTML.

For example, if you are doing something like putting a slideshow or a video in your webpages, there are tools on the editor toolbar for those, but sometimes it is just simpler and more reliable to insert the relevant code for those in Source View. (Frequently, we will just tell people to use the Source View for those.)

Lastly, you can certainly create content in MS Word, copy it to the clipboard, and then use the Paste From Word icon in the WYSIWYG editor. However, that paste function sometimes has problems, and the developer of the editor is currently working to improve it.
Regards,

Steve James, DTM
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Officer Emeritus, Mindful Communicators (Club 1966, District 52) A President's Distinguished Club for each of the last 10 years.

>>> Please put your club number in your forum profile. CLICK here to edit your profile.
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