TOPIC:

Hello,

Please evaluate us!!!

harborcourt.toastmastersclubs.org/


Ted Vallejos
Harbor Court Toastmasters Club
Club #: 1886, Dist #: 05,
Est: 12/1/1960
5952 El Cajon Boulevard
San Diego, CA, 92115, United States

Nice job!

You just have a broken link at the bottom of the home page and maybe make the sidebar a color to get rid of the white space out there... :0)

Linda

Ted,

I am looking at the site as a visitor, not a Toastmaster, clicking on any link I can, so these are my first impressions and only my opinion.

Love the picture on the home page!!

In your lead paragraph, I would have it read "Harbor Court Toastmasters Club, San Diego CA, is open to all members of the community."

I also like the animation of the clapping hands.

I would move the links for the Member Resources into the Members Only area, except for the First Time Log in. Each of the other links though goes to the exact same forum page, and it might be better to use custom page, rather than the support forum documents.

At the bottom of the main page, your two pictures are missing and the links are broken.

In the main menu, you use a lot of acronyms. As a non-Toastmaster visiting the site, I would wonder what a D5 or a HC or a TI is and if the roles change depending on where I am at.

The public downloads seem to have items that a non-member probably shouldn't have access to.
I would also move the Dues renewal link to members only.

My thoughts:

What I like:

1. Agree with Roger... like the harbor photo.

2. I like the verbiage that you start your Home Page with.

3. I like the Area Governor (A4/A32) "brags". Good!

4. Weekly Club Recognitions ... good! Clapping hands! Good!

5. Meeting Info page - Google Map and directions Good!

6. Meet our Members - officers listed Good!

7. Meetings on calendar - Good!

7b. Online Paypal for dues. -- Awesome!

Opportunities for Improvement:

8. Your home page could use an attention grabbing headline above the top photo.

9. "Harbor Court Toastmasters - Club #: 1886, Dist #: 05, Division E, Area 4, Est: 12/1/1960" Some of this will seem like Toastmasters jargon to a prospective new member. If you want to keep it, maybe move it to a less prominent location.

10. Your home page starts off strong, but kind of becomes a mash-up towards the end. Not sure that the following should be on your home page (maybe move elsewhere and have just a link on home page): Recent Themes, Recent Words of the Day, Member Resources, Dues/Membership Info

11. Meeting Info page - I would suggest adding a relevant exterior photo of your meeting venue and/or a floor plan indicating your room, to make easy for first time visitors to find your meeting. For example, you indicate "Finding the Room: Enter through back stairway entrance. 2nd floor of the building." ... Fine, but including a photo of the entrance and floor plan would make it much easier to understand and find you. Personally, I would be concerned about getting lost finding you.

12. Public Downloads -- could benefit from using Virtual folders for organization.

13. Sample Agendas - You have two of these, one from last year--both needed? I would make sure you have members permission to have their names listed publically in these agendas. If members leave the club and are still listed in those agendas, what then? My recommendation would be to either black/fuzz out the names or add made up names to your member roster just long enough to create a sample agenda that does not list real member names.

14. Some of the stuff on your Public Menu is clearly for members benefit. Maybe they do not want to log in. In any case, I would suggest either moving it to the Members Only menu, or make one public page called Members Info (or similar) and just put links on that page to the Members stuff (basically bury it down a level from the top menu).

15. Some of the colors a bit too intense for my taste. The mustard yellow in the menu and the bright green for the M.O.M. page, for example.

Overall, the website has a lot going for it. Just needs some polish. I am sure that you can do that.

Ted,

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.

13. Sample Agendas - You have two of these, one from last year--both needed? I would make sure you have members permission to have their names listed publically in these agendas. If members leave the club and are still listed in those agendas, what then? My recommendation would be to either black/fuzz out the names or add made up names to your member roster just long enough to create a sample agenda that does not list real member names.

Ted,

Attached is a sample agenda from a prospective club I am mentoring. Typically, the very last part about absences would not be printed, but I did for this illustration

Hi Ted!

I realize San Diego, like Miami, may be one of those BRIGHT cities. If not, you may want to consider more neutral tones. If you keep the purple and yellow, I suggest placing a neutral tone (taupe, beige, eggshell) as your BACKGROUND. That way the menu boards won't appear to jump off the screen.

Beautiful cityscape, but where are all the "action photos" of people?

I love the idea of a sample agenda!

I saw the meetup, but where's the rest of the social media?

Personally, I've never been a fan of the floating panels at the bottom of the home pages. If you're going to use them, you may want to include some original content. But with as many custom pages as you have, do you really need them?

I like you links to the officers, and your use of Toastmasters Magazine!

Blaine Little, ACB
V.P. of PR, TM 1757

I like that I know this club meets in San Diego and is open. That is valuable information provided immediately to the user.

Nice timely information about the club winners on 21 February. I also like the clapping hands.

Meeting Information/Directions
I really like the sample agenda. I just may borrow that idea. Good directions too.

I like the New Member Sign-Up. I like the PayPal link.

Likewise, the Dues Renewal is good too,

Things that do not impress me . . .
Link to 19 members on homepage opens a new tab. I would much prefer to have the link follow in the tab I am working in. Same thing for the other links (directions, etc.)

Weekly club recognitions would benefit from a photograph.

The Certificate of Achievement is very nice. It is now more than four years out of date. I would move this off the homepage to a Club Awards page.

I am not a fan of the light blue that is used for the public menu nor the blue used as a background on the member page.

By Way of Background
When evaluating your site, I looked at it with one major question in mind: Will the site grab the attention of potential guests and get them to a meeting? With the assumption that potential guests came to your site interested in learning more about Toastmasters and seeing if your club is one they would want to visit, I would expect that the content of your home page* would:
A. Make it exceedingly clear that guests are welcome to visit the club.
B. Provide the address to your meeting and give (or link to) explicit directions for how to get to your meeting room.
C. Say something that distinguishes the club from other clubs in your area.
D. Demonstrate that your club is energetic, active, and vibrant.
E. Reinforces that your club will help them be better speakers and leaders.
F. Briefly describes what Toastmasters is all about.
G. Have embedded links to additional information about both the club and Toastmasters.

Aesthetically, I believe the home page should be professional-looking and appealing. With that, I expect the content portion of the home page would:
H. Use headers that clearly delineate the topics being covered and make it easy on the eyes.
I. Not use any clip art, stock photos, or bad animations.
J. Not look like a ransom note (i.e., it should not have a lot of different fonts or different-sized fonts, lots of different colors, lots of centered text, that sort of thing).

*As our club’s webmaster for the last three years, I have found that having more information on the home page keeps people on the site longer, and then leads them to click more links. Using information from Google Analytics, I found that when our site had less information on the home page potential guests spent less time on the site and clicked fewer links. As a result, I believe it’s important to have more information, not less, on the home page itself. While it’s okay (and encouraged) to link to even more information in the menu, I believe the content of the home page itself should address each of the items mentioned above.

My Evaluation of Your Site
With all of that in mind and focusing exclusively on your home page (since others here will likely provide a more comprehensive review of the subpages), here’s my evaluation:
A. It’s clear guests are welcome. You may, however, want to mention that attending meetings as a guest is free.
B. You give a link to directions, but where are you located? What’s the address? Which meeting room? This is crucial information and should not be buried in the hope that potential guests will search it out.
C. You definitely distinguish your club. I especially like “one of the few clubs that meets Saturdays.” Excellent.
D. With the weekly club recognition and the theme of the week, you show that the club is energetic and active. I encourage you, though, to add a photo or two of members giving speeches.
E. You definitely reinforce that your club will help folks be better speakers, though you aren’t explicit about leadership.
F. You definitely describe Toastmasters.
G. You have the occasional link (to Meet our Members and area governors, to directions), but I encourage you to embed even more links to additional information in the context of what potential guests are reading.
H. You have headers, but they don’t really do anything to make the page easier to read. (See J below.)
I. Here, I disagree with others who have praised your use of the photos and animation. Regarding the photos, they leave me, as a potential guest, cold. The website is intended to promote a speakers club, not tourism; I would expect photos of speakers or folks in meetings, not landscape and building photos. If you must use the stock photo of the harbor, I recommend that you put it at the very bottom of the page with some caption about the tie to the club name. As for the clapping hands animation: in my opinion nothing makes a webpage look less professional or more juvenile than bad animations, and that is one really bad animation. (Heck, only the very best animation, sparingly used and not a GIF, can enhance a website … and I have seen very few of those.)
J. As for not my suggestion that your page not like a ransom note, here’s where I believe you have the biggest opportunity to improve your home page to appeal to potential guests. I count a forest green font, a primary green font, a purple font, a black font, a blue underlined font (for links), left aligned text, centered text, right aligned text, initial capped words, all capped words, reddish text, at least 10 different font sizes, and at least three different fonts. This is all too much and not very professional looking. I suggest coming up with a cleaner, more cohesive, aesthetic, one that uses bolder headings to make thing easier to read and a fewer fonts, font sizes, and font colors. By coming up with a cleaner, more cohesive design, I believe the home page will be more attractive to those who seek out Toastmasters.

Some Additional Thoughts

• I’m torn about the use of so much member-specific information on the home page (such as the word of the day, past themes, and club recognitions). While it shows yours to be an energetic, vibrant club, too much of it will fly past the heads of potential guests. As a primary public-facing vehicle, the home page should give your potential guests everything they need to learn about the club and get to a meeting; the member-specific stuff feels like too much “inside baseball” that can overwhelm those that you would like to attend. Perhaps you can move much of this detail to customized pages, then add embedded links to it in case potential guests are interested in learning more about what those things mean.
• I’m also torn about listing club officers on the home page. You and I know what officers do in the club, but potential guests won’t. (Again, a bit much inside baseball.) So, what’s the purpose of listing them here? How will I, as a potential guest, know if I should e-mail the president as or the VP of PR with a question? A link to the Contact Us page should suffice.
• I agree with an earlier comment that the out-of-date certificate should be deleted or moved to another page. It doesn’t add anything that a potential guest would want to know.

Overall Thoughts
I really appreciate that you have captured a lot of information on the home page, but in the end if feels like a catch-all, which is also reflected in the “ransom note” formatting. I encourage you revise the page to give it a very potential-guest-centered focus. I suggest that you use the page to only show content that informs or appeals to a potential guest, that will show you to be a vibrant club, and explains how you are distinguished from others in the area. I recommend that you move the member-specific, inside-baseball stuff to other pages. Also, consider coming up with a professional-looking design that you can apply not only to the home page but to all other customized pages on your site.