TOPIC:

I just updated our website: www.poptm.org. Before I promote it I'd love to hear your feedback on the site.

Many of you have been my inspiration.

Thank you for your inspiration and for reviewing our site.

Nikki

www.poptm.org

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 your home page* would:
A. Make it exceedingly clear that guests are welcome to visit the club.
B. 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 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 text 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. You do a good job of saying guests are welcome. You may want to mention that it is free to attend meetings as a guest.
B. You mention "First floor conference rooms of the US Bancorp Tower," which is great, but which one? Does the room change from week to week? If it changes from week to week, how will I find out which room I should go to? Also, is it common knowledge how to get to Bancorp Tower? How I enter the building? You likely don't have to answer all of these questions on the home page, but you might consider at least embedding a link to your Meeting Information / Directions page with these details.
C. You mentioned "A Toastmasters International Distinguished Club," which is great because it helps distinguish the club from others in the area -- even if the prospective guest doesn't know what it means. Also, the fact that you hold weekly meetings immediately distinguishes you, I believe.
D. The picture alone -- with all those smiling faces -- makes me, as a potential guest, feel like your club meets the criteria of energetic, active, and vibrant. I like it. (Our club also adds meeting themes for upcoming meetings to meet this criteria.)
E. You definitely reinforce that your club helps members become better speakers and leaders.
F. You definitely do a good job summarizing what Toastmasters is about.
G. Besides what's already in the menu, you don't embed links except to the contract information. I recommend embedding links to anything that may naturally lead potential guests to want to find more information or answer questions about the information you're sharing on the home page (e.g., which conference room? how do I get to the building? your FAQ for first-timers)
H. You don't have big chunks of text, so headers may not make sense.
I. You don't use clip art, stock photos, or bad animations, so your site gets an instant grade bump from me.
J. I generally frown on centered text. One reason yours doesn't hit me as bad as some is because you have kept your messages short-and-sweet; you've packed a lot of good information into very little space. Having said that, the text on the page still does look a little like a flyer you'd find in a laundry room at a dorm and not that of a professional organization.

Some Additional Thoughts
As your additional menu links caught my eye, I thought I'd mention:

• I love that you have so many members who have filled out their member profiles. Also shows active and vibrant!
• I like that your Become a Member page is customized. (I point to potential aesthetic issues, again, and encourage a more professional-looking page.)
• Your FAQ for First Timers is great! I may send you a separate e-mail asking if we can steal shamelessly (a.k.a., borrow honorably) from this page.
• I also really appreciate your club officers page and your Testimonial pages, which both also demonstrate the club's energy and vibrancy.

Overall Thoughts
It was a real pleasure to evaluate your site. As a FTH 2.0 user since the get-go, and as someone who has been trying to refine our site ever since we converted to FTH 2.0, I am always benchmarking against other club sites. It's always fun to come across sites such as yours, which demonstrate real care for what you are doing. You are anticipating the needs of your visitors and you are customizing pages to meet those needs. Overall, it shows that you take your role as webmaster of your site -- the primary public-facing entity to the broader community -- very seriously. I would love to visit your club as a guest. Great job! And keep it up.

The suggestion I have is to put the photo first and then the description of your club.

lots of good stuff.. keep up the good work

Hi Nikki!

Yes, this forum is a great source of inspiration. It's good that the distance hasn't stopped us from learning from one another.

I like your very friendly group photo. However, I agree you may want some sort of graphic to immediately catch the eye. Mine is a club logo I designed in banner, followed closely by the group photo of us in a meeting.

I like the Visitors FAQs as well as the fact that you reiterate where and when you meet several times.

You may want to "punch up" the color a little. The scheme is nice, but perhaps turquoise menus would give a little more fill.

Your testimonials are GREAT!

I am always in favor of having at least ONE picture of someone delivering a speech! In fact, you may want to incorporate a few action photos. They prompt the visitor to take action as well.

Blaine

Hi

I like your website. It has all the information that a visitor would look for. One thing I would wonder about is, you have the meeting info at the top of the page and also at the end of the page. To me, I do not think the meeting info is needed at the bottom. I would end the page after the contact us.
I like your member testimonials and the photos. Have you thought too of adding a photo page as well?
Again, I liked your page and hope I have helped in some way. BobO Oak Brook Speakers club 6027.

Thank you, Tony, Darlene, Blaine, and mrboboneil; I appreciate all your wonderful feedback

Tony, and anyone else - you are most welcome to borrow honorably! I take it as a compliment

Thank you again and I will looking to update with your suggestions soon!

Very Grateful,

Nikki