Finally - a website for you to see!

[katy111]

Hello again!

Finally, a website for you to see!

Would really appreciate any feedback you have for us...

Our website is;

HOME TOUCHES

HOME TOUCHES

If you could crawl through and find anything thats wrong with it, then let me know id be most most grateful!

Many Thanks!

[benfriedman]

Nice Site.

You might be interested in joining the Sleeping Solutions Programme on Affiliate Window. they are a market leader for beds and bedroom furniture. Would go very well on your site!

Let me know if you are interested.

Cheers

Ben

[Greavsie]

Hi Katy

Hopefully you are asking for some constructive advice - if not, sorry for the long reply.

You have a good URL, which could be utilised more.

1. Content
- currently it appears you are simply running affiliate links. Google and all the other search engines are not going to like this anymore than an average user. So in its current state it will probably only make revenue if you are using it as a PPC landing page
- you have to think about why would a typical user come to your website? write some insightful content on home improvement and decorating tips. Use magazines for inspiration.
- you then serve the advertising around the editorial. readers = potential purchases

2. SEO (search engine optimisation)
- take a look through this forum and look at the various tips, also try SearchEngineStrategies and Webmasterworld and various blogs.
- currently your SEO is poor, but it is definitely worth investigating so you can rank better within the various search engines specifically Google. Google has around 85% market share in the UK search sector - so its vitally important for your site to succeed

3. PPC
- When your site is more ready, it might be worth running a few small campaigns on Google AdWords or Yahoo and MSN (i'd stick with the former) to get more traffic to your site

4. Bookmarks
- Good for SEO, again if your site is useful people will bookmark it. So give them the option

5. Email
- If you decide to produce good content, then you might want to create a weekly/monthly email "home inspirations". With some affiliates links
- Very good for driving traffic to your site, very cheap and potentially lucrative for CPA, and sponsorships

6. More selection & More merchants
- The more options the better, I personally do not shop at Argos or Freemans (wife's a snob) so I'm not going to be shopping on your site or makign you any money
- This can be easy if you categorise merchants i.e. Decorating to a budget, Mid-Range and Luxury

7. Keep working on it
- Don't lose heart and keep working on it, eventually it will work for you if you invest enough time

There are loads of other things you can and should be doing; but it does depend on the time and resources at your disposal. Be happy to help you more if you are promoting LinkShare merchants i.e. Laura Ashley, Cotswold Company etc

[loquax]

I've just looked at a couple of links for Argos and Freemans - and you really could do with putting the affiliate links in if you're hoping to earn commission from them.

Jason

[DioBach]

Once again, in the vein that no one ever learnt anything from a compliment.

The layout is out all over and looks sloppy. Boxes don't line up, item headings have weird breaks, etc.

Lack of content - I'd be clicking away in a second. The lack of content will also hamper you should you try to PPC some traffic to your pages.

SEO wise, no page or folder names to help the search engines, no content for them to spider, etc.

Maybe consider adding a blog about the items you want to sell, rather than the bland item pages you already have. Unique user reviews, item details, etc will also do it the world of good.

[katy111]

Thanks for the great tips! Its much appreciated, any more tips and criticisms would ne great too! The category idea for price structure is a great idea, we are currently looking into joining up with linkshare as soon as we can (today). As weve said, we are totally new at this and really appreciate all the tips and criticisms you all give.

The home page at the moment is looking quite mix and match with all of the images, we didnt want to add too much text to the home page because sometimes if theres too much to read, people dont bother. A balance is what we need to find.

As for SEO - Great point! we have been reading up on marketing our website and how to be more kind to search engines, were basically just looking to get the ball rolling.

The affiliate links - we do have them, every time you click on a product, we have our affiliate link in each URL.

As for the products being completely misaligned etc - totally agree, as we said, just getting things up and running right now, ripping the site to shreds is exactly what we need.

Once weve signed up to linkshare and get some more stuff up and sort out the site in general, we'll probably ask you again to have another look.

Keep the comments coming! We really appreciate it!

[Travel Pixel]

well this certainly isnt ready to be unleashed onto the punters yet i would say.

- Spend more time on the look (atm it looks a tad early 90's). Use CSS and some nice gradients.
- As said above put your affiliate links in to the argos pages if you want to make any money.
- Redirect above affiliate links to mask from the big G.
- Add unique content for each category. Some spiel about beds or something....
- Optimise URLs for good SEO.
- I couldnt actually click on the category text links on the homepage.
- Make a cool mascot for the site (like that hippo for slumberland i think!).

[drivetowin]

Originally Posted by katy111 The affiliate links - we do have them, every time you click on a product, we have our affiliate link in each URL.

Umm - you don't - or at least not on the pages I looked at - you need the full tracking code , not just the url for argos or freemans or whoever otherwise sales are not going to track.

Personally I have to say I don't like it -

1. I think the whole design would look better centred on the page when running at higher resolutions rather than hugging the left hand edge - I agree that is down to personal preference though.

2. There is no real call to action on each product - at the very least I would make the product names links to the product as well as the images - and the same for the categories.

3. Get a copy of Firefox and look at your site in that, the CSS does not work properly.

4. The alt text for each image should be a description of what the image is, and not the image filename.

5. Decide on one font and stick to it.

6. On the bedding page there is a different coloured background to the other pages and where all the other pages have the text below the image, it has the text above.

In summary, not a bad start, but still a long way to go.

[katy111]

Originally Posted by drivetowin Umm - you don't - or at least not on the pages I looked at - you need the full tracking code , not just the url for argos or freemans or whoever otherwise sales are not going to track.

Its not just the URL we have, however it would be nice if you could say how we could get what it is youre talking about? Thanks for all the great advice and criticism, as i said, much appreciated.

[drivetowin]

What I mean is that your urls like:

http://www.argos.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Search?storeId=10001&catalogId=1500001001&langId=-1&searchTerms=SET+OF+2+RUSH+SQUARE+STORAGE+STOOLS&x=14&y=13

Should be like:

http://www.kqzyfj.com/click-1309233-5472107?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.argos.co.uk%2Fwebapp%2Fwcs%2Fstores%2Fservlet%2FSearch%3FstoreId%3D10001%26catalogId%3D1500001001%26langId%3D-1%26searchTerms%3DSET%2BOF%2B2%2BRUSH%2BSQUARE%2BSTORAGE%2BSTOOLS%26x%3D14%26y%3D13

The

http://www.kqzyfj.com/click-1309233-5472107

bit is the link code you get from Commission Junction - without this the sales will not track through Commission Junction and you will not receive any commission

[babrees]

I'm sorry but I have to agree with everything above. There was also a bedding product with no link whatsoever. Another link went to a duff page on BHS.

Your menu, when you hover over it the text is white on a white background so you can't read it.

I see you used a site builder to do your site. May I suggest that you try to learn how to build a site yourself and especially learn css. This will help with your design and layout and especially your code, which is very poor.

[katy111]

Without further repeating myself, we are literally BRAND NEW to this.

We have previously built a website using macromedia Dreamweaver and edited this using contribute, why, may i ask does it matter how the website is deigned? We own 10 domain names and a resellers package, therefore are required to build and maintain our websites fairly easily. The sitebuilder provided was a trial and although the lay out is poor, this is not because of the sitebuilder, this is entirely our own fault. ( )

Again, without further repeating myself, we are looking to set the ball rolling and are appreciative of your comments no matter how harsh they may be.

[babrees]

There is no need to repeat yourself - I read you the first time and am merely trying to be helpful.

The code and layout is (IMHO) as important as good content. There are in fact laws that state websites should be accessible for those handicapped (blind, etc.) and yours is not compliant with this (see [Invalid] Markup Validation of http://www.hometouches.co.uk/index.html - W3C Markup Validator ). I know that there are probably thousands, if not millions, of sites that do not comply, but I am at the moment only commenting on your site.

For my part, if I am surfing and come across two sites offering the same thing, I would go to the one for the more professional looking site.

But what is more important and urgent for your site is that your links track, otherwise even if somebody does click on them to purchase you will not get the commission.

You must get the correct tracking URL from your network - most of whom call it text link or preferably deep linking. Where you find this is different for each network. I can't help with CJ because I do not use them.

[katy111]

Thanks for your help. Sorry if the previous post came across wrong, read it back and the way it was wrote wasnt how it was suppost to sound. I really do appreciate all the help and feedback you have been giving. Really need all the advice and help you can give us.

[babrees]

No Need to apologise, writing can be difficult to put it as you mean it