New website, new blogWell, I finally got round to redoing my site. This is version three! I think – and hope – you’ll agree it looks much better than version two. Here are the fundamental differences:
Cleaner layout
I felt version two was too cluttered. The three column layout and all the icons – which were there to make the site look clean and easy-to-use – ironically made it look messy and confused. I’ve kept the logo and the dark bar across the top but have moved the menu there to save space. Looking back at version two I see now how much of the screen was eaten up by the header. Other than the portfolio pages this version has just two columns and unlike version two, every page places some emphasis on the portfolio.
Less text
I went a bit overboard on the copy on version two. I have consolidated the services text down to one page; I think it works much better that way. People just want to know you have satisfied customers and a good portfolio of work. After that, they just want to know how to get a quote, they don’t want pages of guff about what you do and who you are.
Categorised portfolio
My portfolio was getting pretty big (which is a nice problem to have) so I have split this into sections. It works really well and I have added a neat AJAX loading feature that nicely binds all the categories together. The business/corporate section is by far the biggest, maybe version four will break them down even more.
Stronger marketing messaging on the home page
I realised there was nothing particularly impressive on the home page; I wanted something that would really make an impact to prospective customers. I do get quite a lot of qualified traffic from Google so version three really aims to monetise on that traffic.
WordPress blog
And finally there is the addition of the blog – and this is the first ever post of that blog. It uses WordPress, which I have to say is absolutely fantastic. I got the initial install running in a couple of minutes and soon had it integrated into the rest of the site; it’s a piece of cake if you know PHP. I added the blog because ‘Try out WordPress’ had long been on my to-do list and also I find as a web designer / developer there are certain issues I come across on a regular basis. The blog serves as a platform for me to address these issues and use them as a reference point for my customers. I don’t envisage blogging more than once a month or so but that should be enough.
That’s it – let me know what you think.
