After several unsuccessful attempts to create our own website, we’ve decided to finally pay someone to do it. It’s still not quite functional, but you can see where it’s going…. So – what do you thing? Should we add/delets some things? Comments and/or critique are welcome 🙂
http://www.migasiuk.com/clients/standarek/index.html
TIA
Replies
Very ambitious. Rather slow load for dial-up. It would be nice to click on a picture and enlarge. It was slow enough I didn't go past the first page. But maybe your prospects don't live in the sticks and have better connection.
PAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
All the zoomy stuff gets in the way. It's fluff that adds nothing to the content. I have broadband, and I still got impatient with all that motion on each page. You can still be stylish without going overboard. Keep it simpler, and remember, it's about the message, not the medium.
I agree with the others, the site looks great, but it was obviously done by a computer geek who LOVES computers.
That is both good and bad. It is good because the site looks very nice, but bad because it relies on a fast connection. (I quarentee he isn't using dialup)
I would suggest less dynamic effects and more photo content.
Sorry Stan. The home page took so long to load I finally gave up on it. I'm talking well over 5 minutes, plus it tried three times to download Flash Player even though I clicked NO each time.
There is a way to set up the code so that the information on the home page becomes visible one bit at a time while the download continues. Prospero does this for Taunton's forums, for example.
Your page isn't set up that way; it remained a dead-blank grey square while that little blue bar crawled slooooooooowly across the bottom of my screen. After going downstairs for a cup of coffee, coming back up to the office and rolling and lighting a cigarette, I was still staring at the same boring screen, and I bailed out. I would have done so much earlier if I had been shopping for a homebuilder as a potential client.
You need to get your website designer to understand that not everybody looking for a home builder is as steeped in computer culture as he/she is. Many are on dial-up, know little about computers other than how to turn them on and off, and are very nervous about allowing any unknown programs to download into their machines.
Go to round two, bro....
Dinosaur
A day may come when the courage of men fails,when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship...
But it is not this day.
Sometimes, I think websites are more about ego than an actual sales tool. At least when it comes to certain trades. You will be the one to determine if the expense is worth the number of clients it brings. I have to clean out my bookmarks regularly as folks discontinue their sites.
The Flash format may be a bit too much for dial up users. There is a lot of energy waisted in bringing up the page but it doesn't give any information, nothing more than background design.
I immediately got the impression you were not professionals. The description of how you got started and what skills you bring are not very encouraging. People don't care what you used to do, they want to see professional level experience. You have advertised yourself as a part timer that depends on a partner to see to the jobsite. You sound like a suitcase contractor that built your own home and are now a "contractor". I'd lose all that description and concentrate on your construction skills and accomplishments.
Going from spec house builder to basement remodeler isn't congruous. I think you would be better to state that you offer complete building services from new construction to remodeling and additions, if that's what you intend to do. I realize the site is not complete but extensive thumbs of your work would be more convincing than words. If you feel that there are things you bring to the job that differentiate you from others builders, then highlight those abilities.
I wouldn't hire a carpenters helper without three years of experience, let alone a builder that isn't confident enough in their abilities to quit their day job. The written info gives the impression that you are "playing" contractor. I would leave out personal anecdotes maybe even the year you started and concentrate on looking like a committed, full time builder. Having plenty of pictures that show your range of work and details that show quality speaks more than print.
Sorry for being critically direct. I see quite a few websites through this forum that make the companies look amateurish. There is often personal information that, to me, has little interest, if I was looking for abilities and accomplishments. The "Aw shucks, I'm just a down home boy" routine doesn't impress me. I'm looking for the experienced pro who's pictures and text show a level above the ordinary. Hayseeds and part timers aren't going to bring the level of sophistication that more homeowners are demanding. You will be spending a ton of money for your customers and you should give the impression that you are competent, highly experienced and capable of making their dreams a reality.
Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
No hard feelings :) That's why I asked the question.
I'll talk to the guy doing our website about the extensive use of flash. He MIGHT just be going overboard. Oh, more pics are definitely coming!
I'll definitely follow Hammer's advice and reword "Services" section.
As far as being able to quit my full time job.... I fully intended on doing it, but my employer went out of his way to accomadate me. I would be foolish not to take the offer - I get to keep GREAT benefits, come in twice a week, and work from home 1 day.
Very nice - I liked the website! I have broadband, and upload was not a problem, nor did I think the movement was excessive. Definitely need more pics. And re: the "about us" - I also did not find this very confidence bolstering. Of course, this is coming from a guy who's done this full-time for years, while often being underbid by those "I have another income" side-job contractors (usually firemen, in my area). Owner-builder is a dirty word among professional contractors, in this neck of the woods (if you saw some of the stuff we encounter on these owner-builder homes, you'd know why!). Anyway, nice website, best wishes, and hope you're able to quit your other job and give your customers 100% real soon!
Huck - thanks! We're definitely going to make the content and wording better. The pics that are going in are located at: http://www.standarek.com/pics (caution - if you think the website is slow, don't even try opening some of the pics - they are 3MB :) ).
As far as quitting my "other job" goes - believe me, it's getting harder and harder not to. Not because of workload, though; it's just tough having to sit in front of a computer an entire day while your "guys" are swinging hammers, trimming, painting, laying tile, etc....
Oh, if anybody cares... Here's the last "spec" we built and sold last year:
http://www.standarek.com
And here are some of our basement projects:
http://www.standarek.com/basements
Stan
Very nice. But definitely gotta shrink 'em down for the website! That crazy ceiling coffer was way unusual - how did it happen to come about? Anyway, I hope I explained my bias about the "other job" - just a personal sore spot. Probably doesn't even apply in your case.
Excellent work, Stan!
And I'll tell you what pleases me most about seeing it. Your completed (and successfully sold) projects show what kind of work can be done by people just starting out.
There are some hard-nosed Breaktimers here that would say (and do say) nobody's any good at this residential construction or remodeling biz unless they've paid their dues by coming up through the ranks and slugging away for years. They tend to dismiss newbies, particularly anybody coming to it from a professional day job, as "wannabes."
But I gotta ask? What's more profitable, ground-up new, or basement remodeling?
Gene - thanks for the complements! I've seen enough jobs butchered by seasoned pros to know that we can easily make it in this field, even if we're just "wannabes".
What's more profitable? New construction - by a LARGE margin! Not that there's no money in the basements. The problem with us is that we're not charging enough to do them - and we know it :) We (my partner and I) have 2 guys who work for us. In order to keep them busy, we commit(ed) a cardinal sin - did few jobs that we barely broke even on. We're slowly raising prices, but since ALL of our basement jobs have been recommendations (we DON'T advertise AT ALL), it's not easy getting the prices to where they should be (in order for this venture to be successful/profitable). Now, when we build NEW, we just set the prices right around what the competition charges, and since we usually "build them like we were to live in them", we have no problem selling them and making VERY NICE profit (think six figures +++++ on a ~$600K house).
As I understand it, there is no reason to put a graphic file in which is larger than the spot it occupies - all that does is slow down the load times and increase your bandwidth usage - many (most? All? hosts have bandwidth charges and if you exceed the daily allotment, they stop displaying your siteI've been trying to convince the guy who runs this site of that - the site loads very slowly, even with cable, because his pic file sizes are way too big:http://www.m-i-a.org./On the flash stuff, kind of neat for a page or two, but I thought it started to wear thin reloading on each page.I think it would be much better to only have it load once, and then change the page elements, which I _think_ your guy can do with html style sheets and mouseover or onclicks.
View Image Paradigm Inspections View Image
Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace
Bob - holy cow! That guy should definitely resize his pics! 160x240 pixel pictures SHOULD NOT taka up 800K!
I hear you about the flash! It's starting to annoy me too :)
Well as you reconize the flash gets OLD.The gray text looks sexy until you try to READ IT. Gray is OK for titles and bulliet points, but not by the text in the body.You tagline says "CUSTOM HOME BUILDERS - remodeling, new construciton, reconstrucion".However, you say that specialize in spec home, that is far different than custom homes.And you say "reconstruction" which to me implies restoring older house, but there is no mention that you provide thsoe services.
Bill,
All valid points. The "reconstruction" is something the web creator added - it will have to go. While we do MOSTLY spec homes, we're also doing CUSTOM; as a matter of fact, we're about to do backfill on one.
more direct critic
you ( your professionalism, pictures, projects ) are so much better than your website
Huck AND Hammer are right on
display one of your own houses on that opening page ( lose the generic ) and get rid of that folderesque graphic stuff that tunnels one's sensesand "I" don't want to read that in 2002 you built your first house w/ popular mechanics by your side
I would imagine this website will be a very small incidental in your scheme of things which looks like it's rockin
with more houses / projects on your resume and clients exposed to them you'll be here contributing to the betterment of us all
John - thanks for input. The "White House" in the flash IS my own house :)
Here's couple things:
- the New Construction and Basement Remodeling sections WILL contain bunch of bigger pictures.
-the flash intro will only be active on the main site - it will be deactivated elsewhere.
-the description of US as well as our services is getting updated. More about what we actually offer and less of the "other" stuff.
Stan
Looks like the guy did some additional work with the site.
Some of the wording will need additional work and I'll be adding some more info as to the quality of construction and finishing we provide (i.e. use of cellulose insulation, bullnose drywall, full brick exterior, granite, hardwood floors, etc...).
OK - I've uploaded the website onto my server.Please, try again and let me know what you think! Dial-up users are especially encouraged to try TIA,Stan
I'd think you have just what you need to captivate, expose and link them to you as they choose
cheers John
Much better, but now your guy has to start testing with different screen resolutions.In both versions, at low res, the changing data/info takes place right at the bottom of the screen, half on and half off.At higher resolutions, the display pages change shape as you go from page to page(BTW, I prefer the HTML "dialup" version to the high bandwidth version, even with a high bandwidth connection!)The "masthead" is too high/tall. Attached (LowResView.jpg)is a screen shot at 800x600 screen res - for all of the pages, I see the same masthead, and just the top inch or so of the actual information and I have to scroll down. I lose interest in seeing mainly the same graphic image page to pageAlso attached (LowResViewV2.jpg) is the screen shot with some "editing" suggestions to cut down the height of the masthead.As it exists (at least in the screen shot) the mast head is 310 pixels high, taking up way more than 1/2 of thew available browser window With the suggestions, it's down to 215. I think even less tall would be better.FWIW, my masthead is 129 pixels, And I feel it's still a bit too high.And, FWIW, the BT masthead is 130.
Paradigm Inspections, llc View Image
Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace
Flash. Ugggh. Flash was cool when it first came out, but in my opinion it's nothing but "eye candy" Site looks okay(needs more content, more pages the merrier) but people will never find you if you're thinking of achieving that through search engines. I mentioned to Bob yesterday about the title tag professionals miss and SURE ENOUGH your web guy knows nothing about using it. The title tag is the wording that appears in the top of the browser window. It's the first thing seen in search engines when using a search. On every page yours says "STAN DAREK LLC >>>> CUSTOM HOME BUILDERS" Each page should be different and reflect what's on the page--and all caps looks pretty bad.I think what many guys in this forum miss at the onset is not what kind of website a pro can create but will it pay for itself? Sure it may look cool as hell but eventually these kind of things are mentioned--"we paid this much and it doesn't do a hill of beans"Going back three years ago I wanted a professional to build me a site. The guy is very well known in my line of work and has created hundreds of very professional looking websites. Looking back I'm thankful he turned me down after suggesting I try it on my own because he's not good at getting traffic to a site. Frankly I think he may do it purposely because these kind of guys make the big bucks when the site is introduced or brand new. Trying to get them to come back and make additions or add pages is worse than pulling teeth-- the big money isn't there anymore and they're always busy on other new projects.my .02
To be honest, I'm not sure if I necessarilly want to create traffic to the site or get any additional work JUST BECAUSE of it. I just want people to be able to view it AFTER they've either talked to us or saw our signs at job sites or saw our product. It's meant to be a fancy brochure.
When it comes to new construction, I MUCH prefer doing "specs" - MUCH more money in them and MUCH less headaches. As far as basement remodeling goes - all our projects have been through recommendations - we don't advertise AT ALL!
Stan, I kind of liked the flash, I'm on broadband and it loaded just fine and wasn't as over-the-top as some sites I've seen. It looks professionally designed, but I agree with the others regarding the "about us" section. I think the masthead should be there on every page, but in a much smaller version.
If spec's are what you make the best money on, why in the world do you want to advertise that you do them? Is it because you have a lot of pictures of them? I would suggest focusing on what you WANT to do more of, which is obviously the specs with the occasional custom house. Somehow you have to word it to not put off potential custom home buyers, though. "Spec house builders, who occasionally do a custom" does not exactly excite the custom home client.
Mike
Stan, I don't know if you have these and I just didn'y get to them (I'm on dial-up, too), but maybe you should consider a few in-progress pics with some of your subs in them (at work of course). I know a lot of my customers nowadays like to not only get a "feel" for me, but of my employees and subs as well. Otherwise nice site, and I hope it brings you at least a small portion of business.
I think that if you set up your site with the dial up version only you would be better off. The DSL users will still be able to use the same site. It will eliminate that first page that asks you which one you want to use.
If your going to have a slideshow then make only ONE slide show screen. Two is distracting. With one screen you will be able to put controls on it so the viewer can control the action to some degree. Reverse, Stop, Forward. The Stop button would change to Continue when chosen. This way if a viewer wants to look longer at a particular picture they can. Personally I think a Photo Gallery would be better then a slideshow.
In the future when you take a photo of a house that you have or are building make sure you discreetly get your company sign in the photo. This way people will see that that house was in fact built by your company and not a photo that may have been stolen off the internet. It will also in a way copy right that photo so others can not use it on their web sites as their own.
Of houses of NEW construction group your interior photos of that house with the exterior photo. One way to do this would be to inform the viewer that if they click on the photo of the exterior of the house that they will be able to see the interior photos of that same house. You want people to see that you are able to do as good work on the inside as on the outside of that same house. It will almost look like your doing a real estate add, except your showing off your best work.
DaneI will always be a beginner as I am always learning.
Lose most of the animation. It just irritates your audience.You have the various choices in the bar near the top, but often people don't go looking there, and it takes several seconds for the animation to get around to painting the captions. Mirror the choices (or the main ones) in the text below, and maybe provide hotspots for "new home construction" and (added text) "basement remodeling" in your text near the bottom.Also, "new construction" and "remodeling" should be hotspots in the text below "Custom Home Builders".Your text overall is a little too spartian, and the appearance overall a little too clean. A lot of clutter isn't good, but the current layout gives the appearance that you're "stretching your resume". Even if this is the case (;)) it shouldn't be so obvious.There should be a "contact us" hotspot/button at the bottom of every page. That's where many people look for it.
I was reading your reply for comments/critique and could not help but seeing that you would not hire a carpenters helper without three years experiance. I would like to congradulate you on the main reason why there is not enough skilled trades people. I have been a carpenter for ten years not counting the experiance that i got working for my father during the summers. He taught me almost everything that I know and would venture to guess that he has forgot more than you or I will ever Know. If you are ever short of good carpenters maybe you should try training someone you might just be pleasently suprised
Arty, I have trained many carpenters on the job and also, as a carpentry instructor at a vocational center for 15 years. I've done my fair share of helping out entry level workers. That was then, today, I don't babysit anymore. If you can't prove you are already committed to the trade and have an established work background with references, I'm not going to waste time with you. I've been through too many disappointments.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Nice Jazzdog. I'm gonna use that stuff!
http://www.rocioromero.com/homelv.htm
The above website has a feature that I really like and wish more websites would incorporate: in incorporates a series of thumbnails as well as an enlarged photograph; as you position your mouse above one of the thumbnails, that photograph appears in the enlarged window. Fast & simple, and no need to load each picture in order to see it enlarged.
-Jazzdogg-
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right.
I finally installed flash player last week and I didnt have a problem with your site.
I liked it .
Tim Mooney