I maintain that photographers should not be any more than 50% involved with the design and coding of their websites. Why, you ask? We generally suck at it. Yup, I admit it. As a photographer I have skills that include shooting and post-processing images. Writing code? Nope. Coding is not part of my skill set. I do dabble, but I'm no pro. I'm guessing that is also the case for a large majority of the shooters out there. Case in point. Jeff (www.onlocationphoto.net) is a talented photographer in the Seattle, WA area, with tons of experience doing weddings, portraits and sports. But if you take a look at the website promoting his work, you may come across a few glitches that could be easily done away with. Now, I don't know if Jeff did the design work, so I won't fire any barbs specifically at him. With that in mind, the obvious ones are: A menu with more categories than necessary Typos and layout problems in the About page A silly text arrangement on the main page A hard to read, fancy font on the Wedding samples page Hard to read, badly worded paragraphs in the Fine Art section A not so great self-portrait on the About page The more you poke through this website the more problems are bound to pop up. But I don't feel like getting too detailed. Mostly because I'm tired and I just don't feel like it. I'll keep this review short and to the point. (I see you smiling there) Take a look at the main page, with all the crazy type going this way and that. Don't you think it would be more compelling with one big image and a minimal of text ? After all he is a photographer. Let's try to grab the viewer's attention from the get-go Mr. Faddis. I think that every photographer who is planning a website, should be legally obligated to have the site reviewed by a panel of experts. Only after some grueling, opinionated reviews and a professionally sanctioned approval process, should that site be allowed to go live. This site, with its simple little problems has the potential to be very good. I think he has the photographs to pull it off. All it would take is some effort and thorough editing. Let's start with a few suggestions. First, the pricing for weddings should be a subsection of the Wedding section. Similarly, the pricing for Senior portraits should be a subsection of the Senior portraits section. That would clean up the menu. Oh, and move the menu to the top as well or to the side, vertically. Second, get rid of ALL of the unnecessary text surrounding the image on the opening page. It would be much more of an eye-grabber to have one big image, and a simple menu on the front page. Let's stop the viewer in their tracks. You've only got about 1.5 seconds to keep them from clicking away. Make it count. Third, take a second and redo the font on the Wedding sample page so it is easily readable. In fact, go look at a page about typography and find the easiest fonts to read on the monitor. Keep the font selection to 3 at the most. Don't overwhelm the viewer with fancy-ass fonts and badly designed paragraphs. It's a sure way to annoy people and lose business. While you're at it, go over the entire site and clean up any paragraphs where the sentences are long. Ideally, keep them under 21 words. If the reader has to stop and take a breath in mid sentence.... it's too long. It shouldn't have to be said that anybody designing a website needs to go about it from the point of view of the customer. If you are thinking about putting up a website to promote your photography services there are somethings you should consider. Ask yourself these questions: How can I use my opening page to grab their attention right away ? How can I engage the visitor ? How can I get them to take action ? What actions do I need them to take ? What are they looking for and how will I, as a photographer solve their problem ? How can I make their visit to my website a rewarding one ? Lastly, how can I lead them to a sale ? This is where a knowledgeable designer with marketing skills can be a veritable gold mine to the business owner. When you find a good one, especially one who understands your business.... hold on to them. Okay, now let's get some traffic to the site. Simple. Read my new page about that very subject. It's pretty cool. Lot's of useful tips that will help to get the word out. Here is a new tip that didn't make it into the new page. Tell Google that your website is worth looking at by including internal links in your site. For example, the blue link "page" 4 lines before this one, is an internal link. Try it for yourself and see if it works. Cheers to a recent blog comment for that tip. Thinking about the design and goal of your website must be at the very heart of a photographer's on-line presence. Without these details you might as well be sitting in a row-boat without any oars. by Mike Taylor, photographer and critic Valuable reviews of photographer's websites, designed to help new photographers improve their business
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