Your opinions please

Get some feedback on your site or ad from other rental owners and techies. Also a library of online resources so you can make DIY improvements to your web presence.
User avatar
ck
Posts: 21
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:54 pm
Location: Bodrum, Turkey
Contact:

Your opinions please

Post by ck »

Hi Everybody,
New to the whole forum thing ( and the whole holiday rental thing to be honest with you!) Impressed with the overall wealth of valid information available. Recentley published our website about our property in Bodrum, Turkey. ( see http://www.bodrumbay.com ) The site is in it's first evolution so all comments will be appreciated, visits to the site have been increasing weekly and unfortunatley are still waiting for a listing on google, yahoo & MSN. We're getting daily visits from googlebot so I guess it's just a matter of time! To a degree we have tried to create a brand image, has anybody else taken this sort of route and has it had a positive/negative effect?
Getting a little more specific does anybody know the current state of play on the turkish ownership laws?
Look forward to seeing your comments.
ck
Paul Carmel
Posts: 3836
Joined: Tue Dec 07, 2004 12:25 pm
Location: Palma Mallorca & Greece
Contact:

Post by Paul Carmel »

Photos asap, they are worth a thousand words..........
Cheers
PC
User avatar
ck
Posts: 21
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:54 pm
Location: Bodrum, Turkey
Contact:

Post by ck »

Paul,
Photo gallery has a selection of pictures taken at the end of October 2005.These will be updated when we go to Bodrum in March. The gallery uses flash, I know it runs ok in IE, Firefox & Opera. Do you have flash loaded on your pc?
What are your overall impressions of the site. All feedback is welcomed ( I think! )
Regards,
ck
Paul Carmel
Posts: 3836
Joined: Tue Dec 07, 2004 12:25 pm
Location: Palma Mallorca & Greece
Contact:

Post by Paul Carmel »

You really need some static ones on the home page to draw folks in. The one with the pool half empty, and the for sale sign does not inspire confidence.
Cheers
PC
User avatar
mpprh
Posts: 873
Joined: Tue Jun 14, 2005 6:07 am
Location: Languedoc, France
Contact:

Post by mpprh »

Hi

I agree that photos "sex up" a web site.

Having looked at the welcome pack I can't help thinking that if I arrived at your place one afternoon after a long journey, I'd love to find a bottle of wine !

Peter
The Languedoc Page
www.the-languedoc-page.com
Image
User avatar
enid
Posts: 5599
Joined: Mon Dec 27, 2004 4:47 pm
Location: Labretonie France
Contact:

Post by enid »

It is hard to comment on a site without photos - we didn't have many at first but I thibk wwhat we had we used to advantage.
User avatar
ck
Posts: 21
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:54 pm
Location: Bodrum, Turkey
Contact:

Post by ck »

Taken on board all comments about the photos. These were all we had and I figured some would be better than none. I agree that a half filled pool hardly inspires confidence as does the "for sale" signs and will be addressing that in the near future. I like the idea about the wine. What does everybody else include in an average welcome pack?
Paul Carmel
Posts: 3836
Joined: Tue Dec 07, 2004 12:25 pm
Location: Palma Mallorca & Greece
Contact:

Post by Paul Carmel »

CK,

Have a look at the following. viewtopic.php?t=76
Cheers
PC
User avatar
debk
Posts: 1053
Joined: Sat Sep 25, 2004 12:01 pm
Location: Lisbon, Portugal
Contact:

Post by debk »

Hi, CK -

Congrats on the new rental. Fun!

I agree wholeheartedly about the photos.

And here are some specific suggestions which you are obviously welcome to ignore. Just my initial thoughts:

1. Put a beautifully compelling photo on the main page. Now. :) If it's of a local spot, be sure to clearly state such... otherwise people may rightly think it is a view from the apartment and be very unhappy upon check-in to find no view. eg, "Our local beach, 8 minute walk from the apartment" If you want to do a photo roll-through this is may be the best place for it.

2. You could use most any photo editor to get rid of that 'For Sale' sign. (I don't think this is "misleading" because I assume the sign is gone now anyway.)

3. Perhaps you could ask whoever is managing the property locally to get you some photos asap?

4. Photo gallery: use static photos. The ones in your rolling photo gallery are nice but I would never have sat through waiting for them if I weren't doing a website review. Make it easy for the user who wants to scan the photos. (Plus I was waiting for some interior pics and then, when they never materialized, I was even more disappointment to not find them.)

5. From the photo gallery there is no clearly marked "Home"... so I searched around and finally used the browser back. Again, make it easy for the users. I recommend a "home" or "main" link on each non-home page.

6. Why do you boldly highlight this as a "holiday package" and then explain that it doesn't include travel, transfers, etc? I looked around and this seems to be a typical LMH vacation rental... realizing 'typical' here includes nice amenities.. so I obviously must have missed something. What's the "package"? (sorry to be dense!)

7. Under "Location," I was hoping to see a map, eg, exactly where in Turkey is this? The other info on the page is also very nice.

8. Organization. You have two sets of links and I think it might be helpful to organize them so that one set, perhaps across the top, is specific to the apartment (location, booking/availability/amenities, photo gallery, getting around) and another set is more general (weather, flights, thinking of buying, etc). Right now the apartment-specific and general-location links are mixed up together.

Hope this helps. Congrats again,
debk
ps-Little thing: the title on the location page is mispelled (apatment)
User avatar
ck
Posts: 21
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:54 pm
Location: Bodrum, Turkey
Contact:

Post by ck »

Thanks for all your comments. Major redesign is underway as I write this. Spelling mistakes have been rectified in the meantime. There is a home button located just under the photo-gallery. I agree 100% about the photo issue but in the abscence of any really good pictures I opted to use what we had, in retrospect this has probably done more harm than good.
Debk's remarks were just what I wanted and I appreciate the effort put in reviewing the site.
To another subject does anyone know approximatley how long after the URL submission to google, yahoo & msn a page listing will appear and is there any way of speeding the process?
Thanks again and keep the comments coming.

ck
A-two
Posts: 2091
Joined: Mon Oct 25, 2004 10:05 am
Location: USA

Post by A-two »

I would agree with other comments, also I found the terms and conditions quite aggressive in tone. It's good that you state things very clearly, but if you had to tell someone the same thing face to face, I think you might use a softer, friendlier tone. I find the following quite offputting actually:-
It is your responsibility for travel to and from the apartment, consequentley, no refund will be given for days lost due missed flights or any circumstance that is not the responsibility of bodrum bay.com. If making a booking it will be presumed that you have read and fully understood our terms & conditions and have agreed to be bound by them.
Waves from America
User avatar
ck
Posts: 21
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:54 pm
Location: Bodrum, Turkey
Contact:

Post by ck »

Hi again all,
Just like to say thanks again for all the comments. I think it's just about unanimous now that the pictures suck a large one! As previously stated I'm getting right on to that. I'd like to thank debk publicly for taking the time to critique the site in some depth, its with this sort of feedback that I hope to bring change to the site to make it more appealing to users. I would like to point out that this only the second site I've ever built and when I say built I mean everything from from the logo to the availability calendar, I've not farmed anything out at all (yet!)
What I would like your comments on (apart from the pics!) is the overall look (whether it be positive or negative) and feel of the site, the ease of use and whether the information within is felt to be relevant. I look forward to hearing your in depth comments. If you don't want to post a reply please PM me.
Thanks again to everybody.

ck
Renata
Posts: 25
Joined: Sat Dec 18, 2004 3:40 am
Location: Daytona Beach Florida
Contact:

Post by Renata »

I Love the Logo and effects on your site....but I agree with the picture comments.

Renata
www.Vacation-Daytona.com
Renata Gozdziak
Chicago Illinois---Daytona Beach Florida
Renata
Posts: 25
Joined: Sat Dec 18, 2004 3:40 am
Location: Daytona Beach Florida
Contact:

Post by Renata »

I do have a few comments on what information you are offering...
from a marketing aspect, I would make the contact info more prominent. The travel - flight - restaurant information is a benefit, but, from a marketing view are less imprtant than the "Book for Summer 2006 " and "Contact US"

All information about selling your product should be primary
Area and travel information secondary.....

Renata
www.Vacation-Daytona.com
Renata Gozdziak
Chicago Illinois---Daytona Beach Florida
Clexane
Posts: 330
Joined: Fri Apr 22, 2005 3:42 pm
Location: Provence France
Contact:

Post by Clexane »

Photos, photos, photos ...

Without these in your front page the rest is for nought. Get this done ASAP as your top priority ... everything else can follow. Even if you dont have great photos, something is better than nothing ... get inventive or get some nice shots of the area of the net if you must.
So you wanted a holiday home in france ...

www.villaemmanuelle.com
Post Reply