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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.
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Windy
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Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2007 8:21 am
Location: Windermere UK

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Post by Windy »

Hi All

I have just joined here and think this forum is amazingly useful. :D

I thought I might as well get a baptism of fire, so I would be really grateful if anyone has the time to give some feedback on my website.

You can find it at www.windermerelodge.co.uk

We rent out a 2 bedroom log cabin the Lake District in the UK (started last December).

Our customers so far have been mostly families with kids in the holidays and older couples out of season.

The lodge is brand new and was bought to rent out full time. it is on a beautiful site that is close to Windermere and yet beautifully quiet. Also it's a great place to let kids roam around.

We took a lot of trouble to get a lodge on a large plot in a good place on the site, and had a specially large deck built.

I targeted 80% of potential rental value this year (the site is open for 46 weeks of the year) and we have done 98% of this already with much of November and December still to rent out. We are getting about 2,500 unique visitors to the website a month, over half of whom add us to their favourites (according to AWStats at lleast).

We will have spent about £250 on advertising on listing sites this year.

We get good google rankings for search phrases that we have targetted, and have got a number of reciprocal links going.

I look forward to what you gurus have to say!

Best wishes

John
e-richard
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Post by e-richard »

OK, I'll kick off.

Given the stats you have quoted, the site obviously works and you're getting bookings, so "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" is quite a good maxim.

But here's my experience:
Its a very busy site with lots of stuff, so please help us poor folks find our way around.

I really got confused with the ever changing navigation menu on the left. Actually confused is polite, annoyed is more accurate :wink:

For example, anecdotally:

I eventually found the availability/booking info - thats a l o n g page with a lot of stuff and useful. I went back to home page, and the availability menu point has disappeared (I'm sure it was there at some point). So I clicked on the 2nd menu item "Windermere Lodge", found an interesting page, but since I couldn't remember what I'd clicked to get here I looked back to the menu (remembering I'd clicked something helpful there), and now that one that I had only just clicked had disappeared.

I also got a bit confused with "Booking Enquiry". Conventionally (based on looking around at similar sites on this forum), we have an Enquiry form for "I'm interested in these dates, please confirm they are available and the cost" - or - "please can you fill me in on these questions..." and a Booking form for "I want to definitely make a reservation".

I simply think the site has grown over time, its pretty darn good for the purpose, but needs a bit of consistency/tidy up.

Richard

p.s. If you're hoping to also attract US visitors, try to avoid "Whilst we will try to help with ..." I think you'll find that the word While is synonymous and universal.
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

Well, you've come to the right place, the gurus will knock your site into shape, not that it needs it if you're getting 2,500 uniques a month and half are bookmarking you.

Are they socially bookmarking you? That would be more impressive, and in turn would bump your uniques up somewhat.

I wish I was able to attract 2,500 uniques a month when I started my site over 2 years ago!

Keep up the good the work, you're site is obviously doing the business ;-)
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Windy
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Location: Windermere UK

Post by Windy »

Thanks guys

OK - I have rejigged the menu structure - multi level sites are always going to be a bit problematic. I have done it now so level 1 is at the top and any sub levels are on the left which should make it a bit easier to locate where you are at any time.

I have also renamed the booking enquiry form (although you will find plenty of them out there if you just search Google!)

Whilst US visitors will be more than welcome they are just going to have to put up with my grumpy old English usage -perhaps they can bring themselves to see it as "local color". :wink:

I'm not sure what you mean by "social book marking" - I was referring to "add to favourites".

We started off getting about 500 uniques, but it has built up to 2500 by lots of linking and a couple of funnel sites that we pay for.

Thanks again for the constructive feedback. I'll be interested to hear if you think the new menu structure is an improvement


Best wishes

John
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

New menu looks better but now there's an imbalance on the left which looks odd.
I was referring to "add to favourites"
That's sort of next to useless these days. Social bookmarking allows you to share and tag your favourites publicly so that other people can find them, using sites such as:

del.icio.us
stumbleupon.com
facebook.com - even!

We were 'Stumbled upon' a few weeks ago and it resulted in a massive spike in visits - I was stunned. The good thing was our RSS subs doubled!

If that person who originally stumbled our site had just added it to favourites on their browser then no-one would've known about our site ;-)
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Windy
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Location: Windermere UK

Post by Windy »

"there's an imbalance on the left which looks odd. "

Yeah that's what I thought - back to the drawing board!

J
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Windy
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Post by Windy »

Ok - Changed the pages where there was nothing on the left so that they seem a bit more balanced (I hope!)

J
la vache!
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Post by la vache! »

Hi John,
a very professional site, but still a bit busy for me on the homepage - I found it really detracts from the info on the homepage. I love the idea of a brochure (how do you do that?) but everything on the homepage looks almost too professional, rather than a book direct with the owner. Also something else that doesn't do justice to the site, when you click on one of the small photos on the homepage, I'd rather be taken directly to the page with all the large interior photos on, the page you can only get to by going to Windermere Lodge page first, rather than going to the Windermere Lodge page and then not having a clue where to go for more interior photos.
Like e Richard, I'd prefer to see the same menu on each page, KISS!
That's as far as I've got so far, will have a look at the rest later.
Last edited by la vache! on Thu Oct 04, 2007 5:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

If I was getting 2500 uniques a month with a site like this I'd leave it alone!

In fact, I'd leave it alone then set up a web design firm and sell my services ;-)
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Windy
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Location: Windermere UK

Post by Windy »

Thanks La Vache (or should that be "Merci")

I's a bit of a toss up between being busy and satisfyng my mania for little webby bits :lol:

I am probably guiltyof trying to be far too clever for my on good. (especially as the tell a friend and e-card stuff never gets used!)

the brochure is just a question of embedding some code from FlashPageFlip.com and creating some pages that are in JPG format (I created a large canvas pasted a photo and added some text). The instructions are on the site.

I did toy with the idea of linking to the pictures page from the image, but I have to say i still think it should link to the top Windermere Lodge page.

I guess you can't please everybod all the time.

As to having the same menu on each page, I'm not sure that that would even be possible. I think e-richard was right about it being confusing before, but hopefuly the compromise I dopted will work well enough.


Thanks again.

J
la vache!
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Post by la vache! »

Windermere Lodge wrote:
I's a bit of a toss up between being busy and satisfyng my mania for little webby bits :lol:
I understand, you are a man! It actually looks much better balanced now, but sometimes you have to remember "Less is more", especially with the homepage. Re the navigation to the interior photos - as a simple user I'd rather see a few more photos that grabbed my attention initially without having to search for them too hard!
I'm not sure about the pillows in the bedroom shot, are they plastic pillow cases? The dining/living area photos look very well dresses, but not so sure about the bedrooms, I'm not too keen on towels on beds either.
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Windy
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Post by Windy »

Plastic pillow cases? - I DON'T THINK SO :shock:

The linen in the bedroom was what the cleaners provided. We ended up changing cleaners ( a long story but not one that will be unfamliar in these parts I guess) and now have bedlinen that matches the curtains better. I just haven't got round to taking new photos, which you are right I must do. Thanks for reminding me - Why no towels though - (you are a minimalist aren't you :lol:) - I guess that the cheap white towels in the shots don't help much do they.

Isn't it funnny how other people's eyes see things you don't -

Rabbie Burns was right wasn't he
O wad some Power the giftie gie us,
To see oursels as ithers see us!
Perhaps he should have come here :lol:

What a great way to get feedback - thanks to you all - keep it coming!

J
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marcus
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Post by marcus »

Hi
- as mentioned above, the menus are disorientating, if that is a real word. This is important because it may be cause your site visitors to leave, if they are confused about how to navigate your site. Hence less bookings.

- I notice in your source code you don't have a meta description, and would highly recommend you add one.

Why do you quote awstats when you have google analytics installed, I wondered in passing? (I am google analytics greatest fan)

One other thing to ask yourself - are your targeted phrases that you do well for in google the ones that people actually find the site with? and are they phrases that someone looking for a holiday will actually type in? (This isn't a trick question. Our own gite site comes up for 'bergerac gite', 'bergerac holiday' etc - very nice to see but neither phrase brings in any bookings.)

I ask that question because with that many visitors, if they are targeted, you should be getting all your bookings yourself from your website without needing to pay for listings elsewhere.

I won't comment on what the site looks like - I'm rubbish at design, obsessive about stats and SEO :lol:
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Windy
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Location: Windermere UK

Post by Windy »

- as mentioned above, the menus are disorientating
Oh dear - and that's AFTER I thought I'd improved them :lol:

Not sure what else I can do - any suggestions?

Point taken about search phrases - we do quite well on generic things like "pine lodge lake district" Google #8 and not surprisingly get #1 for "Windermere Lodge"

I'll look into Meta Description - I wasn't aware of it before.

AW stats is just easier to look at - GA is probably better if you have the time.
you should be getting all your bookings yourself from your website without needing to pay for listings elsewhere.
The majority of our bookings do come from our own site, but we get so many hits because we pay for these funnel sites that help deliver them. Hopefullly we won't need to do this for ever but in year one it seems to make sense to me.

Thanks

John
Last edited by Windy on Thu Oct 04, 2007 8:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Windy
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Post by Windy »

Meta Description now added to all pages!

Thanks

J
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