Website online

[Hells Bells]

Early days yet, many of the pages have no content. Tell m what you think so far. What have I missed.
Thanks
www.chamoissiere.co.uk

[charles]

Ok,

If I had an immediate comment is the font type you're using - I think it would look nicer with Arial or Verdana.

I take it you're Scottish and this isn't a mistake: "we will noe expect..." [on the first page] !!

I'd also put in a bit more padding especially on the right as the text sometimes goes right up to the border where the colour changes from light to dark purple.

And maybe, if technically possible, I'd set the picture of the animals at the top right (mountain goats?) to change every so often - maybe a slow slideshow or possibly in step with a page change.

Maybe a location page/ how to get here etc? Nearest airport/TGV/helipad (!) etc.

By the way I was curious to see where your house is - as I think I've been around there a few moons ago - and came across this map: http://www.skimaps.com/map1912 - of the pistes around there - looks a bit clearer than yours - you may want to link to it (with permission of course).

Other than that, yeah, very nice, and if I were a skier I'd be interested.

Cheers
Charles

[vrooje]

Helen,

Before I get to looking at the content and design of your site, let me start (unfortunately) on a bit of a down note... sorry.

I really dislike splash pages. I don't think they add anything to a site. Artists and high-end boutique-type businesses can potentially get away with a fancy flash intro, but websites that are looking to make money from ordinary people should stay away from them, in my opinion. Your particular flash page takes about 10-15 seconds to tell me simply that your place is a ski rental, which I could get (along with a lot of other useful information) from a quick glance at your main page. In addition, the color scheme's relation to winter and snow isn't made clear until the main page, so to me the flash intro looks like a pre-packaged informationless blurb that doesn't have any real relation to your actual property. That's a shame, because it looks like it's going to be a really lovely place!

The kicker for me was that I right-clicked on the animation just out of curiosity, and it froze my desktop! I had to re-start the window manager (which is worse than just force-quitting the application, but not as bad as re-starting) to clear that up.

Thankfully you do provide a "skip intro" button -- yay! Although, if someone doesn't actually have Flash they won't see the button either. If you are going to keep the splash page, I suggest a normal link to the main page as well as the one embedded within the flash animation.

(Sorry to be so negative about this -- but it's not just a pet peeve. I really think splash pages turn potential clients away and lose you business.)

I do like the design of your main site, though!

I can read your text on the light violet background you have now, but I also wouldn't argue if you wanted to make it a little higher-contrast by lightening up the background by a shade or two.

I absolutely love that you immediately give details about the apartment on the main page! That's great -- people should be able to quickly ascertain the main points about your property.

I would also suggest explicitly stating that the apartment is a vacation/holiday rental (use vacation if you're targeting a U.S. market, holiday if you're targeting a U.K. market, or both if you think you'll get equal shares of both) and briefly summarizing where it is (e.g. "located in Town, Region, north-west France" or similar).

Once you get your pricing structure figured out, I recommend also stating either your price range or a minimum weekly rental price. People really appreciate not having to dig around for that information.

Another thing I suggest is removing the clashing black-and-green web counter. Hopefully your web hosting service provides a web statistics package that counts hits and such without posting a counter on your page. Stats are very important, but it looks more professional if you don't post it on your main page.

What you could replace the counter with is your contact information. Later on when you've filled in all the pictures and delicious details, you want to make it easy for someone to e-mail you when they're seized by the fit of "oh, I must see if this property is available!" -- whether that happens when they're on the "contact us" page or not.

I noticed that halfway down your menus the capitalization goes away -- was that intentional?

Also, just FYI, I'm using Firefox in Linux -- a somewhat non-standard browser in a very non-standard OS -- and everything seems to be working perfectly! So that's very, very good.

Overall, I think this is an excellent start. Be sure to keep us updated! And sorry for being so very negative about the flash intro.

Cheers!

[enid]

Charles and Brooke have given you much better technical advice than I can but here's my two pennorth of input in addition.
I liked the colour scheme and the lay out - I found the site easy to navigate and not too fussy. My poor old eyes would like larger print as well as a different font however. I realise that you don't have your proper photos yet but the mountain range one you do have isn't at all clear to me. I have posted a message in your visitor's book - just to check it out - feel free to delete it! Finally I am still unclear exactly where you are so a map or more detail here would help.
Well done - I think you have a really good foundation set up which can only get better as you continue to add your content and those all important photos.

[Stu]

Hi Helen,

I'm afraid I'm one of the 'anti-flash' brigade too! Sorry, I turn them off on ANY site I visit as I find them too distracting. I think a slightly larger font wouldn't go amiss as well, as the 'bold' text (to my eyes at least) seems a little 'blurred'?
Aside from those two very minor niggles, I think it looks well, can't wait to see the pics of the finished apartment, looks like it's going to be in a beautiful area. Syb & I wish you the very best of luck!

[Hells Bells]

vrooje, on the intro page, it wasn't clear when I set up the site that it was included in that particular layout (you can't see it when not published) , and I wasn't too sure myself.

[Hells Bells]

Guys, got rid of the fancy stuff, corrected the typo errors and changed the font. Opinions please !

[Fraise]

I thought it looked good- quite a few pages under construction but nicely worded so as not to turn people off! It actually made the area sound "undiscovered" which is pretty hard to do nowadays! Well done, I look forwards to visiting the site again later when there's a bit more to read.

www.thepetitmanoir.com

[Ciapolin]

Helen,

I have just had a non-techie look at your revised version - it looks much better than the first, and I love the colour scheme!

It could be my pc connection, but the pictures take ages to download. Not sure if there is anything you can do about this?

Out of interest, what software are you using and is it easy to use?

C-A

[Ciapolin]

.... just one other thing: the words on the buttons 'ski school and ski hire' and 'shops and restaurants' are over running the buttons. You could use the '&' so that they fit better.

C-A

[Alan Knighting]

Helen,

It could be my pc connection, but the pictures take ages to download. Not sure if there is anything you can do about this?

I am fortunate in being on 1.2mb broadband so download time is not an issue for me. I think the problem is that the pictures are relatively large and need optimising for those users who are on ISDN or dial-up modems. No doubt you will be dealing with this as you develop the site. Any of the paint" programs gives you the "optimise for the Web" facility.

I normally prefer the readability and sharpness that a white background provides but I think your chosen colour scheme really works!

Alan

[enid]

thank you for the font change - the main body text is much easier to read. But now I have a problem with the menu bar text - a bit too small - could just be my age!!!
I also think your visitor counter really clashes - your site is very tasteful and this just doesn't fit.

[Alan Knighting]

Helen,

I entirely agree with Enid about your counter - it is completely out of step with the rest of your site. Perhaps you should re-examine why it is there in the first place.

Does it enhance the site from a visitor's point of view? Not really! All it does is show how many, or how few, visitors you have had.

Does it enhance the site from your point of view? Not really! If you need statistics then your Web Host should be giving you these, in some detail.

I would say, get rid of it.

Alan

[Hells Bells]

I don't think I got any choice in the visitor counter, but i'll have a look anyway.Enid, I am limited in the changes in the font size, seems large text and large text on buttons don't happen. I'll fiddle some more, thanks for the comments guys.

[Hells Bells]

I've done a few more adjustments, got rid of the counter, and resized some of the pics. Could you tell me which one are still slow to load? Hard to judge when you have broadband.