Help I need advice and feedback about my website

[StarbidAuctions]

Hi I'm new this Forum and am glad to have finally found a site where i can get advice online for free. I'm looking for feedback and advice on what you think of my new website and what might be putting people off from joining, I have done a load of free advertiseing and i show up well on google and other search engines but I havnt done any paid advertising yet due to lack of funds but i am thinking of using google adds using free vouchers.

My website is www.starbidauctions.com


Thanks for your time

[Matt]

Welcome to the forum! It is a very nice website, however, I do have one suggestion. Your logo is kind of hard to read. You would want to get a very clear logo so people know what they are looking at. Also, the image that had the iphone on it was quite blurry, it would be better to find a better image.

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks Matt i wasnt sure wheather when i click on the thanks button for u it lets u know wot member thanked you, i will work on those two things

[pavsid]

Also, i guess people will only register if they have to - when they want to buy a product - and at the moment there arent that many products to choose from.

[GekiDan]

I agree with Matt in regards with your site's logo. I suggest choosing a better typography or font would help.
I also suggest you to refrain from using that type of gradient (horizontal). The right side of your logo is too dark and it's hard to read the text. I think it's better to use a vertical gradient with not so dark colors.

A favicon is also missing.

I also noticed that your site doesn't contain much products. It hinders anyone on registering on your site and buy products from you if the thing they are looking for is not available. Adding more products each section would help.

Other than that, the layout is good. I like it.
Good luck.

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks everyone i work on those things now and i have abit more insight into what makes a website more attractive to customers now

[jonathan2500]

I think you should improve its overall graphical looking and on some point user interface to because what i felt while visiting at that site that it will not be able to give users a richer experience as compare to other sites.

[thinkdeeper]

Wow looks like ebay. The font is not very readable and the part towards the right where its more dark is even worse for reading.
I suggest changing that.

[Fergal]

It's great that you have a forum on your site, forums a are an excellent way for your users and visitors to give feedback on your services, your site and to ask questions. I notice that there are no posts in the forum and this is off putting to visitors. It would help to add some posts, even if they are guidelines on how to use the forum. By the way "which to discuss" in your first forum description should be "wish to discuss". It might also help to add a forum section called something like "Feedback and Suggestions" to encourage your members to give feedback on their experience of your site.

You should also add some text relevant to your site to the "A short text to describe your forum" area in the forum header.

What about offering free fees to say the first 500 items listed on your site? This would help you to get some traffic and to get people used to listing their offers there.

[mysandyda]

as I see you didnt follow the suggestions...the quality of image is still terrible :(
and I cant read your logo from the first time...do smth with it!

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks everyone ive had a busy week but have managed to get around to changing the logo (Its not what im 100% happy with but its the best i can do myself and with the tools i have available to me until i can afford to pay for one i use http://cooltext.com/) I have also created a new homepage welcome section (again best i could make myself) Id be greatful for any feedback about what you think and if you think anything should be changed. Also thanks Fergal i will use those suggestions for my forum and edit the mistake i made.

[Fergal]

CoolText looks like a great tool, thanks for sharing it with us StarbidAuctions, I've added it to the "Free Graphic Software" section of our Useful Online Business Resources (http://www.businessadviceforum.com/showthread.php/377-Useful-Online-Business-Resources) thread.

I still feel that your logo could benefit from a little improvement. Perhaps you could change either the text or background colour, I'd like to see how that yellow text would work against a white background. It might also help to put it on a single line, rather than splitting it over two lines - you could do this by removing the tagline, I'm not sure that the phrase "Earn Credit for Feedback" is very relevant to what visitors are looking for when they go to your site? Something else you could try is reducing the size of the font in the "Earn Credit for Feedback" tagline, in order to give more emphasis to the "StartBid Auctions" text.

The stars graphic doesn't seem to add much, being placed in the middle of the site name. Maybe it would look better at the beginning or end. You might also consider removing the ".com" from the end of the logo.

Finally, I'd be interested to see how the site name would look if you used title case in your logo, i.e. "StarBid Auctions" instead of "STARBID AUCTIONS"

[GekiDan]

I tried making one for you although I created this in rush...
To be honest, I don't know if this work well for your site. Well, at least I tried. :D

319

[joeroxx]

I still feel that your logo could benefit from a little improvement. Perhaps you could change either the text or background colour, I'd like to see how that yellow text would work against a white background. It might also help to put it on a single line, rather than splitting it over two lines - you could do this by removing the tagline, I'm not sure that the phrase "Earn Credit for Feedback" is very relevant to what visitors are looking for when they go to your site? Something else you could try is reducing the size of the font in the "Earn Credit for Feedback" tagline, in order to give more emphasis to the "StartBid Auctions" text.

The stars graphic doesn't seem to add much, being placed in the middle of the site name. Maybe it would look better at the beginning or end. You might also consider removing the ".com" from the end of the logo.

Finally, I'd be interested to see how the site name would look if you used title case in your logo, i.e. "StarBid Auctions" instead of "STARBID AUCTIONS"

I agree with Fergal, The new logo looks much better than the old one. I would also get rid of the yellow background, and reduce the size of the tagline. The name of your business is "StarBid Auctions", not "StarBid Auctions Earn Credit For Feedback", and the logo should reflect that. As far as the stars graphic, see what it looks like after increasing the size of the sitename and reducing the size of the tagline. Maybe you can put it behind the "S" in "Starbid", the way GekiDan did with the single star in his logo idea. Make sure, however, that it doesn't overpower the "S" if you do.

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks everyone I will give all of these ideas a try tommorrow night (I see my son on saturdays during the day :-)) and thanks GekiDan that logo looks amazing i will try it out tommorrow.


CoolText looks like a great tool, thanks for sharing it with us StarbidAuctions, I've added it to the "Free Graphic Software" section of our Useful Online Business Resources thread.

Cool text is a good tool but sadly I havnt had much luck with it when it has come to making my website logo but i find it good for making adds etc

[StarbidAuctions]

I have used GekiDan's logo he made for me and i think it is a massive improvement to my website, Please could you give me advice on if you think i should make it bigger,smaller or if it looks good how it is thanks.

Im struggerling with my fees i thought of making it flat rate fees but i am struggerling to find a way of pricing them up as should i increase them by the same amount each time? and if i did i would have a huge list or should i do a percentage of their total as im going to try and make profit and a living from this site while at the same time i want to be cheaper and fairer on my members than ebay so should i do like 1% or 2% on the end of auctions fees and if so how much does that mean i would take (I dont expect an answer to each range) just need an example like say if an item sold at £1.99, £12.99,£49.99

Any advice would be great on this subject thanks

[Matt]

Great job on the logo! It looks so much better than the old one. I won't be much of a help with the pricing as I'm not too good on that either :P

[Fergal]

I also think the new logo looks much better than the old one, well done and a big thanks to GekiDan.

StarbidAuctions I feel that your main priority at this time has got to be on building traffic and activity on the site. Keep your fees low at this time, perhaps even offer free listings until the site has become busy and there are lots of items listed for sale on it. You will not make any money from fees, if people aren't visiting and listing their sales on it.

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks and sorry i might have worded it wrong, Im doing free listing through a signup voucher which will let members sell without fees for a number of uses and i have alot of items that will be added ova today and tommorow from myself and another member, Im trying to work out good fees that will be affordable/attractive to members so that members can see what the prices will be before signing up rather than me changing them once they have joined up and they leave.

I would like to know what people think of the new welcome section as i have tried to make it so that it attracts customers and shows them what we offer as suggested earlier by members and would like to know if it looks professional enough for now and if not do you have any tools recomended for making a good welcome page.

Thanks

[StarbidAuctions]

I have decided to have my end of auction fees as 2% which should be easier and still lower compared to ebay and ebid if i could still have advice on the below please


I would like to know what people think of the new welcome section as i have tried to make it so that it attracts customers and shows them what we offer as suggested earlier by members and would like to know if it looks professional enough for now and if not do you have any tools recomended for making a good welcome page.

[GekiDan]

Saw a typo on your homepage:

Swap items with other members and place wanted add, visit F&Q page for details.
It should be:

Swap items with other members and place wanted ad (or advertisement) , visit FAQ (I don't see an F&Q page) page for details.

[Fergal]

I would like to know what people think of the new welcome section
I feel that the black font against a gray background is a little difficult to read and that it doesn't draw attention to that text. Making the font larger and giving it great contrast against the background should help. You could try focusing on a few key benefits to your customers, in that area. For example;


No listing, re-listing or reserve fees
A new alternative to existing auction sites
Managed by experienced auctioneers


I'm sure that you can word those benefits better than I can, but the key point is to highlight a small number of benefits that are of value to your target market.

[freelancemom]

I tried making one for you although I created this in rush...
To be honest, I don't know if this work well for your site. Well, at least I tried. :D

319

Love the logo you mocked up Dan -- nice!

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks everyone I will focus on these things tonight and the F&Q Page is right up the top of the right hand corner it appears as below:

Sell HOME FAQ About Us Help

Contact Us

[StarbidAuctions]

I have just made changes to the welcome page and would like to know what you think thanks

[Fergal]

I feel that the new welcome area looks a lot better.

"logo next to there names" should be "...their names".
I'm not sure if you need all that text regarding PayPal, it might be enough to just show the PayPal logo.

[StarbidAuctions]

Thanks Fergal i have made the change with the there and their and have decided to use microsoft word more for spelling checks as im dyslexic so need to make sure i get all of the wording right to be professional and im currently trying to sort out about a better welcome section as no matter how much i change it im just not happy with it as i don't feel that it is proffesional enough.