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Website Decisions

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    Website Decisions

    I'm looking to improve my website as I am now working as Freelance here in Deutschland rather than via my Uk Ltd.


    Criteria/considerations

    - It needs to be professional looking but at the same time being different from the crowd but not too glitzy
    - I am a freelance IT consultant and not a small company looking to give an image of a larger co./global empire
    - I am not a website developer/flash guru and so no I cannot build it myself, therefore i'll get professionals to do it
    - Text/Colours/Logos will all be changed so example content is not so important (plus for those who doesn't recognise, it's Latin)
    - Animation adjustment is limited to either having the animation or disabling it making this the key consideration when comparing the sites, as stated above I am not a web dev or flash guru
    - My personal preference is simple, clean, clutter free websites that age well
    - IMPORTANT *** ALL of the sites contain sound so turn off your speakers if in work *** I will definately not have any sound effects on my site, I hate almost all sites the have sound
    - I'm not looking to pay the unique buyout price, I'll take the risk that no-one in my small niche market of contractors/agents are likely to have any of the above websites and pay regular price only.
    - the point of having this website is that i have bought some fairly prominent work related .net and .com websites and believe with a simple google search of "<area of expertise> contractor" these sites by their domain names would likely appear highly on possible clients results list and therefore may attract small co.'s looking for someone of my experience (i.e direct work).

    So with the above criteria in mind I've narrowed down choices to the following 6 with my own site opinions included:

    1) Hand & Mouse
    Good points: professional looking
    bad points: i'm not so sure of the shimmering arcade machine style menu choices

    2) Laptop
    I like the inital simple clean menu but wonder if the laptop idea is a bit too cheesey?

    3) Business Card
    I like the idea of changing the first pages text to effectively be my business card details but find the shaking biz card when a menu is selected a bit annoying so would look to disable it

    4) Desk
    I like the first page as it looks like a meeting desk to me, I also like the way the scroll bar drags at an angle for each page, i think I'll disable the exploding money animation. I think it’s an interesting site to play with (moving the chairs at the start around with the mouse) but possibly a bit too over the top?

    5) Stationery
    Hmm this is the outside choice. I’m not sure about the black feel to the site, a bit too 80's non timeless I think? and maybe there’s a bit too much movement in the intro and glitz with the sparkling menu icons. a bit too over the top?

    6) Boxes
    A think this is a clean, simple site and I like the inbetween animations when a menu is selected on the main page but would have to change the black/white stripe animation on the initial page for menu selection.


    So what does the panel think?

    Let the "oh my god, are you blind?", "jeezuz you have bad taste", "what kind of web dev cowboys made these awful sites" remarks begin..
    The proud owner of 125 Xeno Geek Points

    #2
    All need Flash or Silverlight and at least two need the most up-to-date Flash version, so didn't work for me. Would potential clients be fully tooled up with Flash/Silverlight? Not iPod based clients presumably

    I usually have Flash disabled.

    Wonder when people will start deploying HTML5 Canvas solutions.

    Comment


      #3
      Originally posted by TimberWolf View Post
      All need Flash or Silverlight and at least two need the most up-to-date Flash version, so didn't work for me. Would potential clients be fully tooled up with Flash/Silverlight? Not iPod based clients presumably

      I usually have Flash disabled.

      Wonder when people will start deploying HTML5 Canvas solutions.
      WHS - if you can avoid having a flash site then it's better.
      "You’re just a bad memory who doesn’t know when to go away" JR

      Comment


        #4
        If you want a simple, clean "I am a freelancer" site, Flash or other rich media is horrible - text nicely laid out and maybe a couple of diagrams or pictures. Web designers may tell you you MUST be on twitter/FB but since I assume you just want a site to refer people to rather than one people find by searching, simple is best.

        You might consider a Wordpress solution, with a custom theme: Premium WordPress Themes | Elegant Themes

        I used one of those and got a developer to tweak it but you might not need any tweaking. One example: BusinessCard Theme | Just another WordPress weblog
        another: MyResume Theme | Just another WordPress weblog
        a third: Minimal Theme | Just another WordPress weblog

        I can recommend the dev I used but not sure you need it.
        Originally posted by MaryPoppins
        I'd still not breastfeed a nazi
        Originally posted by vetran
        Urine is quite nourishing

        Comment


          #5
          All the sites I have shown also come with HTML only versions for those who don't have/want flash, unfortunately these can only be viewed as a single static screenshot for the site's demo purposes

          Good comments so far, I'll take a look at the wordpress ideas.
          The proud owner of 125 Xeno Geek Points

          Comment


            #6
            SEO is far more important than looks. Get something clean and basic - unless you are a web designer in which case the site needs to demo your skillset and creativity.

            I'd go a buy a cheap Wordpress or HTML/CSS template and work with that for a quick site.
            McCoy: "Medical men are trained in logic."
            Spock: "Trained? Judging from you, I would have guessed it was trial and error."

            Comment

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