Website Critique

[RustBeltRaw]

I finally finished assembling a simple, dedicated site for my work. Just portfolios, a blog, and contact info. If anyone has a few spare moments, please take a look. Reactions, insight, and critique on everything is welcome. Design, function, content, image sequencing, and the shots themselves are all fair game.

http://rustbeltraw.com/

[Downrigger]

Very, very nice. Good design, fun to see the portfolio you put up, also. You rite real good, too. My only concern was that when I clicked "Photos" I got the roller girls and at first missed the fact that you have people and places, too. It took me a second pass to figure that out. That's probably just me.

[rpcrowe]

Lex,
An excellent web site. You have some wonderful images posted but, IMO, the roller derby image you selected to be the face plate of the website is the absolute best choice.
The website is somewhat slow to open the various images, even though I am working with a fairly fast computer!
Can you link from the posted images to sites like CiC?

[RustBeltRaw]

My only concern was that when I clicked "Photos" I got the roller girls and at first missed the fact that you have people and places, too.

It's not just you. I'm not a huge fan of that, but I'm trying to avoid having a separate home page (pretty useless, in my opinion), and I haven't come up with a better work-around. That's definitely on my "do better!" list.

The website is somewhat slow to open the various images, even though I am working with a fairly fast computer!

I'm using the maximum available size (1500px). I may cut that down to 1200px or 960px, because you're not alone. Since the site auto-scales to the window it's in - with a very good resizing algorithm - I wanted to give the resizing math lots of pixels to play with. Further study required!

Can you link from the posted images to sites like CiC?

The easiest way is to open the images in a new tab, and copy the URL into an [img] block. The shot below was inserted with (remove spaces) [ img ] http://dft.ba/-7iuP [ /img ]. Note that I put the actual static URL through a shortener to prevent a text deluge. CiC's forums are programmed to reduce image sizes to match the column width, so it'll come through large, but not full-size.

[Nass]

Hm, tried to look at it, gave up after seeing that spinning thing for 60s. Maybe less images/smaller sizes?

[chauncey]

Several months back I queried my adult children about starting a blog, which would partly revolve around photography, with the remaining parts involving wide-ranging personal opinions, things like "worldwide problems"/USA leader cretinism/whatnot. I couldn't understand why they thought that it was a really bad idea.

[RustBeltRaw]

Hm, tried to look at it, gave up after seeing that spinning thing for 60s. Maybe less images/smaller sizes?

Starting to think that's a must. Apparently anything less than a high-speed internet connection is trouble for the site. So I'll downsize and live with the image quality.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone. Keep it coming!

[Richard Lundberg]

Why does the background for the roller girls change from black to magenta after the first image? Ugly.

[Colin Southern]

Overall I like the nice clean design.

I think you need to save your image at a lower compression though (eg 10 instead of 12) - you won't be able to see the difference, but it'll 1/2 the size and 1/2 the load times (which weren't bad, but they weren't great either).

In your "Rates" section, I'm not sure if I'd put the bit about "we'll work something out to suit" etc -- I think it sets up an expectation with the client that you'll lower your prices when they plead poverty -- and thus encourages them to plead poverty to get it cheaper.

[RustBeltRaw]

I think you need to save your image at a lower compression though (eg 10 instead of 12) - you won't be able to see the difference, but it'll 1/2 the size and 1/2 the load times.

Caught. I'll bump down the resolutions and compression.

In your "Rates" section, I'm not sure if I'd put the bit about "we'll work something out to suit" etc -- I think it sets up an expectation with the client that you'll lower your prices when they plead poverty -- and thus encourages them to plead poverty to get it cheaper.

Thanks for the input on that section. I've been agonizing over the wording quite a bit. Glad to hear you think I can get away with less passive phrasing.

...It's best to just shoot me a message with your idea, and I'll work out something to fit your budget.

I'll probably switch that to "shoot me a message with your idea, and I'll assemble a quote." Or something similar, without the reference to negotiating.

For the record, the site's writing style is deliberately on the casual side. Comments on that decision are welcome.

[Colin Southern]

For the record, the site's writing style is deliberately on the casual side. Comments on that decision are welcome.

A quick rant / ramble from my years in (IT) business.

"People don't want the cheapest - they want the best perceived value for money. The problem is is that a lot of people ASSUME that money is the most important thing, so when someone makes contact and asks for a quote - the seller assumes its all about money & gives them a price. At that point the ONLY piece of information the potential client has to base a decision on is the price. So it's not that they're a price-shopper when they called -- it's the seller/provider who's turned them INTO a price shopper.

Perceived value for money covers a lot of things; it covers the price of the transaction - it covers friendliness - it covers trust - it covers recommendations from friends. If they don't like you or don't feel they can trust you then they're not going to buy from you at any cost. Conversely, if they really like you and really feel they can trust you - and they like your work - then that will command a higher price.

So when they make contact, be friendly - be respectful - ask them lots of questions (set the stage with "before I can give you a price, I need to really understand what your needs are -- so would it be OK if I ask you a few questions"?) (which lets them be reassured by the fact that you're taking the time to understand their real needs).

And in the end, don't give them a "price" or a "quote" ...

... Give them a Recommendation & Proposal".

Don't just tell them you charge more because you're better - articulate to them (with examples) of WHY you're better - and what the benefit of that is to them.

Hope this helps

[chauncey]

A quick rant / ramble from my years in (IT) business.

"People don't want the cheapest - they want the best perceived value for money. The problem is is that a lot of people ASSUME that money is the most important thing, so when someone makes contact and asks for a quote - the seller assumes its all about money & gives them a price. At that point the ONLY piece of information the potential client has to base a decision on is the price. So it's not that they're a price-shopper when they called -- it's the seller/provider who's turned them INTO a price shopper.

Perceived value for money covers a lot of things; it covers the price of the transaction - it covers friendliness - it covers trust - it covers recommendations from friends. If they don't like you or don't feel they can trust you then they're not going to buy from you at any cost. Conversely, if they really like you and really feel they can trust you - and they like your work - then that will command a higher price.

So when they make contact, be friendly - be respectful - ask them lots of questions (set the stage with "before I can give you a price, I need to really understand what your needs are -- so would it be OK if I ask you a few questions"?) (which lets them be reassured by the fact that you're taking the time to understand their real needs).

And in the end, don't give them a "price" or a "quote" ...

... Give them a Recommendation & Proposal".

Don't just tell them you charge more because you're better - articulate to them (with examples) of WHY you're better - and what the benefit of that is to them.

Colin...That rant, as you describe it, could serve as the best concise business model that I've ever read.

[RustBeltRaw]

Worlds to live by, Colin.

The one trouble with asking lots of questions is that most of the gatekeepers for the work I want are about my age, which means they have zero attention span. I have literally never started a job with all of the usual questions (access, delivery, rights, usage, and rate) answered. I spend a lot of time trying to shorten the way I ask them, because many in my generation will literally skip reading anything they deem excessively long.

[Shadowman]

Very nice.

[Colin Southern]

Worlds to live by, Colin.

The one trouble with asking lots of questions is that most of the gatekeepers for the work I want are about my age, which means they have zero attention span. I have literally never started a job with all of the usual questions (access, delivery, rights, usage, and rate) answered. I spend a lot of time trying to shorten the way I ask them, because many in my generation will literally skip reading anything they deem excessively long.

Hi Lex,

I know what you mean, -- but I'm coming from the direction of "prescription without diagnosis is malpractice". If you don't know enough about the job then you can't know what equipment and techniques are going to be involved in doing it. Bit like someone asking for you to photograph a boat, so you turn up with a tripod and a couple of lenses -- then you find out it's a factory trawler that's had a fire and they need the inside photographed where it's literally as dark as a cave and 1/2 the size of a footy field. Different job altogether. Customer doesn't know what we need to know ("I thought all modern cameras just took care of all that kind of stuff") - and you and up needing generators, lights, assistants - and 4 times as long (that they don't want to pay for because it's not what was quoted).