Sixties Press Poetry Magazines Website - Essay Example

Critical Report of Sixties Press Poetry Magazine’s Website XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX Table of contents Introduction 2 Critique 3 Appearance 3 Content 5 Functionality 5 Website usability 6 Search Engine Optimization 6 Recommendations/Solution 6 Structure: 6 Graphics: 7 Use of colour: 7 Content: 7 Readability: 8 Page layout: 8 Hyperlink: 8 Promotion 8 Introduction The overall design of Sixties Press Poetry Magazine’s website is really bad in terms of organization, presentation, and matching colors. I would simple call it an ‘ugly site’. The header is nearly unreadable. The images and graphics show here are random and the colors have to relationship with each other at all. The organization is the poorest. The navigation menu at the top uses a lot of different colors and is poorly presented. I will start with the website’s design. Critique Appearance The Sixties Press Poetry Magazine’s website contravenes all the design principles employed by any web designer. First, the website lacks the repetition of visual elements, which is important for the interactivity of a website. In terms of contrast, there are very few blocks of text that contract with the website’s background. Several texts are almost illegible and one would struggle to understand the words put across by the website. ‘Barry Tebb’s Mental Health Blog Website’ link and the whole of ‘Feature Articles’ section give such examples. This is shown below. In terms of proximity, related items are near each other as they should be. The issue arising here is that nearly everything is at this same proximity. While ‘Review’ and ‘E Magazine’ are two separate sections, they have been spaced the same distance as the line breaks in the paragraphs! The fourth item I need to criticize is the alignment of elements to create visual unity. Sixties Press has tried to inculcate this within the main part of their website. However, they have not done it so well. While the paragraphs and sections are aligned in vertical columns, the text is centered. While this may make sense in the case of a poem, this is a website and therefore does not apply at all. The navigation menu has ignored alignments totally. Content The content displayed by Sixties Press seems to go hand in hand with its relevance as a poetry website. The audience, who are mainly the poetry fans, can get informative and relevant information from this website. Therefore with over 8 years of operation, they have developed confidence in the website’s knowledge and competence. The content seem to be short and organized, labeled and broken down into short paragraphs. Sixties Press seems to update its content regularly, something that is likely to endear it to its visitors. Flashy graphics and animation, which may distract someone from getting to the meat of the website has been hugely avoided. While a banner or a catchy video would keep visitors for much longer on the website, Sixties Press has not let this come in as it may affect the content and ‘force’ visitors to go through something they are really not interested in. Functionality Though not entirely well organized or appealing visually, the website is big on functionality. After testing all the links, I did not find any broken or poorly constructed components, which would otherwise leave the visitors frustrated and disillusioned. The components on this website work quickly and correctly. The website over 98% pass in terms of errors. The figures and facts are correct. There are also very few typos, punctuation grammar, and misspellings. Bad grammar and spelling mistakes are not forgivable on any website as this may also be the likely case with other company material, for instance brochures and annual reports. Website usability This website lacks in usability. The website is not easy to navigate for users who need to be accustomed to phrases and layouts on the internet for instance the logo, about use pages and contact use. Navigation is usually in the same place on each page and near the content. Sixties Press seems to have broken these conventions and that is why it has poor usability and many dissatisfied site visitors. However, the positive thing is that the website is easy to navigate and the pages load within the recommended 8.6 seconds. It’s optimal for this to work as 25 percent of the UK website users have broad Search Engine Optimization The website seems to have done really well on Search Engine Optimization (SEO). According to startscrop.com the website has a SEO Score of 68.7%. It is ranked #1,203,420 in the world and is worth $3,666 USD and advertising revenue is $1 USD per day. There are various factors that have contributed to this. The written content has been presented in Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) and does not use flash, JavaScript or any image only-objects for the navigation items, as this may not rank it highly among similar websites. The website seems to have used important keywords frequently and appropriately. Recommendations/Solution Structure: As results of the previous points, regarding the critical analysis of the site, it has been suggested that the following changes be made in order to fit the website’s subject and goals. In addition, the changes should also encourage the user to spend longer visiting the website, rather than looking only at the homepage and then leaving the site. 1- Content on the home page must be clear and present a direct and good impression of the website to the user. 2- There is no need for animation pictures or mouse over links, as these distract the visitor. 3- There is some extra irrelevant information, but important information is missing, such as links to social websites, for example: follow us on twitter. 4- The design, the order and the positioning of the information should be completely altered to be of a high quality, facilitating ease of use. 5- As an art website the images on the home page should be more than text only, to appeal to the browser. 6- The website has to consider its accessibility to the disabled user. Graphics: The next points are the changes that will improve the graphics on the website: 1- The homepage should have images related to the main subject rather than a designer photograph. 2- Pictures that have a hyper link should explain where it leads. 3- Pictures will be chosen that have enough resolution to be clear, attractive and only those that are necessary to improve the page will be included in a non-distracting way. 4- All the pictures will be selected considering: size, quality and the value in assisting the visitor to understand the main purpose of the website. 5- Some graphics will help the user to access demands such as clicking on a home picture rather than writing ‘home’. Use of colour: Colours are important for the reason that users recognise them as branding, so the following suggestions are intended to improve the colour shown on the website. 1- By using a few matching colours the look will be better than is using many colours, which look messy. 2- Colours will be chosen that do not affect people that are colour blind. 3- The colours must follow the standard colour web design and user expectations. Content: The content will change based on the following: 1- The proportion of the page used. 2- How to attract the user? The value of the content for the user. 3- The contact details should be presented on one of the navigation bar boxes. 4- The information should be correct and updated. 5- Consideration should be made of the users’ interest. Readability: To improve the readability of the website the following points will be addressed: 1- The font size should be uniform and easy to read. 2- In zoom in or zoom out the page, the text should not become confused. 3- Use bullets points and subheadings to attract the user’s interest. 4- The texts should be short and truthful in order to maintain the users’ attention. 5- The background should be organised to keep it simple and clean. 6- People with a disability should be considered in making navigation easy. 7- Graphics should be helpful for users. Page layout: 1- The page design of the website should be retained throughout. 2- Titles should be on each page to avoid users getting lost. 3- Pictures should be separated from texts to limit user’s confusion. 4- Control options on the pages should be enabled so users can manoeuvre through the website. 5- A clear structure creates a more visually appealing site. Hyperlink: Hyperlinks make it easier to use the website, this will make it difficult if the hyperlink has not have been explained very well to the user. The recommendations for using hyperlinks are: 1- Hyperlinks should be in standard colours, stable and easy to spot. 2- Hyperlinks should help the website to answer most of the user’s questions: including a ‘contact us’ option. 3- Using internal links rather than scrolling. 4- The website should have a site map. Promotion For my redesign of the Sixties Press Poetry, I will provide a layout that is user friendly and convenient to use. The prototype will have a more sane approach, but still maintaining the sixties flare. The prototype will have a visual appeal in terms of color and navigation. It will also be appropriate to all audiences. Storyboard Here is a screenshot of my prototype. Essential information includes: Home cover page-title, images, content. Poetry of the 60’s Publications- written works published by writers and poets of this time Reviews Featured articles Archives References Brown-DiThomas, D. S. (1999). Design, development, and pilot testing of a web-based counseling support site for a California community college. Retrieved from ERIC MICROFICHE ED457949. Whitney, S. (2002). Top ten biggest mistakes in website design. Retrieved February 18, 2003, from http://milheimqh.com/designarticle.html. Devaraj, S., Fan, M., & Kohli, R. (2002). Past history of B2C channel satisfaction and preference: Validating e-commerce metrics. Information Systems Research, 13(3), 316 333. McCarthy, C. Whee! New numbers on web usage. CNET. Retrieved from http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-10160850-36.html Read More