Website Critique: Advanced Granite Systems

Heather I like the look of it a lot. It is definitely a huge improvement..

A couple of suggestions after a brief look through the site and code. I noticed you have no hover or "rollover" states for any of your links, I would highly suggest you make sure that first, your links are different colors than the content; on your interior pages I noticed the left navigation links were the same color as your content, it's hard to immediately distinguish they are links as a result. Second, make sure you add hover styles to all links so when a user puts their mouse over the link they have a visual indication that something happened; aka they are over the link. A simple underline, color change, bolding, background color would all be just fine.

Secondly at quick glance your HTML looks rather clean. I would suggest making sure you add title tags to all of your links for accessibility reasons, and make sure you use alt tags for all of the images as well.

I merely spent 10 seconds in your CSS, but I can offer a suggestion of looking up shorthand for many of the properties. It not only saves time, but saves valuable kb in the long run for the size of the CSS file. An example is for the background property. I noticed you were diong each property seperate; background-color, background-position etc... You can actually write all background properties in one line by doing the following: background:#0000 url('images/myimage.jpg') no-repeat top left; That line just set the color, image, repeat, and position all at the same time. It's a huge time saver.

I didn't notice if you used short hand for fonts, margin or padding, but if you're not, those can all be done on one line as well.

Hope some of this can help. Great job for a first attempt though.

Love it.

You have no copyright info though... might want to add that. And as the above poster mentioned, rollovers.

Did you know in the "gallery" inlays and countertops are the same images?

Also, your main elements are not centered into your rectangle which they should be. The elements are the large image of the kitchen and even the white lines across the top.

@Tadams: Thanks for the tip on the links. I understand what you mean by them not really being seen ask clickable. Do you think that maybe a bold as a rollover would be sufficient or do you think I need something for the standalone link as well? And thanks for the tip on the shorthand for CSS. That's good to know and will be a time saver!

@pokie: Ah, you're right about it not being centered. Whoops! And the inlays gallery is actually a # link. Maybe I should have a coming soon page instead as to not confuse people. Also, is there a standard way to put in the copyright?

Thanks for the feedback, I'm really glad you both like the design.

All in all, a well put together site and a vast improvement over the previous version. It has a nice, clean look that works well with the business. Also a nice effort for your first css site.

A few things that I would note, though. First, the lack of action and distinction on the links as mentioned before. I would definitely make them colored (I am thinking bright-ish green for some reason) so that they are instantly recognizable as links. Even if the rollover state took them back to white, I think this would really help. Also, make sure your email link on the contact page is colored this way as well.

On the home page, you have the "sliding doors" on the bottom, (the stylish, elegant, natural), but I am not sure that the average person would pick up on the fact that they are supposed to click them. I would make those the same link color and maybe have a small "up" graphic next to it (a small arrow or something to give a hint of what clicking it will do)

On the contact page, you need to right-justify the names of the people to match their contact info.

The only other thing I see is that the FAQ page is kind of bland. I think you are using the sliding doors here where they don't need to be. Kind of an overuse of technology. I would just have it all out there on page load. Once again, you are asking someone to do something when they don't really need to with the clicking on the question.

Nice redo.

on the "home" image: are the cascading ovals down the left sidesupposed to be there? looks accidental to me, didn't want you to miss it if it is.

That's the edge of a log wall.... :)

Glad to see your finally putting some time into this 7 months later so that Advanced Granite Systems doesn't have to rely on your cousins lame and desperate attempt as a website designer.

Shelly

Good site. Two things:

1. Why is the site so low down the page? I'd raise it up a bit.
2. You're losing some valuable SEO on the home page. Put some of the About us content on this page and link it to your page title and meta tags. This will make your site more popular. :)

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Natobasso
dirtandrust.com
"Powerpoint is not a design application"