Site overhaul?

Torsten · Wed Sep 17, 2008 18:32 pm *Site overhaul?*

Hi,

As many of you have pointed out it's time for an overhaul of our website. This process will take some time and we would like to give you the opportunity to have your say on anything we change. Below you will find two drafts of our renewed start page. What do you think of them? How do you like the colors, images and especially the structure and navigation? Many thanks, Torsten

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Test Of English for International Communication
TOEIC Preparation & TOEIC Vocabulary

Yankee · Wed Sep 17, 2008 19:58 pm *Site overhaul?*

Hi Torsten

My initial reaction is that I like layout of the second version better. However, I find the logo in the first one more appealing.
I would suggest changing any German words (e.g. Kontakt, Suche) to English ones.

You've got a lot of material besides the tests on the site and I'm curious how you're planning to reorganize all of that. Or haven't you gotten that far yet? It seems to me that there should be at least one very general link on this page that will take a visitor to the rest of the stuff on the site.
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Amy
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ESL teacher, and native speaker of American English

Torsten · Wed Sep 17, 2008 20:12 pm *Site overhaul?*

Hi Amy,

Thanks a lot for your feedback. I agree with all your suggestions. You are right, we'll have to come with a layout that reorganizes all our content and the challenge is to create 'navigation paths' that lead our users intuitively. Yes, of course all the information will be in English and we'll a uniform layout for all pages.

How much information would you put on the home/start page and how would you group it?
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Test Of English for International Communication
TOEIC Preparation & TOEIC Vocabulary

Yankee · Wed Sep 17, 2008 20:42 pm *Site overhaul?*

Hi Torsten

Personally, I find an uncluttered first page to be preferable. However, I think you could add a sentence or two that briefly describes/outlines the sorts of other things available on the site. That brief description could then be linked to a page that serves as a relatively detailed (and complete) table of contents for the entire site.
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Amy
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ESL teacher, and native speaker of American English

Stew.t. · Wed Sep 17, 2008 20:43 pm *Site overhaul?*

Hi Torsten

I like the clean design of the 1st option.

The second option looks a bit like a template design from cmsimple or other such web designers.
We (trans-lingo.com are overhauling as well) and I think the logo is crucial, and agree with Amy the first logo is better, has a more graphical look to it.
Are you going for a dynamic site, and keeping phpBB?
We have opted to try out typo3 which is better for handling and storage than cmsimple.

Will the forum threads appear in the same window as the tests shown above, that is quite nice if it can be achieved navi-wise.

Maybe also consider groupings such as audio and official tests under one umbrella. At the moment there are too many sub pages in my honest opinion.
A lot of sites are cluttered, and my favourite ones are clean, simple and minimal.

I like these guys:

www.hhl.de

They have a lot of info but it is cleanly presented.
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Please meet Stewart Tunncilff

NinaZara · Wed Sep 17, 2008 20:44 pm *Site overhaul?*

I like the first layout better, less blue colour. Some people might find it difficult to read fonts in white. This might be the hidden factor why people are so bad at navigating, too many distractions.
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Try your best and damn the rest.

Yankee · Wed Sep 17, 2008 21:03 pm *Site overhaul?*

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