Website Review
First Impressions
Well, as a college student myself over in England, I feel like I am suitable to view this site, haha!
In all seriousness though, as a first time viewer, having seen your website link, I did think that “It’ll just be some kind of educational help site” but I was quite surprised to find that it wasn’t because who doesn’t love pictures and videos? The only problem was though, was that when I first clicked the link the page loaded a frame of the page first (The outlines of the sections I mean) and then the images/banners and what have you.
I checked my connection and loaded it again to ensure it wasn’t a one-time thing and every time, it did this. This tells me your site is a little full on with images and what not. In a world where people judge a site by its loading time, you may turn away some visitors!
Leading on though, the first thing that catches my eye is the two orange banners in the top section of the site. Fill with the little images of what treasures are encapsulated within that area they give me the impression that you have content, which is always a good sign for a new visitor to pick up on.
There are two problems I did notice. One is an actual problem and one is just personal opinion though. I was scrolling down your homepage and due to my mouse, I can scroll in any way that is applicable. Due to an accidental scroll, I discovered this. (
http://gyazo.com/6d02564b7931e3c1a1c29b ... 1327869642) note the huge scroll bar and it is just that blueish colour all the way along the bar. Whilst that may qualify more as an appearance area, as a first time visitor that would annoy me slightly! As for my personal opinion, where the two banners are, you have a bit of white space in-between. I can’t help but think you could have a little design in there, an announcement link or something related to either take up the space or you could move the banner(s) a little closer together in my opinion. But that’s just my personal view as a guy who hates white space in many forms!
Overall though, a good first page. I can see a lot of content for me to get dug into, a wide array of pages and a decent theme to boot. Some minor issues with loading time and such but I’m sure that can be sorted!
(Score: 16/20)
Appearance
So, I’ll start off this section by listing what I actually like about your theme first of all. The menu bar, love it. I love how the colours blend, the logo fits into the area and is attributed to the niche by means of the beer cup and what I presume is vomit/beer around the end of the ‘I’! The font is generically College-y so that fits in well also.
I love the orange banners also; they are bright and stand out like they should as they host your latest content that has been uploaded. As a side not though, on your current banner as I am reading this. 4/5 videos have a kind of black banner inside the video preview area, whilst the 5th one does not. See here – (
http://gyazo.com/222bd254db1f7472801f63 ... 1327871640) I hope you get what I mean there. I am putting that down to the way in which the video is however, it is just a note though!
Overall, you have a strong theme whilst it does look a little too busy for my liking in terms of what’s down the side versus the main content but it is easily definable due to the way in which the layout is done. Now, onto what I have spotted/don’t like!
So, I had my peek around the site and I’ve spotted what may be either a problem or yours or my end of the stick but nevertheless! Where you have the buttons “Sign In”, “Sign up” and “Upload” there is a very minor detail but one which I noticed and a friend verified I was not seeing things. See here (
http://gyazo.com/e13bd338c544cd630f7841 ... 1327872157) See the little pixilation around the corner of the “Sign up” button? You have that on the Upload button as well but whilst I had to zoom in to get that photo for you, it is noticeable from when I reverted back to my normal web page size. Just something to look at.
Again, this one is personal opinion but I just feel that the orange area in the footer just doesn’t fit personally. I can see the very minuscule white area indicating it is meant to be protruding over the black space and similar to the other orange areas but I just think making it fit within the footer area itself would just be better.
There appears to be an area of white space between your ‘Facebook/Youtube/Twitter’ buttons and the Popular Pictures area. I don’t know if this is intentional or not, but thought I’d let you know! The same occurs between the last article on the homepage and the orange footer piece.
Another personal opinion of mine is that I think your site could benefit from a different colour down the sides instead of the blue combination you have now. I just do not feel that the current colour is in line with the site’s humour/niche area. Maybe you could make it white and affix people “peering” out of the white area onto where an article is posted or similar. Just an idea!
(Score: 17/20)
Navigation/Layout
This is a section that doesn’t need much explaining. I can very easily navigate around your site as your menu bar is prevalent and consistent on every page I click too and it is fairly easy to find the more official stuff such as your TOS and Privacy Policy and such. I also like how you have the notice atop the page about the filter and such. Very user-friendly site in terms of navigation.
(Score: 20/20)
Content
As you have a mix of both galleries and written articles I am going to focus mainly on the written ones but I will talk about the picture-orientated ones. Just, its quite hard to critique a website via the pictures you have!
So, on your homepage you have 5 articles on it, 4 galleries and 1 written article, so on that basis I went into your article area so I can get a better overview of your content. Although, after reading through a random array of your articles, I can safely say that they are beautifully written and full of information on all types of subjects. I can see how the content can be attributed to the student/college area and they are helpful. Good reference links with the odd funny anecdote here and there. They do make me want to keep reading and that is a good sign!
Due to you only having a few articles, I chose to move onto your blog page. I like how you write and the information that you give your visitors whilst shipping in funny remarks here and there. It just fits within the ambience of the site itself, which is always a good thing to do. They again, are beautifully written with only the odd spelling error here and there. Very well done.
The only problem I’m seeing is the lack of written articles and stuff for me to read! It just seems like the focus is on videos/picture but not everyone likes them! Unless I am missing the area which gives me all the articles that have been written, I am only seeing a few and if you were to put that into comparison with the amount of pictures and videos that you have, it isn’t looking good! Maybe you should concentrate a tad more on the articles area of the side, just to pump up the ratio a bit!
(Score: 26/30)
Footer
I have already had my say on the footer but I will add some more points into this area. I feel that some things could be improved text wise. In the orange area where you have “THEMEDIA” and such, the text is just bunched together and I just feel that a space will help things along. Othr that, the only thing you are really missing is some form of Navigation to the homepage in the footer and a copyright notice really. If you add those, your footer will be more or less complete!
(Score: 7/10)
Total Score
86/100
Final Remarks
A very good site a wide array of brilliant features such as the text/quotes function and the music area! Even the “colleges” map is a great function I hadn’t expected to see. Your site has great promise, promise that I believe will be delivered with you at the helm. Keep up the great work.
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