Follow along, part 2

[dacoyle]

OK, I have an initial new draft ready ... pending client review. (Two words so many of us hate.... }

One quick comment; this time, I was smart enough to use a 2nd stylesheet so I'm not mucking up the existing site.

For those joining the story late, I'm redesigning this site and the above link is the proposed new look. Ignore content and colors; I have no control over either.

[Richard Waller]

Dennis

No. You must get the USP Unique Selling Proposition right up the top in meaningful text - the first words on the site. AND you should put the same words into the text attached to the first image. AND you should have a META description clause which certainly Google likes to see.

Otherwise you are doing a great job <g>

[annc]

Originally Posted by dacoyle

OK, I have an initial new draft ready ...

Oh, dear! ;-)

This is all so loud and disorganised that i can't follow it at all.

I suggest you make sure all the text on the left lines up. At the moment, nothing lines up at all, which is very distracting. Also, the colour bands don't seem to mean anything. They should lead the eye from one important element to another, or not be there. Instead of which, they trap the eye in each level with no 'ladder' to the next. You've also wasted important header space on a peripheral issue, which is the link to joining an e-mail list. Use that space to sell the product!

In the text points, the third one should start with 'protect' rather than 'protecting'.

[Patrick Nethercot]

Another politician? You're getting as bad as me. :-)

I use the same stucrture and look for al my political sites, makes updating so much easier.

[ktinkel]

Originally Posted by dacoyle

OK, I have an initial new draft ready ... pending client review. (Two words so many of us hate.... }

Clients: Can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em!

The layout is improved, but a few thoughts (realize some of the things may come directly from the client, but I’ll mention them anyway):

The 49th District line needs spacing, bullets, something.

The two pictures are so similar, yet so unlike. If you use both, make them drastically different in size and balanced in position — not stacked.

The page would be stronger if the larger photo could be an action shot of some kind — showing the candidate with people, doing something. Then it could be at left, under (and same width as) the banner, with your text at the right.

That would put the message in the middle of the screen where it would be more prominent (and the bullet text could be larger).

I would leave out “As a Virginia Delegate” (already stated above), and head the list with a very strong “My priorities” with no attempt to make a sentence out of the list (no punctuation, especially; and no “and” either).

The list bullets lack punch (and they are floating above the baseline of the adjacent text).

The text at left bottom should be indented rather than hard on the edge of the screen. Shouldn’t the Constituent and Campaign office information be in similar (same) style?

I agree that the e-mail list form is a waste of the top part of the screen. It might work at the bottom, with the addresses.

Like Ann, I find the color bands to be more puzzling than clarifying.

As usual for me, some of the text is unreadably small on my system: the copyright notice and, worse, the navbar. I will attach a same-size screenshot so you can see how it looks here.

[dacoyle]

Originally Posted by ktinkel

Clients: Can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em!

Ain't that the truth.

All, thanks for all the input. But reminder... ignore the content! It's just place holding for now.

Have been working with Adam all day, incorporating both his ideas and the comments here. What a work in progress.

Kathleen, let me know how the nav buttons look now. I bumped 'em up from .8 to .9em. There are three pages that aren't currently online, but I had no room to add more than one more link so I moved three of the more informational pages, About, 49th, and Endorsements, to the bottom. I don't really have room for a sidebox, but it's a thought.

Any comments on pictures, don't bother. I don't have any others to use and Adam likes the two pictures where they are. He's one of those people that have trouble taking good photos.

Still tweaking away...

[jgr]

The most critical element on each page -- other than the text for that specific page -- is the navigation element. There's a bit of work to do on that:

Indexnew.htm - Calendar nav element is duplicated; About Adam nav element is missing.

Other pages - nav elements should be in the same order as the front page (some pages now have eight elements while others have nine).

Have fun...

[dacoyle]

Judy,

About Adam is now at the bottom of the page. Thanks for catching the double calendar link. I'm still rearranging the navigation.

As to the other pages, I haven't touched them yet. The site has needed a full redesign for some time. I've already stripped the old formatting/nav from my local files. Just need to finish this new design, create my Dreamweaver template, then slap it on all the files.