http://www.s3i.co.uk

Hi, new B2B site, been up about 2 weeks.
Would welcome opinion on look & feel of site.
Especially on-line purchasing usability.

Further comment on how to up the PR!

thanks

james

Congratulations! - I opened your site for a cursory look and the index page gave me a fair idea of what the site is about, and the navigation bar some idea of your product list. You’d be amazed how often index pages don’t provide that info.

The h1 tag is useful – that’s the first thing I looked at, although I got the idea of rigging pretty quickly. You’ve repeated the word twice in the title, three times in the description, three times in the h1, again in the h2. I would say there is a good change that Google will see that as spam.

Anyway, the pictures are informative – really useful to me as I have no interest in rigging but really strong interest in handbrake cables, and I saw some component parts – I thought Ooh, maybe these guys can help.

So I went to the wire rope page. I was stumped for a while as I wanted to buy wire rope and instead found out about stresses and strains. It took me a while to notice the left menu had changed. How about putting that info in the page body as well. In fact the left menu changes again when I came to select shackles leaving me quite confused.

The code is reasonably tidy, the site works very well in a text browser (so search engines will be able to find their way around). The main points I picked up on were the titles and keyword stuffing.

From a style point of view, I would reduce the gap under the logo and address. Stick an <hr> in there - that’s all that’s needed to break the header from the rest of the page, then bring the content right up there.

For on-line purchasing put a big red button at the bottom of every page saying “check out”. I placed a couple of things in a basket, went back to the site then wondered how to check out without buying something else. I missed “view order” – you need check out as well even if it takes you to the same page.

Good site, function driven is just what you want for B2B. Go get those inbound links and put your site on the map.

listen to vord....he knows his stuff.
he is a web accessibility guru.

Vord,
Thank you for the run-down.

I am concerned as to why you think I may be 'spamming' google by the overuse of search terms.
I get mixed messages about this.
Some sites seem to say 'Ham it up Big' with key words, you suggest I've overdone it! What experience of this do you have?
What amount of key word repeat is acceptable to google?

All other points you make are fair, and I will take these on board, esp. the one about getting Techie info on what should be a key product page!

In the mean time, I DO make up brake cables, esp for vintage cars ( I trial a 1928 Model A Ford!) if you want anything, let me know!


Thanks, in anticipation, James.

Some people have reported that a reduction in keyword density has helped bring their sites back into the serps after falling in Florida (Nov 03) and subsequent Google updates. I have no direct experience of this - my sites have generally survived these updates.

Have a look at this research - it shows what is working at the moment - in summary perhaps a little repetition in the title, no repetition in keywords or description: http://www.gorank.com/research/0219...ty_Report.ph p

My advice would be to ensure the keywords are in the page, but use a writing style aimed at your visitors not at search engines.

I think I have solved my handbrake cable problem - I fitted 4 link rear suspension (and a 4 litre V8 ) into an MGB, http://www.vord.net/cars/mgb_mods/updates.html
then wondered why my handbrake cable wouldn't fit. I think I've figered out a way of using the original cable, but I'll certainly bear you in mind if that doesn't work.