Website Evaluations

The first website I evaluated was www.mayfairfestival.org. I chose it because I went to the site to find information and at first I was frustrated. I bought tickets to an event they were holding and was trying to find information. I went to the site and the homepage loaded. Links were clearly visible on the right side. The most prominent part was the large Mayfair logo at the top of the page. Underneath was a dotted line which seemed unnecessary and under the line was a lot of empty space. I didn’t scroll down initially because the empty space made me think nothing else was on the first page. I clicked on a link from the side and the next page loaded. It looked identical first. I clicked on the other links and it seemed the same page kept coming up. I did this a few times before scrolling down and seeing that the new information on each page was at the bottom of the page. When the pages load you should clearly see the new information without having to scroll down. This page was clearly not checked on various browsers or with different resolutions. The large blank space under the logo could easily be removed and prevent the problem. The other elements of the page seemed ok. My only other criticism is the blue title texts don’t stand out against the blue background. Using the criteria in the not so good checklist form the book it seems the general design was lacking.
The other website I chose belongs to the union I belong to. It is www.local302iaff.org. Despite being designed by amateurs it seems pretty good. I used the checklists in the book as the criteria for my critique. The site is easy to navigate around. Links are clearly visible and don’t leave much guess work. Text is easy to read and despite a lot of information it doesn’t appear cluttered. The site also clearly shows when it was last updated. At first I thought that having a large news items displayed above the general information about the site may be a mistake. Then I considered the purpose of the site which is primarily to educate the union’s own members. In this case most visitors are checking the site to get informed on current happenings so the prominent news is acceptable.
Looking at both sites showed the importance of a good first page. The site I intend to design will feature my wife’s garden and what we do with the harvest. I will need to provide a clear path to the information I will include. I will not make the mistake of the Mayfair site and have too much space. Learning form the union site I will need to have a clear explanation of the site expressed on the first page. It should be expressed without having to scroll down much. My target audience will be new viewers who may not know what the site is all about at first.