Hi everyone, I have a travel site - National Visas which offers a free online visa assessment and also travel tips and advice.
I just recently updated the site's content.
Could you pls. take a look at it and tell me your suggestions on how to improve the site? as well as its content, information and services offered?

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Australia Visa

I'm no expert, but took a quick peek since your post was the first one on the topic.

I would consider some alternative to the gray used in the menus - firsthand the current gray is a little uninviting.

Also while I think the chosen colours are decent - I don't see the color logic in the topics Employer Sponsored Visa Program, Business Visa Program etc. I.e. why each heading has that specific color assigned to it?

Last and least, the dynamic menu at the top skilled visas, business visas etc. that expand on mouseover looks a little unfinished - top border is above the heading/content area border, the background color doesn't match anything else on the page and left side of the dropdown menus could use slight padding to make it seem less "tight".

I do like the top headerbanner as well as the right side menus and the appearance overall - just trying to help out.

Kindest regards

Niko Kotiniemi

I have a few comments - i can't see your ABN or ACN anywhere on the site and your MARA registration number icon takes the viewer back to your "about us" page ( which does not give the ABN or ACN etc.) Who is carrying the compulsory professional indemnity insurance? I doesn't look quite professional enough to me in that it doesn't really tell me what a migration agent is ( as opposed to a solicitor). Whoever completed the migration agents graduate diploma would usually post those qualification on the site and the institution eg. A.N.U., Edith Cowan University etc. ( at least that is what I would be looking for as a prospective client)

I would have more confidence if your MARA icon linked to MARA /Immigration Dept site so I could confirm you ( or the business? ) is a registered agent. It is rather ambiguous. As such I wouldn't want to register just to start the process when the Immigration Dept's website is pretty easy to find and very comprehensive. I am not sure what you are offering.Well, I know what you are offering but if I didn't know the system I might be confused the message doesn't really jump out at me.

The affiliation link is ambiguous it implies something that you then dismiss in the copy. I saw a Canadian migration agents site where she had a picture of herself and a bio which did inspire confidence. I guess I am saying part of the ambiguity is the lack of personalisation and the grey tones add to this. I realise some of the bottom links address some of these issues but you have to go looking for the answers.

Hope this helps. You could always put Mandy Vanstone's caring visage somewhere on the front page ( joke ! )

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I've come a long way in the journey of life and most of the roads weren't paved.

Thanks for those suggestions. I'm working on it now and hoping it would look a lot better.

Anything else?

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Australia Visa

Obviously the site has been around for a while given its PageRank and overall rankings - so I guess the main reason for asking for review is to keep up the link popularity. You know the site is popular (or you are not doing your job!

The site however, does not meet basic accessibility standards. You could help things enormously by tidying up the html. Mixture of lower and upper case in your tags is really unprofessional.

Your header section is 294 line long. God, I have built pages that are shorter than that. Go put the menu Javascript off page. That will take out over 220 lines for a start and if not possible - go find a better script.

It's a pity that you hadn't taken the opportunity to move to a less table based design but there again why should you.

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SEO Specialist, CSS Developers

Ian made a real good point. Javascript menus are great because of the ability to create whatever functionality that you want from them, yet they are literally invisible to a search engine. Yet there is a solution. You can go ahead and sign up for Google's webmaster tools, and upload a sitemap of your site to ensure that Google has all your pages in its cache and not just the homepage. Other than that you are doing real well. Yet the other good point raised was the fact that the colors are a little boring, yet if you were to switch up the colors you might as well just re-design the structure. Try using <div id="section">info for section sans the style information</div> for all of the pieces of your page. This way you can easily re-arrange the way the page is organized and changing the overall style of the site could be handled through CSS instead of embedding the style info directly in the page. CSS is a much better choice for standards web design and yet it is also a pain in the neck because every computer renders CSS just a little differently, browsers are a completely different topic, as the W3C has been able to convince most browsers that standards matter and then Microsoft gives them the finger and does what they want with Internet Explorer.

From an appearance point of view.
Some of your sub menu writing is a little too small (ie the fees section)
Probably go for a larger size - use a plain font.
You might want to consider adding pictures of the team and yourself to add some personality to the site and inspire trust.
I have added some video footage to my own site.www.marksmusicaustralia.com
(Go to the services page to see what I have been working with - I'm currently in the process of a complete redesign and will feature footage of me doing what I do).
Perhaps a little more color in the header.
In essence to convey on the screen some of the Australian lifestyle and the advantage of being in Australia to help consolidate in your visitors a desire to move to our country.
Do you have any links to other Australian sites?
Just some suggestions.
Kind regards.
Mark.

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"When it rains on your parade - dance in the puddles!"

Thanks for those comments.. it led me to prioritize those to improve the site much better.

Do you that think adding a video clip on my site would help? Like the one discussing about visas, the process and the like?

What do you think?

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Australia Visa

That's an excellent idea.
You could use it to introduce staff and video an example of a customer using your service so viewers can see how easy it is and the process involved.
You could also record a couple of customer testimonies - this would be very powerful.
The ideas are only limited by your imagination.

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"When it rains on your parade - dance in the puddles!"

Yeah.. i'm still planning those things as of now.
And hoping to come up with a successful plan to help increase my site rankings and as well its visitors.
What do you think?

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Australia Visa

I think you can't beat good content.
You have a good selection of keywords in your meta tags.
I personally would be also looking at creating sites that are related to your product or service, posting some articles etc.
Drop by my blog and read a few of the articles there too for some ideas on how to generate traffic and eventually customers.
One thing I do know is it does all take time to build up your position.
I personally am going to take a more creative approach with my sites in the near future (adding video) and creating quality articles to generate more traffic.
You could do the same, maybe write some material about Australia, how to get around etc.
Would be a good idea to see if you can swap links with some sites that advertise "working in Australia" jobs, backpacking jobs etc.

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"When it rains on your parade - dance in the puddles!"

Probably a great idea. I'm still working on its articles' page where you can find topics about different visas.

If you were asked, what article content would you prefer to put on your site?

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Australia Visa

I would personally consider material that is complimentary to my site.
ie for your site being visas, I'm thinking maybe something to do with booking travel tickets.
Also laws regarding quarrantine?
All the stuff you might associate with travelling to Australia.
(You could also take advantage of some affiliate programmes here).
For my site I have included a relaxation article - being my music is relaxing and this is an niche area (but not the only one) for me.
I'm thinking about more material related to Australia in the future (ie the bush, nature etc).
Still have a lot of work to do myself.

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"When it rains on your parade - dance in the puddles!"

That would be great... but there's still a lot of work to be done.

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Australia Visa

Just updated the site's content. You may take a look at it now - Australian Immigration

More comments and suggestions are welcomed.

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Australia Visa