Please Review these sites for me!!

[bzforum]

Hi ,

I would like valuable feedback on these 2 sites...

I am posting both the sites here as Both have a Similar Theme and Design Structure..Layout and Looks...I want the vistors to know that they are with the same company on both the sites...I have few more sites launching with the same looks before i launch them i need to get some reviews on what should i consider changing as i want all the sites to look similar.

Site 1 : Rental Lease Agreement
Site 2 : Power Of Attorney

Suggestions and Feedback I need :

1) These sites has been on this structure for a long time...and users are very happy with finding what they want easily...so i do not want to change the layout very much and make it look different.
2) I want it to look simple and point to point site...I do not want much graphics...

What else do you suggest?

[weegillis]

Wow! Major throwback to FrontPage 4 days. For the sparseness of the page, there is no lack of code bloat in the markup. But then, this in not a review is it? I think the simplicity of the page could be translated into HTML5 markup and made to appear a little more modern. The markup would be cut by four fifths. These pages are destined to be bounced a lot, imho.

[bzforum]

Thanks for the HTML5 Suggestion would seriously be working on it

Wow! Major throwback to FrontPage 4 days.

I did not understand this statement

[weegillis]

You obviously didn't read the Stickie at the top of the Site Review index - These pages have not been validated, and contain several errors, mostly due to mismatch of DOCTYPE and the markup presented.

Back in the day of FrontPage 4 it was common to see sites with 200 words on the page and 25 KB of markup in the page source. The Rental Agreement page has 18.7 KB of markup, and only 1.36 KB of page text, in total. That's about a 13 to 1 markup to text ratio. Very similar to old FrontPage generated pages.

Not that this is generated with FP, as it states HTML Tidy in the head. I find it hard to believe that HTML Tidy would not have alerted to the HTML 4 markup, and XHTML 1.0 DOCTYPE, or perhaps the member didn't bother to examine the validation errors it would have thrown up.

I'm sticking with my high bounce rate assessment, at this time.

[bzforum]

Oh ... I read them ...but did not validate the Markup as i knew there would be Validation Errors !! as the site had been designed using a poor WYSIWYG editor...but i would be changing it this time and building it using Expression Web from Microsoft so most probably it would improve

[weegillis]

If you are sticking to a simple layout why use an editor, at all? Just mark it up in a text editor using HTML5. It's not a new language, only an extension of HTML, so there's nothing much to learn, except maybe keeping things simple, to which HTML5 is well suited.

[bzforum]

If you are sticking to a simple layout why use an editor, at all? Just mark it up in a text editor using HTML5.

Wouldn't it be time consuming?Not to use an Editor?? It sometimes comes very handy to jusy Press Ctrl + B to bold a text instead of adding the Markup manually !!

[Shadders]

The state map images could do with some attention. Some of them sent me dizzy. Probably better off using a solid colour.

[silentg]

1. Nice domains.
2. There's too much blue on your pages. My eyes are all over the place.

You could try developing the same site in Wordpress or Drupal. Easier to manage in the long run.

[weegillis]

Wouldn't it be time consuming?Not to use an Editor?? It sometimes comes very handy to jusy Press Ctrl + B to bold a text instead of adding the Markup manually !!

Time consuming? Yes and no. How hard is it to type "<strong></strong>"? A basic page does not take that long to mark up. Layout the standard elements, create the main containers and populate them with content. Run it through the validator to make sure all your main pieces are in place and correct (syntax) and go to the next phase: styling. Even your buttons can be done with CSS.

If this scares you, then I guess you're left with using a WYSIWYG editor or hiring a web person to create the template for you, and go from there.