Drive-By-Shooting Sundays: Creative Texture Tools

Harry looked around the studio. “James? What month is it?”

“October. Why?”

The yellow and purple, the flowers and spring… “Could’ve sworn it was Easter.” He moved around the benches, picking up some tools. “Is this a pottery studio?”

James stood observing the sign that hung above the shop. “Should be.” At least this site held a mood, a feeling, some meaning, unlike last week’s hit, one that was devoid of emotional association.

And yet…

Today’s hit is for All Things Metal Clay, the site of Elaine Luther, artist, writer and specialty tool manufacturer extraordinaire. Here’s what the site looked like when we drove by:

“There’s a word missing.” James was still staring at the sign, rubbing his chin with that contemplative look.

“I know. It should be ‘All Things Metal and Clay’.” Harry’s mind had long filled in the mental blank and even thought it wasn’t in the title, that ‘and’ had stuck. Now he was just wondering why the word hadn’t been put in the shop’s name.

“I don’t understand what this place is,” he shook his head, attracting Jamie’s attention to a flier on a desk. “It says the owner is a metal smith and taught precious metal clay. What is that? I’ve never heard of that before.”

Hence begins the confusion for the average visitor landing on the site. Granted, metal clay is a term for the material you work with, but to those still unfamiliar with the product, it’s difficult to understand both the site name and its purpose. This may affect interest that new crafters may have in getting into this area.

Having the “and” in the title of the site won’t hurt what you offer. It is metal and it is clay, so why not avoid that mental blip of “error” and fill the blank in?

Adding a tagline to the banner is a must; “An Expert Guide” isn’t enough to tell anyone what this site is about, what a reader might find and why they should stay to read. A suggestion would be “Helping You Explore the World of Precious Metal Clay”, which clears up that it’s something new and that you are qualified to help others as an expert.

Another trick you could apply to not just cater to people “in the know” but to a wider audience would be to add a little descriptive text in the sidebar to tell visitors a little more, such as what metal clay is and what it’s used for. Just extra info, short and sweet.

“Do you really like those colors?” James had gone back to perusing the shop’s sign and interior décor. “Pretty damned-…”

“Easter,” Harry finished the sentence firmly. The banner was pretty enough, but almost too bright, too yellow, too… April flowers. Paired with the purple walls of the room, it’s too much.

We suggest toning things down, blending the colors in a bit better and removing that big yellow flower to replace it with images of what sort of work you do, some photos of your creations or tools of the trade. That would really show people what the site is about and give them inspiration.

“Check out this room.” James was peeking in a door that had the sign Creative Texture Tools, and he opened the door wider for Harry to see. The room looked almost the same, but… not quite. It was as if the copied décor didn’t quite match, didn’t quite fit.

This was something we discovered when we analyzed your navigation. We expected (as first-time visitors) that the page was part of this site, but it brought us to a new site for your tool sales, and the inconsistency of designs made us blink for a minute. We literally weren’t sure if we were in the right place.

Consistency counts for branding – a great deal. We suggest having something that is either exactly the same for both sites or something completely different so that people understand this is a new site and not just a screwed-up page design.

“Texture,” Harry was the one musing now, walking carefully around the shop again and perusing the walls. “This place lacks texture. See here?” He ran his hand over the flat matte purple paint. “A little bit of texture would enhance the design’s appeal and make this place look more expressive.”

James squinted. “What kind of texture?”

“Something related to the art, the craft…” Harry thought some more. “Maybe the texture of the metal clay itself, you know?”

“Mm, good idea.” But Jamie’s attention had been pulled back to navigating the room, always something he picked on. He could find his way easily. The shop was small and there weren’t many rooms. The signs on the doors were clear, too, nicely labeled.

Kudos on the simple navigation and big fonts. A title of “Links” never really seems clear to us, though, and using “Resources” instead may increase the professionalism and help people understand that these website links are useful.

The email subscription opt-in isn’t clear – subscribe by email to what? To a newsletter? To a feed? Change the text and clarify that a little more. The RSS button is nonexistent – or at least, looks that way. Those little rectangle buttons aren’t the best to indicate RSS options. Why not take one of those clay plate images and turn it into a unique RSS design? Put that right at the top of the sidebar. Speaking of sidebars…

“Now if this were my shop,” James stood in the middle of the room, examining furniture, “This,” he indicated a big table, “would be here.” He mimicked moving it to the complete opposite side of the room.

That’s the first change we’d make – switch your sidebar to the right-hand side. The reason is that Google crawls pages top to bottom, left to right. Putting your content on the left helps your search-engine capacity. Humans read left to right too (in most cases), and the brain places more importance on the left-hand content than the right.

Put the Categories in your main navigation too. Help people find what they want and need from your site. You could also organize those categories into groups, too, and split them up as such. The list is overlong and overwhelming.

Take out Similar Posts from the sidebar. Have that as a plugin for your posts so that similar post links appear after the person has read the post in question. That’s where it’ll be the most useful to the reader. In the sidebar, it’s not very good.

That would free up some sidebar real estate for other things. Your banner ads and affiliate programs would move up where people can see them right away. If you want visitors to click, don’t hide these things way down below the fold.

The All Things Metal Clay section is confusing. Is this a Recent Posts list? A Most Popular Posts list? A Top Ten posts lists? Change that title and let people know what this is all about.

Oh, and there’s your RSS button… not good. Too small, inappropriately place… nope.

The search is too low as well, though by freeing up all that clutter above, it’ll move up nicely. Remove the Meta widget – that doesn’t add value to the user and you probably don’t use it yourself.

“Are you done?” Harry quirked an eyebrow at James from where he leaned against the wall, arms crossed and waiting. “You forgot to mention that the social media icons looked pale and washed out compared to the bolded headline encouraging a click.”

“I was just getting to that,” James sniffed indignantly. “Anything else you’d like to add, Mr. Know-It-All?”

“Yeah, SmartyPants,” Harry pointed to a beautiful frame on the wall. About Us, the artist had titled the image, and the woman’s face looked serene and pleasant. “If the text were wrapped around that instead of being below with that big chunk of empty space,” he showed James the area to the right, “It would be more appealing. N’est pas? Same thing here,” he showed James the Contact leaflet.

“Oh, cool, look. It’s a treasure hunt!” Jamie’s face lit up as he saw the clue. “Don’t look here, go somewhere else… Oh, no, hang on,” he opened the folded page and saw the form to fill out. “Rats. I like treasure hunts.”

But site visitors don’t. That’s one huge issue we noted, too; while you have a Contact page, it appears as if you’re telling visitors to go look for your contact form somewhere else on your site. There are a bunch of social media icons cluttering up the page, a comment from a stranger that shouldn’t be there, and then there’s the contact form.

If we had been wanting to drop you a quick question or comment, you never would have received it – we would stop looking the moment the text says, “Go over there.” Amend that. Fix up the text, remove the clutter and bring that form right up above the fold where it’s easily seen.

“What are you doing?” Harry frowned at James, who was hefting a clay pot in a hand and weighing it.

“Wondering how far I can throw this.” James started tossing the pot back and forth while eyeing the picture on the wall. “You think she’s watching me?” He moved to the left and then to the right to see if it was one of those illusions where the painting’s eyes followed along.

“Maybe. Webcam,” Harry shrugged.

“You think?” Now James was wide-eyed. What if they were seen damaging the shop? What if the camera took pictures? What if the photos were leaked to the newspapers – or worse, the police?

He set the pottery down carefully on the bench. “Well, we were just looking,” he told Harry, a little loudly. After all, he did want the hidden microphone to pick up his voice. “Didn’t mean to touch anything…”

The bump he gave the bench with his knee, the one that wobbled the pot, the one that made the pot tip and fall… Well, it was an accident. Really, it was.

Want more? You got it. Check out the lineup of upcoming hit jobs:

October 19 – Ulla Hennig’s Weblog
October 26 – Simplistic Thoughts
November 2 – Positioning Strategy
November 9 – Sushi Day
November 16 – The D Spot Redux
November 23 – The Antisocial Social Worker
November 30 – Writer Dad
December 7 – Deaf Mom World
December 14 – Linkers Blog

Note: We’ve closed requests for free drive-bys on our blog for now and will start taking names again in December for January’s hits. Thanks everyone!

Want your blog shot down? Hit us up for a private drive-by via email. It’s only $30, and you’ll get your shoot-out within a week.

Come on. You know you wanna.