# Critique My Site, Please



## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

Hi guys, I'm on the edge of completing my website. Since last time, I've added the store and the blog, and made some notable changes. I would really appreciate if you guys could look through my site thoroughly and tell me what you think of it.

Mochi Mania

Changes to be made:
- new navigation
- Facebook pile plugin (apparently I need more followers for their profile pictures to show)
- store policies need to be added
- Footer is missing information

Thanks!


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## ErisedDesigns (Apr 18, 2013)

My first thought: It's really colorful.

That isn't a bad thing, though. Considering that your market is pretty much going to be children, at least to start off with, bright is good. There is enough going on on the front page that it grabs the attention, but not so much that it's overwhelming.

On the shop pages, the layout is nice. However, when you change the colors the new images are loading extremely slow. That may be a server issue that will resolve once you take the site off of a test server, or it may be a code issue. The mockups are decent, but not fantastic. Some of the art looks like it's been lain on top of the rest of the image with no attempt to make it appear to be printed on the shirt. Probably not noticeable to anyone that hasn't been staring at mockups for a while.

The Characters page is pretty cool. I could probably spend 20 minutes just browsing through that section. The one nitpicky little thing I see is that when you click on the letters the menu jumps left and right on some pages. Not something that would make me leave the site, but it is a tiny annoyance.

The Downloads section is a great idea, taking into consideration what you've shared about your goal. Just a thought, but you may want to include some line art of the characters that parents can print for their kids to color in. As the father of 2 young girls, I can tell you with some certainty that a shirt with one of their favorite coloring book characters is a tough item to say no to.

That's all I've got right now. It's looking pretty good, all in all.


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

ErisedDesigns said:


> My first thought: It's really colorful.
> 
> That isn't a bad thing, though. Considering that your market is pretty much going to be children, at least to start off with, bright is good. There is enough going on on the front page that it grabs the attention, but not so much that it's overwhelming.
> 
> ...


I guess it _is_ pretty colorful, huh? Well, like you said, it's not a necessarily a bad thing. I think there's enough white (from the background and the main body) to balance it out.

The images loading slowly I hope is due to the server. It could also be because the web designer has it so that the full-size images load (but the smaller preview size is displayed.) I was really hoping this wouldn't be an issue for most people because of (hopefully) fast internet connections. It would be hard to resize all those images; there's tons.

Some of the mockups look better than others. The shirts in the photos are already pretty smooth and not very textured so there's not really much texture for the designs to "grab onto." Still, I can assure you that they _are_ blended and not just pasted there.

On the characters pages the menu jumps sometimes? Hmm, I've never had that happen to me before but I checked it right now and you're right. I'll let my designer know.

Making coloring pages is a great idea! I did actually think about making some but I guess I was hesitant because some people might use them to copy my designs. But I guess no risk no reward.

Thanks for the feedback Jim, I really appreciate it.  You've been very helpful. Oh, and thanks for liking my page; now the Facebook plugin works


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## ErisedDesigns (Apr 18, 2013)

Artie1 said:


> I guess it _is_ pretty colorful, huh? Well, like you said, it's not a necessarily a bad thing. I think there's enough white (from the background and the main body) to balance it out.


There's plenty of balance. Like I said, I think it's a great design for a site focused toward younglings.



Artie1 said:


> The images loading slowly I hope is due to the server. It could also be because the web designer has it so that the full-size images load (but the smaller preview size is displayed.) I was really hoping this wouldn't be an issue for most people because of (hopefully) fast internet connections. It would be hard to resize all those images; there's tons.


If they're all the same size, you can batch resize the whole lot of them with Photoshop. Not sure if GIMP has the same function, but I would imagine it does. Then again, could be server thing. If they need to be resized by hand, I'd take a gamble and wait until the site goes live before I jumped the gun. Just make sure it's fixed quick if it does turn out to be an image size problem.



Artie1 said:


> Some of the mockups look better than others. The shirts in the photos are already pretty smooth and not very textured so there's not really much texture for the designs to "grab onto." Still, I can assure you that they _are_ blended and not just pasted there.


Never had a doubt 

Like I said, I might not have even noticed it if I hadn't spent the morning doing mockups of my own.



Artie1 said:


> On the characters pages the menu jumps sometimes? Hmm, I've never had that happen to me before but I checked it right now and you're right. I'll let my designer know.
> 
> Making coloring pages is a great idea! I did actually think about making some but I guess I was hesitant because some people might use them to copy my designs. But I guess no risk no reward.


Design theft is always a concern, but like you said, no risk no reward. Put your copyright on the printed pages and hope that people are honest, I guess. 



Artie1 said:


> Thanks for the feedback Jim, I really appreciate it.  You've been very helpful. Oh, and thanks for liking my page; now the Facebook plugin works


No worries, I like looking at other people's designs. I do custom Wordpress themes, and if I don't look at other sites once in a while I get stuck in a rut and the themes all start looking alike. Plus, it's a good way to refresh my mind when I've been doing monotonous work.

Glad to hear the plugin is working.


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## supergooch (Mar 12, 2013)

The only thing that I'm not a big fan of is mocked up shirts. It makes me wonder if this place really has these shirts or is just a rip off. That or it makes me wonder what the printed piece actually looks like. That is a big turn off for me.

You don't necessarily have to print each shirt and do an entire photoshoot, but your designer could definitely make them look more realistic.


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

ErisedDesigns said:


> There's plenty of balance. Like I said, I think it's a great design for a site focused toward younglings.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Really, you can do that? I'll have to learn then. I hope it's not too difficult.

With the coloring pages, I'm thinking about making them PDF files. If I'm not mistaken, they can be printed but not copied. Although someone could just use print screen. Oh well, hopefully a PDF will deter some wrongdoing.


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

supergooch said:


> The only thing that I'm not a big fan of is mocked up shirts. It makes me wonder if this place really has these shirts or is just a rip off. That or it makes me wonder what the printed piece actually looks like. That is a big turn off for me.
> 
> You don't necessarily have to print each shirt and do an entire photoshoot, but your designer could definitely make them look more realistic.


Well, I tried playing around with the images in Photoshop but there was really nothing I could figure out that made any difference. So as of right now these are the best I have. Do you know any way to make them look more realistic? Maybe there's a good tutorial or something somewhere...


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## supergooch (Mar 12, 2013)

Artie1 said:


> Well, I tried playing around with the images in Photoshop but there was really nothing I could figure out that made any difference. So as of right now these are the best I have. Do you know any way to make them look more realistic? Maybe there's a good tutorial or something somewhere...


It just takes practice/experience. There will be slightly different treatments depending on the type of image and color of shirt.

Maybe for your mockups, use illustrative tshirt images instead of photographic. That way it's expected that they don't look photo-realistic?


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## tinysartshop (Jul 22, 2012)

Looks good, yes the load time for the store is very slow. Agree that the shirt mock ups need to be a little more lifelike.
The company branding and graphics look very professional.


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

supergooch said:


> It just takes practice/experience. There will be slightly different treatments depending on the type of image and color of shirt.
> 
> Maybe for your mockups, use illustrative tshirt images instead of photographic. That way it's expected that they don't look photo-realistic?


ErisedDesigns (Jim) suggested I try these other realistic templates. Here's how they came out:
[media]http://s4.postimg.org/gwy9wcsm5/newtemplate1.jpg[/media]
[media]http://s22.postimg.org/j1roe7981/newtemplate2.jpg[/media]

I think they look much better. What do you think?


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

tinysartshop said:


> Looks good, yes the load time for the store is very slow. Agree that the shirt mock ups need to be a little more lifelike.
> The company branding and graphics look very professional.


I sent my designer a message about the load time so hopefully that will be resolved.

ErisedDesigns (Jim) suggested I try these other realistic templates. Here's how they came out:
[media]http://s4.postimg.org/gwy9wcsm5/newtemplate1.jpg[/media] [media]http://s22.postimg.org/j1roe7981/newtemplate2.jpg[/media]I think they look much better. What do you think?

Thanks! I always try to make the branding and graphics look their best. 

Thanks for the feedback Tiny!


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## tinysartshop (Jul 22, 2012)

Did you run off and print those!!!
Fooled me


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## supergooch (Mar 12, 2013)

Those look great, man! You'll be dialed in and selling in no time!


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

Thanks guys


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## LiteralT (Apr 21, 2013)

Really like the product pages! I think I'll be changing mine!

Nice site overall. I didn't get to play around so much but very eye catching!


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

LiteralT said:


> Really like the product pages! I think I'll be changing mine!
> 
> Nice site overall. I didn't get to play around so much but very eye catching!


Thank you


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## NinjaTactics (Mar 6, 2011)

Some things I would recommend:
1) Get a more recognizable domain name, like the name of your company (MochiaMania.com or something similar).
2) Maybe think about using whatever font is in mochimania logo for things like the menu at the top and other stuff, so you have a more unified look. Right now I am seeing 5-6 different fonts just on the front page between logo, menus, 'Free Charm' graphic, 'We are now open'/'Learn More About Us' graphic, 'Express Yourself' graphic, etc. 
3) Eventually start using real models for shirts once you get rolling so every product image looks real and different. 
4) I'd ditch the large Twitter and Facebook boxes at the bottom. You already have nice social networking icons/links in top right corner, and big things at the bottom distract from your brand more than they add.

Color scheme and background look very good, but like I said, I would focus first and foremost on the first two things above. Good luck with the venture.


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

NinjaTactics said:


> Some things I would recommend:
> 1) Get a more recognizable domain name, like the name of your company (MochiaMania.com or something similar).
> 2) Maybe think about using whatever font is in mochimania logo for things like the menu at the top and other stuff, so you have a more unified look. Right now I am seeing 5-6 different fonts just on the front page between logo, menus, 'Free Charm' graphic, 'We are now open'/'Learn More About Us' graphic, 'Express Yourself' graphic, etc.
> 3) Eventually start using real models for shirts once you get rolling so every product image looks real and different.
> ...


Hi Jaco, thanks for the feedback.

Don't worry, I already have my domain, that's just my web designer's domain that's being used while the website is built.

Hmm, I tried to keep only 2 main fonts. The one for the logo of course and the one for the site body text. I use lots of different fonts for the graphics simply to make it look nice. Sure, it's not cohesive with the logo and body text but since they're graphics I figured they were fair game. I wouldn't be too worried about it, all the sites in my niche do the same thing (not that I was just doing it just to fit in) and it seems to work for them. Besides, I can't imagine how boring it would be to be restricted to only 2 fonts.

That said, I'm in the process of designing a new navigation menu for the site and your suggestion of using the same font as the logo isn't too bad. I'll definitely try it.

I do hope to use real models in the future. It's just not really an option when you're just starting out and you have 93 designs in 6-11 colors and 3 different sizes.

I guess the initial reason for adding the Twitter and Facebook boxes was to look more like my competitors, hoping it would make the site look more established and professional (I guess I did want to fit in with the cool kids on this one, haha). Now, however, I find them useful.

My feeling (and hope) is that the Twitter box serves to provide the latest news without my visitors having to click the Twitter link and leave the site. For example, if I was running a promotion and I advertised it through social media and my blog, anyone who visits the site will immediately see that on the front page. Without the Twitter box, the visitor would have to click to go to my blog or Twitter, _if_ they decide to do so.

The Facebook box lets people 'like' the page and hopefully gives me some credibility when visitors see the faces of people who 'like' me.


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## Artie1 (Aug 23, 2012)

Ok guys, I tried designing a new navigation menu for the site. I don't know if it's something that can actually function but I hope it looks alright. Let me know what you think.

[media]http://s9.postimg.org/hij793rdr/newnavimenu.jpg[/media]


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## trenDsigns (Aug 6, 2012)

Looks to me like a complete copy of Tokidoki.it That being said, you have neat characters, a colorful site (which I really enjoyed) and if you use can match tokidoki's success u are going to be just fine! The one thing I noticed was that when I went to the ABOUT section I had to stay hovered perfectly and scroll to the left perfectly in order to be able to click the two dropdown menus because they appeared all the way on the left side. A minor nuisance but you do want people to get on your ABOUT page easier! Good luck!


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