Wanted: Website Review Responsive Alternative Advertising Site

[roydovaston]

Having been a member of this forum and reading & contributing mainly to the SEO section of Acorns it became apparent that relying on Google is becoming a dangerous game! We've been considering alternative advertising methods for some time and earlier in the year launched a small business selling advertising space on large bicycle trailers that we use in high streets and high footfall areas. Our USP's are being cheaper than the rest of our competition + the fact our bike advertising trailers WOW passers by and are obviously high impact!

I'd appreciate if I could get some feedback on our web site www.activeads.co.uk

Thanks
Roy

 

[EdwinEdwin is verified member.]

This isn't specifically aimed at your site, but I don't get all this "responsive design" stuff when it's all on a single page - seems to mess up logical site structuring.

In the "old days" you for example click on "About" and get an "About us" page - which you can then PRINT if you want to. Ditto for any other page/section. Each page could be "themed" and you had at least a half chance of ranking on Google for keywords related to that theme.

Now everything is slopped together onto a single page, which means good luck printing out just the bits you're interested in and getting it to look right, and good luck getting Google to take an interest in what it will see as a single giga-page on everything under the sun.

So isn't (single page) responsive design just a way to pander to tablet owners while inconveniencing regular users?

As such, your site is no better or worse than others with a similar sort of layout - just find it much less "usable" than a conventional web structure.

 

[EdwinEdwin is verified member.]

BTW, the style you're using (and the one I was referencing in my mini-rant, above) is called "parallax design" (it may also be responsive, but that's by-the-by) and can have significant negative SEO implications http://searchengineland.com/the-perils-of-parallax-design-for-seo-164919

 

[PaullasPaullas is verified member.]

How easy/hard is it to get permission from local councils to bike around the town centres or other venues.

 

[The Ferryman]

At the start of the page it has the top part of what is probably call us today and a phone number peeking over the top of a white wall with black and blue circles on it.
It would be better if the wall was lower, then people would be able to see the phone number.
Regards
Bruce

 

[Retired_Member38]

How many people do you realistically think are going to want to print his site out? People aren't even likely to print off maps, timetables, directions or anything else that would have been printed years ago - they'll just access it again on their phone/tablet. I don't think making your site harder to print is a concern at all.

I can't see any real issue seo wise either - he has 4 pages, all tightly aligned around the same topic. Anything he wants his site to rank for, it would be the homepage that ranked. So here, having this extra content on the homepage may actually help rather than hinder. I think it would only become an issue if he wanted to rank for 'Manchester advertising', 'essex advertising' etc and needed internal pages for each (to make use of page titles, unique link building and so on).

On some widths you are making your phone number illegible:

I'm not a fan of that type of design... I think its just gimmicky and using the feature for the sake of it rather than because you need it or it makes any sense. But not displaying your phone number properly, and not listing prices is probably something that will cost you enquiries.

 

[roydovaston]

Thanks for input. I'm not fussed about the printing aspect as this to me seems irrelevant.

Thanks for pointing out the phone line being cut off, I'd better try & fix that!

The reason we went for a 1-page site is because we wanted something a bit different, from the competition and just because we wanted to take a modern approach.

Obtaining permits varies by town/city. Riding our trailers about is actually a big no no, it's more where we place them and the flexibility of being able to move them at an instant. Good for placing outside banks in morning, coffee shops and eateries at lunch etc.

 

[Retired_Member38]

Is it worth including pricing info?

For me personally I can't be bothered having to inquire on price for something that doesn't need customising. It also leaves you open to being Wonder Landered and ripped off with a gouging attempt to price at what they think you'll pay,rather than when the product was actually worth.

I assume you have a flat rate to print the ad, then a daily rate to run the ads... Is there any reason not to feature this on the site?

 

[roydovaston]

We chose not to include pricing as we offer different packages for weekday, weekend, different towns/cities are also different rates as well as negotiable things like leafleting and brand clothing etc. we also have multiple adtrailers which some advertisers like to include.

The only price which is certain is printing cost. We design the ad if necessary but this also costs more or less dependant on brief.

We just felt there were too many variables to make it flat rate. I guess we could do a 'price from' £99 but then once we start adding up other costs we don't want to alienate an enquirer.

 

[fastworld]

I personally like the modern look, however if your going to have a single scrollable long home page i think you also need to add more pages/content elsewhere. Also seams a bit much to use wordpress for a single page site. I would have just used the bootstrap framework the themes built on.
Good luck with the site/business

 

[websaway]

You can grow the business.
see MobileAds. net

 

[bermuda]

Your website has a modern, attractive design but it might seem a bit on the complicated side to access and navigate for the average web users, you know, not everyone is internet savvy to find their way around feature-rich sites. Many time, choosing the basic type of e-store would be a better approach. Try putting some plain, indexable content on your website, many of your customers could find you naturally while surfing the net and your contents will help them find your offers faster.

 

[paymatters]

On the dragons den they always used to get excited about advertising opportunities ie the vending machines with adverts down the sides In tube stations. They were more interested in advertising space than the vending idea so must be value in the idea.