
Ask HN: What do you think about my agency's new website and how can I improve it - kiraken
We had to retire our old website, and move to something more modern and simplistic. However i feel that i spent a lot of time over thinking this project, so i wanted to show it to you guys at its current form to get your opinion on whether or not its ready to be used, and if there are any issues that i need to take a look at!<p>This is the link: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.eliteware.co&#x2F;testing" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.eliteware.co&#x2F;testing</a>
======
matthberg
With js allowed there's a page which displays that looks browser window sized,
yet if you scroll down slightly there's "";}}?>" at the bottom of the page. I
was expecting more content below, so was confused a little. Also I mistook
your logo on the left red column as the menu icon, and took a little time to
find the actual burger menu at top right(ish). I love the font, colors, and
floaty dots to far right though!

~~~
kiraken
Thanks for the feedback! And i fixed the small text on the bottom. I'll
definitely keep in mind making the menu icon bigger, and maybe the logo would
also open the menu!

------
clusmore
When I noticed that you linked to a subdirectory, I immediately went to the
root and noticed you're serving a raw directory listing at
[https://www.eliteware.co](https://www.eliteware.co) . I don't expect I'll be
the only person to check this.

~~~
kiraken
Thanks for that! Completely skipped my mind

------
Freeboots
Not ready. Have you looked at it on mobile? It barely functions, not just slow
but not mobile responsive.

"; } } ?> At the bottom of home page.

Text is often covered by images, particularly on the projects page.

I also question some design decisions:

Why a wall of text popup for About instead of a page?

Why is the Close button sometimes on the top-left, sometimes top-middle, but
never top-right where everyone expects it to be?

Because of the visiual similarity to a hamburger menu, it took me long time to
realise your logo was a logo and not a menu icon. Edit: I see a couple other
comments also made this mistake.

Why is there a non-scrolling bar telling me to scroll? Edit: I figured it out,
it's scroll buttons. Why? Is this an accessibility thing?

Anyway I don't mean to be an ass, but you badly need to sort out the mobile
experience. It's not encouraging that a web agency has failed to do so on
their own website.

~~~
kiraken
Thank you for taking the time to go over the website! And i forgot to mention
this in the OP, but the mobile version is not uploaded yet. But i'll keep
everything else you mentioned in mind

~~~
Freeboots
Ohh haha ok

------
markbernard
Do not break the user expectations. When I use the scroll wheel on my mouse
the page screws up. As soon as I get close to the bottom it automatically
flips back to the top. You may want the user to use your scroll buttons but
most people won't because scrolling has been around from the beginning and
people already do it a certain way. Expecting them to change for your site
will make them leave. You can add your own little nuances like you have but
always make sure it meshes with the current way of doing things.

------
Aeolun
You've got a lovely `"; } } ?> ` right at the bottom of you page ;) I mostly
noticed it because somehow the page was scrolling when it shouldn't be.

~~~
kiraken
Thanks for that! Fixed!

------
kjullien
I'll give UX feedback: Don't use a burger menu, especially for a desktop
version where you only have 4-5 pages that could easily fit horizontally.
Disable the link of your logo on the homepage as it is redundant and can lead
to confusion. The subtitle font is so thin I cannot read it. (I have bad eyes
and a reading problem) You don't keep any navigation consistency between your
pages. "About" simply opens an overlay while "Projects" is a separate page.
You serve mixed content (my browser warned me I haven't checked what the
content is)

And lastly, if your point is to make people discover who and what you are,
this design is pretty useless. A quick google search returns 20K results for
"we Create digital experiences". I, for example, haven't got a clue about what
kind of work you do.

------
haser_au
\- Load times for the case studies are loooong.

\- Took a bit of getting used to the scroll thing. Didn't know if I was at the
top/bottom, so just had to guess

\- Text is small. Can't zoom/enlarge text on
[https://www.eliteware.co/testing/projects.html](https://www.eliteware.co/testing/projects.html)

\- You have some weird characters at the bottom of the page ("; } } ?>).

\- Does the left menu work? I can't get it to.

Overall, seems like a professionally designed site, but you need to be clear
on who you are trying to appeal to. Are you showing what you guys can do, or
are you trying to give them information about your services/past clients? It
seems like you're trying to do both, and expecting the user to click through
quite a few times.

I'd love to see it all on one page, but that's just me.

~~~
kiraken
Thanks a lot for taking the time to go over the website!

-I agree about the loading time, working on a fix right now -I'll make sure i change the font size -Fixed the weird characters thingy -What left menu? Didn't get this point, there's a menu on the top right

------
acconrad
Fellow consultant here. These are the top 3 things you should fix:

1\. The site loads very slowly. This is largely static content, it should not
take this long to load. Adding in all of the whiz-bang animations and
transitions detracts from your overall message.

2\. It's not very accessible. Small fonts, poor contrast, it's very difficult
to read. If you have a 50-year old CEO with money to burn, do you really want
him/her to pass on your firm because they can't read your case studies?

3\. It's a bit confusing. The logo kind of looks like a hamburger menu. The
hamburger menu dropdown is really in your face, and you take over scrolling
when going through the list of projects. So many things that make me cringe,
please don't take over my scrolling! Make the information intuitive and easy
to access.

------
MrLeap
Hijacking the scrollbar is a big pet peeve of mine. Designers keep trying to
bring this fad back. I wish they'd not. I get the allure, but I've never seen
it be a value add. Browsers handle that for you, don't get in its way!

------
pwg
With no javascript allowed, I get a large red dot in the center of my browser
window.

If I turn off stylesheets, I can see that there was html text delivered to my
browser, so that text should have appeared, instead of just a single red spot.

------
jonah
Pretty broken on mobile. (Android 7.1.1, Chrome)

Menu animation is too slow on mobile.

~~~
kiraken
Thanks for going over the site bud. The mobile version is not uploaded yet!

------
alphabettsy
Why am I stuck looking at a red ring type animation on iOS? Very fast
connection on very fast hardware.

------
moltar
Doesn’t work on iPhone SE. Get horizontal scrolling and layout is all out of
whack.

------
rambojazz
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_least_astonishmen...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_least_astonishment)

