WordPress.org

1. metamatic_
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   Hello. I'm developing my first wordpress based website, and i'd like to receive some feedback and advice from experienced users/developers, since it's the first time i deal with it.
   The site is intended to:

   - Be a website for a band: the wp posts are used as news/announcements about the band activity, plus have other pages for general info.
   - Have a very minimal and clean design.

   Keep in mind that it's the first time i try to realize a website (i'm a C/C++ developer), so you'll get into lot of naive-ness

   You can view it here
   any advice is greatly appreciated.
   thanks, regards

2. roostertail
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   Well, the site is indeed minimal. I didn't think the page loaded properly because it is nearly blank. I'm using Firefox 4.0 with AdBlock Plus which I even disabled thinking it was blocking some content. That wasn't it, just not much there.

   Unless you reconize the name of the band, no one will know what the site is about. Will there be a header image or an opening description?

   Good luck with it,
   Nick

3. metamatic_
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   Yes i was thinking about putting at least an header image.
   I think if anyone gets to the site, he'd already know it's a band.
   The description is in the "about" section.
   Besides the header image, how would you improve the design, still keeping it minimal?

4. porterwebdesigns
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   I've noticed a lot of new sites sticking with the subdirectory of 'wp' or 'wordpress' and not making their sites the root.

   Follow this: http://codex.wordpress.org/Giving_WordPress_Its_Own_Directory

5. metamatic_
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   yes it's still "hidden". I'll link it to the root when it's complete.
   Thanks for your comment!

6. Roy
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   I like the minimalistic layout a lot. It's perfect the way it is in my eyes. The only thing I want to say about something is that you should watch out with image alignment, some are centered, some are aligned left which looks a bit strange when you look at the category 'live' for example. For the rest: good job!

7. metamatic_
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   Thanks Roy
   Yes, i'll try to keep all the images aligned the same way

8. roostertail
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   OK, @metamatic I'm at a complete loss for what the point of your site is. Please help me understand...

   I get minimalistic, but that site looks totally unfinished and quite incomplete. The home page gives no indication of what the site is. Any casual visitor would most likely leave before they even had an idea of what the site is.

   If the site is to promote the band it won't attract much in the way of visits from anyone other than the few people that already know the band, thus limiting the exposure for potential new fans. I've been to a few fan sites and band sites...they are typically loaded with content, pictures, sound clips, videos, they have discussion forums, blogs, stores, etc.

   Nick

9. metamatic_
   Member
   Posted 1 year ago #

   Thanks for your comment Nick.
   Of course the content is poor at this stage and will certainly be increased. However as i stated the aim of this site is to give just brief info about the band (in the sections), and use the blog (home page) as a blog.. providing updates about the band activities.
   There's a player at the bottom of the page with two tracks loaded. I used the SCM player, as it's the only one i've found that doesn't reload when you navigate through pages.
   Anyway as you're saying that's a potentially poor design for the reasons you told, i'll try to consider modifying it and make the site "statement" more clear. Thanks again

10. Roy
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    Met, it is not because one person doesn't like the design that you'd have to change it. Personally, when I look at the website I see a name and I see "live", "new ep" and links to Last.fm and Myspace, so we're talking about a band, that's clear within a second. I love the minimalistic design. It would be nice that within one click I could see what kind of band Bialogard is, but like you say, there's a player. In my eyes, the site is close to perfect. Perhaps a 'page' or 'sticky' with some sort of 'about' could be an idea.

    Besides, what Nick seems to imply is that people who accidentally stumble upon the website won't know what it is about, but when somebody knows a band and 'google' it, that's in this case a more likely way to find it I think. In any case, if I were you, I'd rather know what my fans think of the website. Especially when it's a matter of taste, asking techies may not be the best platform to ask about it :-) (Nono, I'm not saying that techies have bad taste, but a forum like this is more functional for technical or SEO questions :-) )

11. metamatic_
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    Thanks Roy. I love the minimalistic design too, and would keep the site as it is. I was just gathering some feedback about user experiences and take note for design ideas.
    I also think it's quite unlikely that someone would see the site if he doesn't know the band already.
    There's already an "about" page, maybe a sort of banner/graphic that explicit that we're talking about a band could be in order..have to think about it.
    Also i was thinking about an opaque to transparent sort of textuerd background, that could be mixed with the solid gray background...
    thank you very much for your ideas guys!

12. GeneticallyDesigned
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    I agree you need a header. Also, your background image is taking forever for me to load properly--you may want to stick with just a solid color.

13. mikey1
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    Hi Metamatic, I like the site a lot. I admit I was a bit dubious to start with, but I think your minimalist approach works well. Took me a while to find the navigate button. but it contains all you need really. I was glad to see the last.fm link facebook and myspace, and you could certainly use twitter to promote too, having worked with entertainers and musicians on sites, there's enormous potential to promote yourself and the band with your site. You Tube of course is valuable in reaching an international audience. I like the SCM music player, even though its hard to find the playlist, the images are nice and overall I think you're on the right road. In fact if this is your first wordpress site I think its excellent.
    Well done! Good Luck. Mike.
    Hope the new EP goes well ;

14. Betty Donelly
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    Hello!

    Just took a look at your band website.

    Although minimalistic is good .. you are leaving a lot of free space on the home page totally unused .. All your stuff is situated at the top of the page ..

    Just to give you an idea, and because it's a band website .. i want to offer you to have a look at my band blog as well as my record label blog and another related educational music blog i have going on ..

    I have been working very hard on the two other blogs lately (and the band blog was actually imported from an old Blogger blog) ..

    You will find they are feature rich and drive the blog audiences to be interactive, all via the smart use and the combination of several plugins ..

    I believe this website of yours truly could benefit from a major overhaul!

    So please have a look and 'steal' away some of my ideas!

    My Band blog: http://bettydonelly.pro/blog

    My record label blog: http://witchyrecords.pro/blog

    And this one is very popular it's been LIVE only since November 2010 and i have some 650 approved comments on there, although htey don't actually belong to my main music oriented target audience, the 'one musician band':

    http://simplemusicworld.com/blog

15. nmfrazer
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    I really like the look of your site. The background did not take very long to load for me. I found the only distractor to be the long stretch of black to the bottom of the home page. The vertical navigation was a nice change. Oh, I think it looks great without a header.

16. agothtale
    Member
    Posted 1 year ago #

    Took a look at your site, and I think you did it from a coder point of view, and not from a "what does the band needs" point of view.
    I've worked with a lot of bands on tour, and they usually fail at selling themselves to the world, they tend to believe that their music and talent will be enough.
    But it's not. Your site sounds like "We don't really want to be online, we don't really care if you see this or not, we have a website coz we've been told we had to have one".
    It doesn't really feel user-friendly. It doesn't feel like a place to warm fan's hearts. You've got nowhere to click, nearly nothing to read, you just feel like an intruder and you'd better get away from that place soon.. Tho I'm sure you've spent a lot of time on it, it might work on a wordpress theme point of view, but it doesn't work on a "promoting band website" point of view.
    I don't want to sound rude, I just want to help, please don't take it wrong.
    More technically :
    background image is too dark. try lighten it a bit so we can see what's written, or change the police color. For now it's too dark, and it's really difficult to read, and most people will just go away if they can't read.
    The long stretch at the bottom, what's the use ?
    Try to add categories, try to add stuff to click on.
    Like... Biography of the band, photos, interviews, tour dates, music, videos links...
    It's ok to have a few blog entries, but it's not enought.
    You can add the above suggestions as pages, so it doesn't mess with the blog entries.

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