Website launched! Critiques welcome

ArtistErin

Hi SVS fam!!! I have been out of the loop, working a ton lately, getting caught up these next couple of days while I'm off. I love all the stuff everyone is posting! My hopes are to be able to cut down to part time this year, decided to just hone in on finishing my website, which has been super important to me.

I launched www.erinrichardsondesigns.com and contracted with an SEO strategist today to help me get found in search engines! Let me know if you have a minute to take a look and give me your feedback. Trying to stick with simple and minimal, noting consistency, ease of navigation and good design.

My next strategy: build a LinkedIn presence and start connecting with people in the industry. I know I am going in sorta green and blind but I figured better to learn as I go and be willing to make mistakes. Any advice?

Thanks you guys!!!!

willicreate

@ArtistErin Congrats on launching your web page. I have some thoughts on the UI.

You should reconsider the splash page-like header. At first, I thought the pages weren’t loading, but eventually realized the container underneath the header element was loading a new page.

Checking with my browser's mobile compatability mode, the site isn’t setup with responsive web design. This is an issue if a potential client were visiting your portfolio via mobile device.

Lastly, I think the hyperlinks could have been bigger.

All these things are easily addressable, should you chose to. It’s great you got a business plan in motion.

NessIllustration

@ArtistErin I agree - I actually really like your spot illustration but we can't see the pages loading. How about taking it out of the header and just putting it at the top of your home page? You can remove it on your about and contact pages so we can see the difference better.

This is a lovely website though, and very beautiful work!

kirsten-mcg

@ArtistErin beautiful work! For the most part I love the layout of your website. I agree with @willicreate and @NessIllustration about the header. It's a darling image, but it makes it a little hard to see the other images loading. One thing you could try, instead of getting rid of it, is to move your social media links down to the bottom of the page, and just have your email on the contact page. Those changes would move your portfolio pieces closer to the top of the page and might fix the header issue.

ArtistErin

@willicreate @NessIllustration @kirsten-mcg Thank you all!!! I am brand new to this and so thank you for all giving me this great feedback. Will update soon

kirsten-mcg

@ArtistErin also, there was a discussion on here a few weeks ago about text on images for portfolios. The general consensus was that you shouldn't include the text on your images in your portfolio because it can be distracting. I ended up taking text off of several of the images on my portfolio site!

NessIllustration

@kirsten-mcg My agent asked me to do the same a year ago! Remove ALL text on pages she said.

ArtistErin

@kirsten-mcg Oh really? Ok, thank you I have seen a few portolios doing this so I suppose I have much to learn! Yeah trying to polish as much as possible!

Ok made a few more changes, took off the splash component....

A work in progress!!!!!!!!

Mimi Simon

Just took a look at your website and your art is so cute! I have a few suggestions. Get rid of the home page, the home page should be your art not a blank useless page. Move the navigation menu up to right below where it says children's book illustrator and get rid of the header image of the boy and the dog. just put that image in your portfolio. if your going to have a header image, incorporate it into your name at the top. speaking of your name get rid of "designs" after your name and in the web address as well. To most people design means graphic design and will be kinda confusing. So make it just erinrichardson.com if you can. Change the font of your name as well or make the space between the letters smaller because it is currently hard to read. Also get rid of the contact page and put your contact information on the about page. On the about page put the image and the about text side by side and make the font smaller or put in a bigger image of yourself next to the text and get rid of the other image. Putting the images and text vertically makes it look like a blog. Lastly justify the tiling of your image gallery so the images take up a consistent width of the page instead of being randomly strewn about and get rid of the image descriptions because no one cares about them and so the images can show up bigger in the light box. Hope this helps!

Kim Rosenlof

@ArtistErin I think your artwork looks great! I also agree with the others that you don't need that big image on top, just put it in the portfolio. I also feel like you don't need a home page AND an art page. I would just make your art page the home page so people who come to your site see it first thing. I think you should make it as easy as possible for people to find your art since that is why they are going there. I do like that you are including an about and contact page.

Charlotte Glaze

Good job getting a website.

Some thoughts: use your art page as the homepage. There's no reason for that front page. There's no content and people want the content right away or they may leave.

Your contact page background made it hard to read. I would make it look the same at the other pages.

I think your top banner image should be taken off, and the menu be at the top. It was hard to find the link to click when scrolling back up to the top after seeing the art.

I like your portfolio page, the subtle effects are pleasant, and your images are lovely.

Best of luck!

ArtistErin

@Mimi-Simon Wow thank you so much Mimi. This was so helpful. I made the adjustments, published now. The only thing is I bought the domain erinrichardsondesigns.com through Wix and am committed as far as I know, yet I figured if I could adjust my title to just my name on my front page will that be enough? I know brand recognition is super important.

Trying to not look like a blog, so in Wix I chose a template that looks like a gallery, and it has a feature that allows you to toggle to mobile view to see how it would look on a smartphone... So I had to choose how to set up from that vantage point as well. I guess as I learn more I'll keep tweaking. Not kidding I feel the trial and error process with this has been super educational.

I love your website! Your work is so good. I love how organized and streamlined you are as well, and I can see how your advice has really shown me what I had envisioned to begin with, so thank you...

Mimi Simon

@ArtistErin glad I could help! I just checked it out and it looks so improved! websites can be super complex and annoying so just try and fix what you can and without sinking in a ridiculous amount of time trying to fix one tiny thing (I am guilty of this and my website still has a few problems that I've just kinda given up on since i'm not a programmer lol)

ArtistErin

@Kim-Rosenlof Thank you Kim!! Yes totally agree! It is now much better! My main intention is to keep things super simple and let the work speak. Hoping to maintain this approach, adding better pieces as I get better...

Definitely planning to begin a contact strategy. I know LinkedIn is a way to do this as well as reaching out to artists with similar styles and finding out their methods. I would like to approach some pros to pay them for their time for a critique too.

ArtistErin

@Charlotte-Glaze Thank you! All you guys pretty much echoed the exact same thing LOL I love it. This process has been super crazy, I've been up since 3 am cause I couldn't sleep so I have to chill for awhile, let things ride! Hoping it all starts coming together soon though. Really want to get my LinkedIn Profile going soon.

On another sorta related note: my urgency now is felt more acutely, I suppose, because I'm back at work after taking the year off for surgeries so feeling a bit impatient. My time off is limited, and can't quit the day job until something comes in! Ugggh. The grind...

ArtistErin

@NessIllustration Interesting! I do see how it cleans up the art and looks more professional...

Jeremy Ross

Hi @kirsten-mcg, I ended up doing the same on my Kamari piece after the good advice here.

Jeremy Ross

Website looks great @ArtistErin! The improvements certainly helped!

ArtistErin

@Mimi-Simon Oh yeah you nailed that point totally. I have to make myself walk away often. I could fiddle with something forever! And I'm not a programmer either I'd rather be an artist, it's way more fun

ArtistErin

@Jeremy-Ross Thank you Jeremy!!