Hemp Jewelry Website - Please Review

[hemppets]

I've been going at my website looking for ways to appeal to my customers.
Gone through a few layouts already and am now just trying to see what
is missing.

My site involves selling custom handmade hemp jewelry and hemp accessories for pets and people.

The site is created on geocities, which is fine for now. I've had registered
names before and am happy with this site for now.

Please view my site and let me know your thoughts.
I would like constructive suggestions.
Be nice!

http://www.geocities.com/hemppets

Thank you for your time!

 

[ahk2chan]

The site is fine... I am not sure what you meant by "...looking for ways to appeal to my customers."

The way I looked at it is if you are just providing a platform to let the current customers know about new / other products, then it serves the purpose.

However, if you are looking for creating a sales channel, then I would really think that you should have your own domain. Because I guess it will increase consumer confident. Personally I would not buy something from a geocities site unless through a referral.

 

[hemppets]

Website Review

Thank you for your review. The appeal factor question I was
was seeing what I can do to help with sales. I was wondering
if I was missing something on the way I was presenting the
items.

Many sites in my field vary on there presentation styles.
Some use plain white backgrounds, others use neutrals,
and some use wild bright colors throughout there layout.

More closely I was talking about presentation level. Looking
for ways to make the website more attractive and customer
friendly.

In the near future I hope to have another registered domain
to sell my crafts on. This is something I am sure affects my
sales and confidence of the buyer, as you mentioned.

Thank you for your kind review!

Suggestions for domain registration and hosting services are welcome!

 

[adamblan]

the design is all over the place (maybe choose something... greener?)
Set up a CMS w/ a nice template when you do your real site if you're trying to attract new business from the internetz

 

[ian]

I would not buy from somebody using a geocities website.
Also is the title of the website Hemp Pets or Pooch n Caboodle? that is confusing.

 

[hemppets]

Web Site Title and Geocities

I have had this temporary website for quite awhile now and
have been building upon the ideas for the shop and the overall
design. Since before 2000 I first had opened my craft to
the online venue. The site has been through many different
servers. It has now a steady place on geocities. The name is
a combination of the sites title and sub title. It would read
Pooch N' Caboodle Hemp Pets. Pooch as in the Dog and Caboodle
as in Everything. Hemp Pets refers to the hemp pet accessories.

I recently signed up for a registered domain name again. So
as soon as I get things together on there I hope that there
will be a better response.

Geocities has served my sites for so long now, that its time
to jump on band wagon again and see what the .com will do.

Thank you again for your kind and honest suggestions.

 

[horrorshow75]

Glad to hear you are moving away from geocities. Geocities is okay if you are a doing a personal site or maybe a family website but not a business. Also you may want to look into a store front. Something like Zen Cart or OS Commerce. They are free. Honestly if I found your site through a search I would quickly move on. The fact that I have to fill out a form to order and wait for you to get back to me to work out payment would deter me right off the bat. If you don't go the store front path at least look into offering google checkout or paypal as a payment option. Also I think a template will help you greatly, and I say this certainly not to be mean but hopefully to help, my first impression of your site is that it was made with frontpage. Which to me does not convey a professional site, which for a personal site would be okay, but not a business.

I hope some of this information is helpful and good luck to you!

 

[hemppets]

Shop Shopping Cart & Design

I heard of the paypal shopping cart, and do use paypal as a form
of payment. Haven't yet created a shopping cart. Everything on the
website is ordered as a custom order. If I narrowed down the
types of custom orders and made a format to follow I am sure I
can create a fairly good check out system. I didn't think not having
one would discourage customers since its a custom tailored thing.

The use of web templates I am looking into. I tried the best I could
do by making an original layout with no graphic or web software.
The design was made by myself without borrowing any elements
from pre-made templates. I've been on huge search for the right
template to use.

If you have a suggestion of place to get free web templates please
let me know. I have looked everywhere. I need something that will
fit the general theme.

Thank you for suggesting the shopping cart option with the Zen
cart and OS commerce. When I get a chance I will look into setting
one up.

I would also like to keep my custom order forms for people who
desire to order a specific piece. Thank you for your kind suggestions.

 

[horrorshow75]

What do you mean by ordering a custom piece? You mean a personalised collar or something like that. Zen Cart can do those things. They are called attributes. You can attribute colors, sizes, probably even a "customize" text field that will allow your customer to enter what they want. The only difference is they can pay for it straight away using a credit card (through paypal or google checkout) or their paypal account if they have one. No form sending no waiting. Item is payed for and sent to you to fill now your customer only has to wait for order fill and shipping. Kind of set it and forget it for the user.

Again these are all just suggestions, I mean in the end you have to run this business so you should always do what's easiest and most comfortable for you.

 

[adamblan]

Look into Joomla- there are tons of templates & mods, it's fairly simple to administrate, and you can add e-commerce with VirtueMart.
Best of all, it's an open-source project so it's free

 

[inline853]

for your business to be successful online, you might want to consider hiring a professional designer to design your website, and then you could make all subsequent changes.

pay them to do SEO and shopping cart