1d) Do you have a corporate visual identity (a customized (non stock) logo and color scheme carried out throughout your office, stationery, business cards, etc.)?
Nothing other than the logo at this point. This is a new venture.
1e) What is the nature of your business?: Briefly describe your products or services:
We plan to create a content portal about e-business, from everything to a glossary and opinion and editorial pieces about various aspects of e-business and e-commerce. We plan to have a user forum area for discussion threads and to encourage people to upload and include their own pieces and opinions. We want this to be young, interesting and not the normal staid content portal.
1f) List the things that make your company/product unique.
Our perspective is going to be mainly focused on small business and small e-commerce businesses because that is our passion. Our main business focuses on building and consulting with small businesses and now we want to get useful information out to more small businesses and business owners.
1g) Who is your target market? Who are you hoping to reach with your site?
Small business owners and people interested in e-business.
1h) What advantages do you expect this project to bring you?
An exciting look and feel to properly promote our new venture and to invite readers and small business owners into an informative and useful e-business website.
Website Details
2a) Do you have an existing website? If so, what is the URL?
No, we do not.
2b) IMPORTANT: Please list at least 3 URLs (web addresses) of high quality sites that you like the look of (these do not have to be sites who’s business is similar to yours. It aids us in determining what your design style is.) Please consider layout, colors, navigation, graphics, and typography.
2c) What colors or color schemes would you like?
Primary colors, see the logo for some guidance.
2d) List any color that must be used or must be avoided specific for this web site:
None
2e) List the Navigation links for your Site:
Home, e-commerce, Small Business, Software Reviews, Forum
2f) What is the single most desired action for a visitor to take while at your website? (e.g. call a phone number, fill out a form, sign up for a mailing list, make a purchase, request a free report, choose your company over a competitor, etc.)
For now, we want people to read and to register.
2g) Would you like Flash elements? What are the Flash elements (e.g.: intro, header/banner, menu etc.) that you want in your website? Please describe them.
Perhaps, but not necessarily.
2h) What type of look are you trying to achieve? (e.g. clean, high-tech, conservative, warm, neutral, gothic, spiritual, artsy, fun, flashy, etc.)
Clean, professional and interesting and young.
2i) Please provide the addresses of competitors' sites, if possible:
N/A
2j) Do you have any images for use in the design of your site? If not, do you have images, can you offer suggestions of what you type of imagery you feel would be most suitable for your website:
Not at this time.
Deadlines and Deliverables
3a) What is the deadline for the design of your project?
We need this ASAP!
3b) What is required breakdown of the files you require our designers to supply you with on finalization of your project?
We'll need photoshop files.
3c) Are there any other comments/specific ideas we should keep in mind while designing your project?
The site is going to be very "texty" so we need
an interesting layout, some interesting graphical elements to break it up. We look so forward to your submissions!
I really like your color scheme and layout. I hadn't thought about earth tones and you made this template look really nice and polished.
I'm just trying to figure out what to give you for feedback and the only thing I can think is that I wish it had a little bit more fun, or "zip" to it? I know that is very vague and I want this site to be taken seriously, but I also want it to be a little fun, a little lively and to have a little humor.
Thank you so much for the changes. I feel like you gave me a couple of concepts in the new post to work with and I really appreciate it.
I think I like the little cartoony buildings above small business but I think I don't need the cartoon character guy. Is there some way to bring out that building element in other ways?
Fabian - YAY! I very much look forward to your concept.
My concept is not quite done, but I wanted to share it with you now to get preliminary thoughts before progressing?
I envision that if you plan to do software reviews.. these are paid reviews?
If that's the case I would suggest you run this through the featured article section along with top articles when you have no paid reviews to do.
I assume you'll have paid text links and have included them in the left column along with ideal spacing for banners underneath.
This is what I had in mind,the idea is to break up the content blocks with Ad placements or links to other parts of the site.Hoping this creates the right amount of visual interest to keep people reading.
The text is in large reader friendly fonts in order to reduce eye strain,the headings all use New times and the content is arial.
Oh yeah...and it has cool icons
Interested in what you think of it
Thanks
Fabian
Last edited by Fabian : 12-14-2007 at 03:06 AM.
Reason: I can't spell to save myself:)
I love how you used the piggy bank and the ads from sponsors to add the visual interest but you have kept the design really clean and simple. I also really like the blue and orange fonts.
We won't be doing any paid text links - so we can take that out.
Fabian,
I love how much thought you put into this - and I can see it in the clarity of design. The only feedback is that I would love to see you incorporate stock photography instead of the cartoon guy! :-)
I am going to solicit some additional feedback for everyone from my business partner and my assistant and I'll try to post that today!
Again I want to thank you for your awesome submissions!
Sev, right now you are the leading design. We like the use of a little tint to delineate the 'boxes' of text from one another without using lines that chop up the whole image.
The piggy bank is cute and friendly without being unprofessional or cheap looking.
The circle around the login area is a good way to draw the eye up to the call to action and echo the circle of the ebusinessscoop circle.
We don't love the way that the pale orange at the top looks pink. Can it be tinted a bit more to make it more orange or if that would be too much maybe it should be blue?
Gypsimind
If we wanted just a straight professional site, we like this one best. It's simple but has good use of color, text and lines with a minimum of clutter.
Pam
We like the template very much. It has an overall professional look and the boxes aren't so boxy that you feel like it is all lines lines lines.
The use of the ebusinessscoop as its own box logo in the 'Software Reviews' section looks great. We would love to keep that element and maybe have one that
looks like a book for book reviews.
Having one element of cartoony art (the cartoon buildings, or newspaper or quote bubble) would be ok, but having three or more starts to make the site look less professional. We know we asked for something more fun, but we want to make sure we don't slide from professional to do-it-yourself looking.
Fabian
Overall we like the top banner, with the circles and hoops is much more dynamic. We like it best of all the top banners. We do feel the design is a little icon heavy though.
Anne
Certainly a clean and professional design. Right now this is lacking the 'fun' element that we want, but overall a really nice design. We particularly like
the 'Latest News' section and how you used the little newspapers as icons. They are subtle but cool.
I'll see what I can do to add a splash of fun to it.
)
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