Blog Week 3 Post 1

Looking through a critical lense.

1.  https://www.pennyjuice.com/

Problem 1.  The site is not adaptive.  When shrinking the screen the sides are cut off, when viewing on mobile, it is atrocious.  This is going to not only hurt their users ability to use the site, it will also crush them in google search rankings.

Problem 2.  It feels very dated.  It seems like they are running a very old version of Wordpress or didn't want to invest in high-quality image assets or something.

Problem 3.  The parallax scrolling on the more info and orders page seems like the page just isn't loading and I think will hurt their bounce rate by a lot.  I also saw that they put critical information about how much juice their concentrates make on their order form page, UNDER the order form...  This is probably the worst place to put critical information like that.  Also I just noticed the order form is the worst I have ever seen.  The people are expected to add up the total and submit a separate payment.  This is 2021, we should be taken through a checkout process like woo commerce.

It seems professionally done, a long time ago.  The copy, navigation, and overall structure is good.

I would redesign the page using Elementor on Wordpress to make the whole thing responsive to screen size.  I would keep the basic copy and menu options because I think they are basically good, but totally redesign the page to look far more modern, and add a checkout process that doesn't appear as if a fifth grader put it together.

2.  https://www.apple.com

Problem 1.  Oddly, when moving my curser over the top menu bar the whole thing is flashing white as if there is some problem with the css, or maybe it is an issue with the chrome browser.  I am surprised to see this happening on the apple website.

Problem 2.  I could see issues with this site for people who are not technologically savvy.  They seem to be really doubling down on their brand and current customer base, which I think is smart of them, but I think that they may be alienating a segment of their potential market in the meantime.  It might be beneficial to put the fact that they give free training on iOS to all of their customers, for those who are switching over from Android, or who are new to the smartphone game.

Problem 3.  Their site is so modern that older browsers will not be able to display it properly.  This is a real stretch to find 3 problems with the apple website...  I don't think that this problem will effect a very large percentage of their traffic, but it is feasible that some will be effected by this.

Yes, the site is definitely professionally done, likely be an entire team of designers utilizing the latest techniques and psychographic data.

To improve the problems I listed above, I would suggest they put a tab, "switch to apple."  There they could list their free training, articles on how to migrate all your stuff over from android, and maybe even a promotion or two.

The Optimistic Perspective

1.  https://www.nps.gov

This site has excellent mobile optimization, that still feels pretty good on a desktop.  While I prefer to have a full desktop version of the site and a mobile optimized one, I understand that most people on mobile these days so I can live with it.

They also do really well presenting the elements on the page.  They are using an excellent theme that loads fast, and doesn't have bulky excessive code.

Yes, it was done professionally.    You can tell by the efficiency of the coding, the cdn they are using, and the overall professional tone of the website.

Their use of design on this .gov website illustrates an authoritative source of facts.  The alignment, and all of the other elements are very well optimized.

2.  https://artcenter.org/

The California Center for The Arts should have a well designed website given their business, and it is very good indeed.  It is mobile optimized, fast and responsive.

They also have a very clear menu for the most in demand needs that visitors to their site need such as contact info, event, and donation information.

The site is beautiful on mobile, and appear to be using a good responsive theme.  They have great call to actions throughout their pages, and ask for your email which is certainly best practice.

It was definitely done professionally, as best practices are in use throughout the site.

The overall tone of the website is good, professional, clean, easy to navigate.  I get the impression of an authoritative website.