The overall look and feeel of your website is important (in addition to good content of course). Remember that there are so many gambling websites out there today. People who visit those sites will tend to stick with the ones that get updated regularly and that are easy to use (navigation). Site that look like an old Atari game tend to turn people off, especially when there's a vast selection of sites out there. There are exceptions of course. I have seen sites that look awfull but that have such great content that people keep returning. But since you are starting fresh, you may as well do it right from the get go.
remember that website design starts with a pen and paper. There are different methods of doing it, but essentially you end up with something that looks like an organization chart but instead of dealing with positions, it deals with content. They're called "information architecture". Most people don't use these design tools and jump to coding to quickly. They design on the fly. They pay for it later.
As the site grows, you'll find that it will evolve and you'll probably want to modify it at some point. Doing an information architecture diagram that contains both current and future needs will help you come up with an overall site template that can meet your immediate requirements while offering you the opportunity to expand without making that process too painful.
Branding is an important aspect of a website (something I need to work on myself actually). It becomes more important as your traffic increases. Let me give you an example: WPT. Three letters. Everyone know what they stand for. And everyone here can picture the logo that goes with it. Branding allows you to be remembered, and be noticed amongst thousands. Your brand is associated with your reputation, and once you build a good reputation, you want to market it by slapping your logo to everything you do, support, promote and sell.
Now lets look at your site and be specific - Warning, serious bashing ahead. If you can't take it, don't read it! I'm going to be very honest and blunt, it's not personal.
First, you got yourself a great domain name. It has a lot of potential. Personally, I would try to build my site so it reflects the theme of the domain - Make it about pokerstars.com. That would be putting all your egss in one basket, but it's a HUGE basket and it can work quite well if you set it up right.
In terms of content, sentences like "PLEASE FEEL FREE TO VISIT OUR POKER TOOLS PAGE FOR INFORMATION ON SEVERAL TOOLS THAT WILL HELP YOU ON YOUR POKER GAME STOP PLAYING IN THE DARK." are sooooo bad. First, the all cap is annoying, not to mention impolite. There's no need to yell! Second, it's just not coherent English. English is not my first language so I sometimes make gramatical and vocabulary errors myself, but it is important to use proper English. I'll make a lot of typos when I post in these forums, but I type 35 words per minutes with 2 fingers so cut me some slack! lol! Also, I am too lazy to go back and correct them all. But when I write an article for my site, or any content that will be viewed by my visitors, I take the time to do it right.
There is no consictency in your fonts. Your "play online poker" link in the middle box doesn't match your "play online poker" link in the right box. And then your hyperlink paragraph in the middle uses different fonts as well. You also have blue hyperlinks and black hyperlinks.
Try to standerdize things. Hyper links are done one way, Headings defines another way, etc. I notice youve used some CSS in the code of your page, but you need to read more on CSS and template design I think. Also, you can get all that CSS code in external files, and you can use multiple files (usually one can be used for fonts and another for template/layout). The importance of consitency is that if you decide to change the font of say all your headings, then you change it at one place, in your CSS file, and every single page that uses that heading is changed. It's virtually maintenance free, and that is why CSS was invented. In addition to your links, your text is inconsistent. You have black text in one box, bold white text in another, and non bold white text at the bottom.
Your choice of colors, altough that is personal, just doesn't work for me. I find the blue background wnd the green boxes don't mix well. I especially find it dificult to read the text on the green. It's a color that is dificult to work with if you're going to use that as your content background.
The bottom of your page says - hosting by web.com. Why do we care? Are you getting free hosting thus are forced to put that there? That should go, and if are serious about running a poker website that generates income, you need paid hosting.
If you asked me to do a link exchange with your site, I would turn you down. This falls under my clause of "websites that make my eyes bleed".
This concludes my evaluation. And please, understand that I'm not bashing you at all. This is my honest opinion, and the last thing I want to do is discourage you. I'm doing this so that you can start on the right track. Building a site that generates revenue is hard and it will take you hours and hours and hours of time dedicated to the maintenance of your site. It will take months before you generate income, and the first revenue you make will be insignificant in terms of $$$.
One year is the critical point. In one year, you'll have to decide if it's all worth it or not. If you're not generating income in one year, you're doing something wrong. You'll either need to persue the dream, and change things, or you'll sell or scrap the site (I would try selling the domain name).
If your expectation is not revenue, then you can do what ever you want. It becomes a fun personal project. But if you want to generate income, you're off to a poor start.
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Last edited by mypokercorner : 12-14-2007 at 01:38 PM.
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