New website review please

[lukehoare]

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Hi All,

I have been reading some website reviews here on the forums and thought I would put my current project up for review. Please let me know what you think? Any feedback welcome! Please be aware the website currently has “dummy” data loaded, but hopefully this will give you an insight into the look and feel of how the website will work.
A couple of technical things being sorted and some Blog posts being created, then hopefully ready for launch sometime in November.
I would also be very interested to hear from anyone who has experience or ideas to launch this website.

Site: https://www.countrymade.com.au/

Thanks everyone:)

[Rowan@quaotic]

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Takes quite a while to load. I would like to see a bit more ‘pop’ as it is pretty generic.

[lukehoare]

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Thanks Rowan,
Great feedback, it is a WordPress site and I was feeling like it loaded a bit slow. I do need to run a final optimisation to get it loading a bit quicker, but I am also considering finding a new host or upgrading the plan I am on.
My idea for keeping the site basic was to ensure customer pictures and advertising “pops” on screen, not the site itself. A bit like theage.com.au, but I think a bit more colour might be beneficial;)
Any feedback on the concept itself? Good idea/bad idea? Something I am missing?

[businesstrade]

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[USER=119308]@lukehoare[/USER] the website loads quite slowly, to be honest. It is also quite plain in terms of its colour scheme.

Serious question and food for thought – why will users (both buyers and sellers) use your website instead of Gumtree or Facebook marketplace?

businesstrade.com.au - buy or sell a business

[Dave Gillen – Former FS Concierge]

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Hi Luke,

My queries would be…

1. What suggests to a country-based business that this will work, or that their products will be seen by anyone?
2. Do people have a good reason to switch to country-made products? If you know of certain industries where it’s important, maybe you could focus on those industries.

Good luck!
Dave

Dave Gillen | LinkedIn

[lukehoare]

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Thanks [USER=113709]@BusinessTrade[/USER], yes it is becoming obvious my host is very slow. I will also look at Cloudflare to speed it up or change host!
As a website, I wasn’t really thinking of competing with Gumtree, Facebook, Ebay or the likes, but more as a niche site (for rural and country businesses) my point of difference (in my mind) is to offer a business the opportunity to create an online profile, create some ads for their products and build their brand. No buying or selling or commissions is intended on my site.
Apologies to city businesses.

[businesstrade]

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lukehoare, post: 271124, member: 119308 wrote:

As a website, I wasn’t really thinking of competing with Gumtree, Facebook, Ebay or the likes, but more as a niche site (for rural and country businesses) my point of difference (in my mind) is to offer a business the opportunity to create an online profile, create some ads for their products and build their brand.

I see, that makes more sense. Good luck, hopefully it works out!

businesstrade.com.au - buy or sell a business

[lukehoare]

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Thanks [USER=49676]@Dave – FS Concierge[/USER],

Appreciate the questions, here’s what I am thinking for both your great questions.

Question 1, I will be working hard on SEO and also social media to get this off the ground. Possibly working with some social media influencers if I can. If you know anyone that would be a good match, please let me know.

For Question 2, i don’t have any products and won’t be selling anything myself. No products called CountryMade! The website will be for any country based business that wants to promote their own products and get some potential new customers.

Any more feedback or questions, please let me know.

I appreciate these questions and feedback, it helps to clarify if I have considered different aspects and thought of potential issues:)

I think I have a reasonably good starting point if I can get some businesses to sign up, but will always be ready to pivot if needed!!

[OliverCivic]

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I like the layout of the site a lot — nice and clean, easy to navigate.

The one thing that threw me was the pricing. The first three are per month, then it jumps to one that’s every six months. It took a second for it to click that the big jump in price was over a longer time span.

[lukehoare]

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Thanks [USER=119010]@OliverCivic[/USER], appreciate the feedback.
I have changed the pricing section a couple times so far when developing the site. Will look at how I can make the options more clearer.

[plgs]

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Hi Luke, the load time was fine for me.

I have a couple of minor points from a legal perspective.

First, you sometimes use “Country Made” and sometimes “CountryMade” – it seems minor, but can be significant because your business name is registered, so it needs to be used in the registered form.

Second, your privacy policy sometimes uses APPs and sometimes NPPs (APPs is correct). Also, you say “We have adopted the Australian Privacy Principles” – I wouldn’t use this kind of language, as it might result in your being bound by the APPs when in fact you can take advantage of an exception (eg, turnover <$3M). You might be taking on information privacy obligations where you don't need to. Hope that helps,
Patrick

[lukehoare]

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Thanks [USER=8505]@plgs[/USER],
Great point about using the correct business name. I will make some corrections.
Would you believe that the template I used for my privacy policy comes from a government website:
https://www.business.vic.gov.au/marketing-and-sales/eCommerce-and-digital-technology/eCommerce/selling-from-a-website
Will do some more research myself and do some corrections. Are there any other good resources you could point to?
Thanks,
Luke.

[plgs]

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Hi Luke – lol, just goes to show not everything that comes frorm a government site is correct!

For resources on information privacy, because privacy (for business) is Cth regulated, I’d suggest a look at the Cth Information Commissioner site at oaic.gov.au.

[UmarBatchelor]

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As its about brand building…to entice people perhaps show stats of people coming to the site, how youre promoting the site, where the traffic is coming from etc.

[bb1]

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The marketters always say you have 7.2 seconds to grab someones attention before they move on to another site. Yours takes 7.3 seconds to load.. Even if the marketers are wrong, that way to long.

I understand what you are trying to achieve, but I’m not sure there is a market for it, can you explain the value proposition for me to list with you, rather then the many other options out there.

It’s a minor thing but you say country made items, but you are showing mass produced products as your sample data, if I wanted to sign up I would think wow I’m competing with that. I know it’s sample data, but use realistic data.

I’m confused by your about page, interesting story, but if I am going to advertise, I want more then a story, I want to know about the owner, show us a picture of you, who are you? Also I’m wondering why random words are capitalised and others aren’t, I don’t see the logic behind it and it just shows poor copywriting to me..

Did I mention that the [pages take about 50 seconds to load (OTT but it feels like it)

How do you intend to get people to your site, so that they can find my site. Again I think that shows you havent sold the idea or have a market slot.

[Author]

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