Journal 8

Journal 8

       For this week's review, I found a social media web site entitled: Mouthshut.com. Interesting choice for a name. I accidentally happened upon this web site after looking up different social media sites -- this one caught my eye in particular. Overall, it was not horrible, but there are definitely a number of improvements that could be made. When I first went to the site, I was not sure what to look at first. All of the text is a very similar, small size, which makes it difficult to figure out what is most important. This is the first thing I would change to the web site: make the text size different so that the eye is drawn to important words. In addition, there needs to be a title banner of some sort to let the audience member know what exactly this web site is for. The way the site is now has the "Mouthshut.com" logo in very small text at the top left-hand corner of the page. I would suggest they make a banner with the title and a short mission statement about the web site, and put it in a central location so it is easy to see. This would really help to clarify what the web site is about. The last suggestion I would make is to organize the layout of the site, and add in a better navigation. Right now, the site's nav consists of only a few links, and they are small, unnoticeable clicks at the very top of the page. I think it would help tremendously if they added to their nav and cleaned up the boxes of information. Also, make the nav bigger so that is easier to spot -- because right now it is too easy to overlook that part of the web site. 

       After I figured out what this web site was for (by going to the 'About us' page) I realized what a neat idea it was. Mouthshut.com uses reviews of different businesses to help shoppers make informed decisions. The site compiles thousands of reviews so that a shopper can quickly and easily discover information about the product they are looking at. There are reviews on other shopping websites as well. Not only can you read reviews, you can also write your own. In addition, Mouthshut smartly uses pools on the main page of their web site to take in information from the people visiting. I think this is very clever -- a great way to get a read on the people viewing your web site and figure out how you can attract more people. As it is, I would say their target audience are adults, most likely well educated adults who are invested in purchasing quality items. After all, someone who does not care about the quality of something they buy probably will not bother visiting a site like this. 

      The web site also has a list of recent movies down at the bottom of the page. Although I find this somewhat random, it does show how diverse the items they have reviews on are. The site also states who recommends going there which is a smart move. A few of these companies, such as CNBC, are well known, and therefore add to the credibility of the web site. Although this site could use some organization help, and there needs to be some change with the text size and positioning, I think it still has a lot of potential. I would encourage others to go here only if they are invested in doing research about what they are shopping for. A site like this, that isn't completely awful, but isn't exactly that great at the same time, requires some patience to navigate. 

http://www.mouthshut.com

Week 8 Journal

Week 8 Journal

This week, I am reviewing a social media site. The web site I chose, Cafemom.com, is designed as a meeting place for moms. This was the first thing I noticed about the web site when I opened up the page. It is very clear what this this web site is aimed at: connecting mothers. Besides the fact that the site itself is titled Cafemom, the banner underneath the navigation communicates the purpose of the site. In large text is the statement: "Welcome to the Meeting Place for Moms." This is a very understandable statement that summarizes what the web site does. I found this extremely helpful, as it requires no searching or clicking around to discover who this site is aimed at or what it is meant to do. In addition, I like how the website has a search bar in the top right hand corner. This makes it very easy to find a certain article or link one might be looking for. Sites that have a search are automatically ahead of other web sites. Personally, I find I can easily become impatient when looking for something on a web site. With the ability to type in a search, it is much more convenient to find what I am looking for. The last reason why I like this web site is because of it's organization. There is clearly a lot of information being offered through Cafemom.com, but the site is able to group it into larger sections. Underneath the main banner are three large boxes titled: Conversation, Advice, Entertainment. These three boxes are a great way to categorize the information. 

I noticed the advertising that is on this web site. Toys R Us adds are at the top, sides and bottom of the web site. While adds are never pleasant, one can appreciate that these adds at least pertain to the audience. Moms are likely to purchase toys for their children, and therefore Toys R Us is an appropriate store to be advertising it's products. In addition, I noticed how the web site had a segment on Michelle Obama's campaign appearance. This is a very smart inclusion of information. As women, mom's are likely to be interested in the First Lady, the women figure representing our country. This also ties politics into the web site, which many mom's may be interested in but not normally find the time to discuss due to the business of parenthood. 

The one adjustment I would recommend is to combine some of the links at the top of the page under, "in the spotlight." It would make for a less busy navigation, which I think would be beneficial. Not that it is overly crowded, but shortening the number of links could help neaten the navigation up more. Even without this change, I would recommend people go here (and by people I suppose I am automatically talking to mom's). The audience is clearly targeted as mother's, there is no confusion there. And the web site seems to offer some generally interesting and helpful information. If you are a mom and looking to connect with other mom's, Cafemom.com is a great place to go to. As a (hopefully) future mother, I could see myself using this as a potential recourse. So it's got my vote!

http://www.cafemom.com

Web site review - week 6

Journal week 6

     For this weeks journal, I decided to review Healthline.com, a web site meant to connect people to better health through informational resources. Just by first going to this site I could tell that it had an extremely large amount to cover. Any health web site automatically has a lot to touch upon concerning information. Due to this overwhelming amount of data, it could be difficult to organize into one web site. Healthline.com seems to have done an excellent job with this, however. The web site is clear and easy to view when first opened. The large font at the top posing the question, "How can we help you today?" is very eye catching, and immediately gives the viewer a place to type in a question or statement and look for support. I really liked how easy it was to find this search box. No searching or scanning around for help, instead it is literally impossible to miss. Right off the bat, this web site is very well organized.

      In addition to the nice organizational piece, Healthline.com did a fantastic job utilizing pictures to keep the text from becoming too overwhelming. Instead of simply having sentence after sentence of information, they did a really nice job breaking it up with images of common objects that we can relate to and understand. For example, next to the line "Dirtiest places in your home" is a picture of dishes stacked in a kitchen sink. Not only does this give us something interesting to look at that we understand, it helps to balance out the ratio between text and images. This helps the web site be much more esthetically pleasing. Instead of going to a site and being bombarded with small text in paragraph after paragraph, Healthline.com keeps it much simpler and thereby less overwhelming. I, for one, am much more likely to click on a link that is accompanied with a small image, versus a link that is described by a paragraph of text.

      I also found that at the bottom of the page, there is a box containing "Featured Topic Centers." This is a very helpful asset for a website, and I commend Healthline.com for having a featured topic section. In doing so, they help viewers find what they are looking for much more quickly. In addition, if someone is simply browsing the site and not looking for anything in particular, the featured topic section could help them find an interesting article. This also helps with the organization of the web site by sorting information into more containers. It could be part of the reason why you do not have to scroll very much to view the entire page, another big plus, and kudos to Healthline.com for being able to layout the information in such a manner so minimal scrolling is required.

      Overall, this web site was very nicely designed. I would highly recommend someone go here for medical information, or even if they are just looking to learn some interesting facts. I would even go as far as put it on WebMD's level. The one, tiny, tiny piece that I may suggest be changed, is to make some of the small font larger, or bolder. Do to the fact that a large amount of people going to this web site will be elderly, it would be beneficial to have an easily readable font. We don't want to have to squint! That's all for now folks.

http://www.healthline.com