Dutch of School Spirit was the second of 5 brave volunteers willing to have me go through their site and critique it. Previously reviewed was Chirault, by Varethane. A note, copied from the previous review: I don’t ever ever review in the form of “this sucks, change it to suit me, puny human!” I prefer to use reviews as a teaching tool, and I definitely try to write reviews such that no matter who or what is being reviewed, everybody wins/learns. Also, all of the links inside this article do not lead to Dutch’s site, but instead to articles that expand upon the point I’m making.
Let’s get started! *cracks knuckles*
I’m going to start out by role-playing a new visitor to Dutch’s comic. I stumble across his link, and BAM! I’m presented with some very important things:
- This may seem like a “d’uh” thing, but Dutch states that hey, it’s a comic (and furthermore, it’s Australian :D)! You have no idea how many times I’ve had to explain to people who had never read webcomics before that it’s a comic, on the web. I encourage anyone reading this to have SOMETHING to cue total webcomic noobs into what your site is about (a webcomic). Either state it’s a comic, a webcomic, or have a link stating “new to webcomics” or simply a “new reader” link. It sounds absurd, but it works. Some people REALLY DON’T KNOW that they can read an entire comic online.
- He has prominently displayed his update schedule!
- He’s got an amusing title image (that randomly rotates). This is a very catchy, welcoming thing! If you can make someone visiting your page for the first time laugh, chuckle, snort, etc, you win. That new reader WILL stick around to view another page. One of the WORST things you can do is have your title in boring letters, slap a gradient on it, and call it done. It doesn’t work that way. Your title graphic and/or logo needs to be personalized and stylized and catchy (this links to an article that briefly mentions this, since I haven’t done an all-out article on logos yet) and represent you.
- So, still role-playing that new visitor, I see the important stuff, nice and bright: archive, cast and contact links (filling in for an about page link at first glance). Each page is organized in an appealing, simple manner,with obvious/simple/good names for those pages. No mysterious links! So far so good, Dutch!
Okay, Dutch’s site passed the “new reader” test with flying colors, so let’s go more in-depth in my self-titled webcomic website must-have’s:
ARCHIVE PAGE: Organized by storyline, starting with the FIRST storyline (which is good. I hate it when the most recent storyline is first), the number of comics in that storyline, and a short text synopsis. I still recommend linking each and every page, but even I will admit with nearly 700 comics, all those links would be slightly absurd, and more likely to scare away new visitors (with the sheer immenseness of it) than please them. High marks on this set up!
CAST PAGE: Ok, the webdesigner in me is screaming about ugly tables. I’m going to address design itself at the end of this review, and stick with just organization and information display for now. After making as many webcomic sites as I have, I am confused by the order in which the characters are presented. If you’re not going to order them by first appearance (and I don’t think that’s what has been done, since the “first appearance” links jump around a bit), then they should be ordered alphabetically, or by “main cast” and “supporting cast” (and then in each of those sections, ordered by first appearance or alphabetically). The random display of them is confusing if I’m looking for a specific character. Admittedly, you don’t have so many characters I’m liable to GET lost, but people with a larger cast need to keep the ORDER of their characters on this page in mind.
ABOUT PAGE: the closest thing I can find is the “history” page, which, while aptly-titled considering the content, in my opinion better belongs on an about page, in a “the history of School Spirit” section. The reason I don’t like the “history” title is because when I first saw it, I didn’t know if I was about to be bombarded with an Aussie history lesson! I love how you put history in your comic, I think it adds tons of culture and is a great teaching tool, but as a reader, I don’t want more than that. One of the many reasons I encourage people to have an about page is for redundancy of information as well (not to mention SEO). We all know internet users….aren’t always the brightest bunch. You have an email link in your menu, and an about page should additionally state how to contact you. It should also redundantly state what your comic is about (ASIDE from a one-line synopsis, something a little more in-depthe), and more about you. Which….is almost exactly what you already have on this “history” page. If you are very attached to the page title “history”, at the very least include a link alt, “About the history of School Spirit,” or something. Include link alts on all those mapped links there, especially the Strine. Us non-Aussies have no idea what that means, but if you included the link alt, “Australian glossary of terms,” there’s no confusion there. I know there may be some issues including more about yourself, since you are a teacher and your students read the comic. I am unsure of the peculularities of such duality, but I AM saying all of this stuff is something someone who is a regular webcomic reader (not your students, or their parents) would want to see.
Still, really great job on the WWM-H’s there. Lots of text for search engines to see as well. Moving on to the should-have pages:
GALLERY PAGE: Again, a lot of text for SEO, great! I’d like to see you linking the people who have sent you guest art (that’s par for the course), especially if those sites are the same rating as your webcomic. If they are more mature, the people who sent you the art probably don’t expect a link back.
LINKS PAGE: Gah! Only one banner available!? And not even for your comic? Dutch, make more banners for yourself, man! Do you NOT want to be linked or something? I think I remember you mentioned something before about not desiring to be linked by more “mature” sites, but if you have a linking policy, you just have to state it! 99% of people will abide by it. If you don’t provide people banners to use, a lot of times they won’t even bother to link you, or ask you to make one, or even use a text link. They just won’t.
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SITE DESIGN:
This is where I groan. You’ve got everything mostly where it needs to be, all the aspects of a good website, but the webdesign needs some work. Not a lot, because where you have all the information already there, and the style in which you’ve built matches the friendly, out-going nature of your strip. But some aspects ought
Some things YOU need to keep in mind: Take out every table border you’ve got (technically, set table border=”0″). The cast page is the main culprit. It just looks….guh. Try cellspacing instead.
Be consistent in the design between pages. For example, your cast page has orange headings in Comic Sans, white body text in Times New Roman, and a black background. Your history page has headings in just a larger Comic Sans font, with a page background that looks like crinkled paper. Mostly, it seems the cast page is the odd man out. Perhaps you just haven’t gotten around to it yet, but the front page news area has the same issues. It’s not a good idea to use more than 1 font face on a webpage, especially if images have different text. Find a theme you like, and use it on EVERY page.
The order of your site navigation buttons needs changed. Like the cast page, the order should be alphabetical, or by order of importance. I usually go with the later. No matter what, “Home” should be the first button. I usually then recommend “Archive” followed by “Cast,” [insert other pages here], ending with “Links” and then “About/Contact.” I’d recommend taking out “Reviews” (and put that in an “about” section) and if at ALL possible, making horizontal nav bar. I’m guessing you don’t want to do that because then you’d have all that room up there with nothing to do with it, so how about a compromise? Perhaps a banner or half-banner or square button(s) ad slot up there instead? And the site navigation below that? Also, the text sizes on all the buttons needs to be conistent. It looks very odd with the changing sizes. It wouldn’t bother me nearly as much if all those buttons stayed in the same place, but had fonts all of the same size.
Next, um, the wood paneling background. I’ve never been a fan of that. I don’t think it matches your comic or art at ALL. I get that you’re going for a classroom desk (at least, I think), but just like fonts and such need to be consistent on a site, so does the art. You have your art in the title graphic, an obviously drawn ruler for the comic navigation, and then you’ve got this photograph of wood texture! It just will not mesh. It would be like inserting a photograph in your comic for a background (obviously we’re not talking about your history lesson comics here). You wouldn’t do that, because it would look BAD. It would look totally different, and I daresay good, if you drew that yourself. Consistency in graphic design/web design is a MUST for a good-looking site, and if you’ve been reading this blog, you’ve heard me say it: webcomics are half comic, half WEB. The quality of your website needs to match the quality of your comic!
Some other random things: Add “storyline archive” or something above your dropdown archive. Let people know what it is.
Do something with your news area (that doesn’t involve table borders). It is floating off into nothingness. Remember! Cohesive design. Make sure the font styles here match the font styles on the rest of the site.
I would suggest less ad space. You’re offering too much space for the prices they are going for, and unsold spaces don’t look good. Now, if you’re just being magnanimous with your space, good for you! But if you want to be making more than a cent per spot, offer 1 or 2 spots MAX. In this way, rather than 4 people bidding on every spot, 4 people bid on the same spots, and compete with EACH OTHER, rather than just taking the least expensive spot. I’d recommend getting rid of those 3 boxes all together.
That’s it from me! I apologize if I was wrong about any of things “I remembered you saying…”. I read so many webcomics, and I’ve been reading yours for quite some time now, I may have gotten some details wrong. <3 Next in line for a website review is Beertycoon’s Maskerman. But first, a webcomic host review of ComicDish. Finally got my mirror site up there and joined the forums.