eCommerce Website Gallery

[rmspangler]

Just about a month ago I started an eCommerce website gallery, and i'd love to hear your thoughts on it! It's basically a showcase for well designed and optimized eCommerce sites.

I know this is something I was always looking for (that's why i started it!) so hopefully you guys will find it helpful.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts!

Thanks,

Rob

[BasicECommerce]

Great idea for a site! My colleagues and myself are constantly looking for 'best practice aficionado' sites.

There does not really seem to be much of a homepage. You immediately dive into thumbnail images of sites with no real introduction. You should use the space on your homepage to tell the visitor what to expect from the site and what to do (view and post comments about the sites shown).

Also, I would make the thumbnail images link to your page about the site - not the site itself. Anymore, many users click on images more thank links. So, it was a shock for me when I ended up at the Home Depot website.

Finally, I would improve your Page Titles. Include titles that convey this as a list of best practice users. Searchers looking for ideas on best practices wont type in Zoka website. They'll type in something like 'best practice examples' or something along those lines.

Hope this helps.

-BEC

[skytopdesigns]

great idea. i like the set up.

good luck

[rmspangler]

@BEC - Thanks for the feedback. Very good points, I guess my main concern is that I really want it to be for people that are used to galleries like cssremix.com or cssdrive.com, etc... Only, for eCommerce sites. I'll definitely take your tips into consideration, I really appreciate you looking through everything.

@skytopdesigns - Thanks for checking it out!

[marc77]

Nice website.

I would move most of the information you presented on the site's bottom (about, tags, etc.) on top.

You also may work on your meta tags...

[rmspangler]

Yeah, very good point Marc, I definitely think i'm going to move those tags over to the sidebar. It was functionality I added after the initial design, thanks for pointing that out.

I do have a little 'about the ecommerce gallery' up at the top, are you thinking that I just need more?

And yes, i really neglected they keywords meta tag , for client sites I'll spend the time on them, but for my stuff I don't tend to worry about it. Just because it doesn't really have much value anymore to popular search engines. I know they can't hurt, but out of curiosity have you guys seen instances where they keywords have helped out?

Oh and @BasicECommerce - I changed the thumbnail to link to my details page, vs. the site - I think that was a great improvement, thanks.

[Paul Roberts]

Just about a month ago I started an eCommerce website gallery, and i'd love to hear your thoughts on it! It's basically a showcase for well designed and optimized eCommerce sites.

I know this is something I was always looking for (that's why i started it!) so hopefully you guys will find it helpful.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts!

Thanks,

Rob

Rob, Thanks for this, very usefull site, will visit it many times in the future for design ideas

Kind Regards

Paul
http://www.robodesignsolutions.com
http://www.robodesign.co.nz

[marc77]

I do have a little 'about the ecommerce gallery' up at the top, are you thinking that I just need more?

No I think it's fine as it is :-) Especially when we consider that most people love short pages (no one wants to read a novel).

[marc77]

Just because it doesn't really have much value anymore to popular search engines.

Do you think so ? I must say that according my experience these meta tags still have a high impact on the visibility and rating. Especially Google seems to be very sensitive to changes made there.

[rmspangler]

Do you think so ? I must say that according my experience these meta tags still have a high impact on the visibility and rating. Especially Google seems to be very sensitive to changes made there.

I do still use the meta-description tag, it's good for usability. Typically...well occasionally Google will use it to describe your page on the SERP. As far as the keywords tag though, I think after all the abuse it got in the 90's and early 2000's it's not valued to major search engines.

I know Danny Sullivan ran a long test on it, you can check out the results here:
http://searchengineland.com/070905-194221.php