Hello all,

I am looking for feedback on a website I have created and launched.

First some background on me. I am a recent engineering grad turned software developer. After graduating from university (in chemical engineering), I had a pretty difficult time finding a job (I even posted on this forum for advice).

Luckily, while in university, I helped do molecular dynamics research. For those who don't know what that is, it is research of chemical systems based on computer simulated interactions of atoms. Because I participated in this research, by the time I had graduated from university, I had decent programming skills (probably stronger than most engineering grads).

In my free time (while searching for an engineering position), I learned new software languages (mostly web based languages: C#/ASP.NET, php, html, css, js etc.) and worked on a website idea that I had. I hoped that I could obtain a softward development job because it was looking harder and harder to get the engineering position and, anyway, programming is fun!

A month ago I obtained a programming job and I have been working in my free time to push this first version of the website out. Finally, it is ready to be seen (save for one bug in the image upload that I am working on).

I am looking for your comments and criticism on most anything. Is the purpose of the website clear (I am purposely not saying what the website does in the post, I would like to see if it is self-explanatory)? Does the current functionality work and is there any functionality you think should be added? Is the design nice? Any ideas on how to grow this website etc.

I respect this community, I think I can learn a lot from it.

The website is: backyardcures.com

bump for thoughts on the website. No one has any comments?

I have been working on the site since the original post. Fixed some bugs, especially one really annoying one involving image uploads.

My original plan was to let my friends and family know first so that they could be the first ones on both so that they could beta test it for me and also so that they could be the ones to post content on an otherwise empty site. For the past week I have been trying to spread the word.

So far I have 10 users (not much I know but it is a step up from 1). Yesterday I got my first real user (i.e. not someone that I told directly about my site ).

Let me know what you all think.

I am looking for mainly thoughts on functionality. What is good, what is not and what can be added in terms of function. Also, I am looking for ideas with respect to social advertising, how to let this website be known.

To be honest, I really don't like the interface. I find it to be very busy and there is no clear sense of direction or action for me to take. I just look around at everything and then wonder why these pieces of content (the apple cider) are on the front page, and if it is only because they were added recently or something similar.

The site also has a global search at the top and not many pixels down another search below that. Most websites have terrible search experiences for thousands of nodes of content. I'm guessing you are using Lucene and search may be decent, but right now there isn't enough content to search for. So, by having two different search bars but not much content when I searched "poison ivy" I found nothing, which isn't a great experience and until you have significant amounts of content search may not work.

Think about this section of the page from a brand new users perspective:


How many different Call-to-Actions (buttons, things to click, etc.) do you count on that section of the page.

I count:


Give me a few things to do to solve what I am looking for, right now it is way too much going from a UX standpoint without there even being any content.

Interesting. Yeah, I definitely need to get more content on the site. I'm trying to get users right now (since the users are the ones that are supposed to be adding content).

Definitely going to give the "too many calls to action" some thought.

Thanks for the feedback

Answer the following Questions

- What do you want users to do?

- What do your users want to do?

and then give them a very clear path to accomplish that, as quickly as possible. People don't actually like options, they like to be told exactly what to do.

A bit confused as to why you would waste your time with this idea.

Are you trying to create revenue? do you have an earnest interest in this field? What are you trying to gain from this?


I dont see how this site will draw a lot of attention. If someone has a condition and its bad they will probably see a doctor or pharmacist and get something over the counter. Another issue I see is there is no validity to any of these..

sounds good. I appreciate the advice.

I disagree with you. This site is obviously not meant for really sick people. I would expect that those kinds of people would go see their doctors, just like you say. The site is meant for people who have minor, commonly-found ailments.

The idea was born through my own experiences. I have found myself, many a time, on the internet searching for a cure for some common ailment (e.g. fever or athletes foot) precisely because I didn't want to go to the doctor or to the store. Often, I end up spidering my way on and off google through random forums and blogs and then, after an hour of reading, wondering which of the many cures that I just read are any good.

The point of this site is to act as a central location where these cures can be posted, standardize the form in which they are posted and provide a way for the reader to know if they are any good (i.e. ratings).

I am still convinced that it is a good idea. You may be right though, time will tell.

But he's right. How are you going to monetize this?

I agree with the sentiment so far in this thread. Too many CTAs, design generally lacking, and not enough content.

It doesn't matter if you have 1 user or 100 users, all you have to do is fake having users by posting yourself under different user names. Check out how Reddit started. Waiting for users with a model like this is the most inefficient thing unless there's some compelling reason for people to share the site, or you're doing a bunch of other marketing.

I don't know anything about this niche, but I'd hazard a guess that there is a decent amount of search volume for long tail super niche keywords. I'd recommend doing a tonne of keyword research and optimising every article you write. Look on forums to see what people are searching for; go to all the big forums in this niche and sort by most popular posts.

How are you going to monetise this?

ads? I mean there are a lot of forums how do they all make money? I suppose sites that have a ton of traffic have other avenues available to them but, in the short term, ads.

Thanks. Can you expand on the "design generally lacking"? Is there anything besides the two many calls to action that looks bad about the site?

Do you think the site header should be colored? Any ideas on which color? I have been struggling with that. Any ideas on the graphics or layout in general?

Also, what do you mean by keyword research? How do I do that? Does going to forums and searching for popular posts count as keyword research? Are there any other ways to do keyword research? What do you mean by "optimize articles"? Does that just mean the wording of the titles and descriptions of the cures that I write under fake accounts?

Thanks

update:

We have been getting users slowly. I've gotten a few users since the last update but not many and they have posted almost no content.

In order to obtain users, I have decided to add a new section to the site. Because I have a decent amount of experience reading research papers (and because I have access to a good many online journals), I have decided to add a section of the site where I summarize cool healthcare related research articles so that they can be read easily (+ give some relevant background). I have just posted the first one.

I have also added social media buttons to some areas of the site. I plan on adding them to the whole site.

Thoughts?

That braggs cider vinegar? Why the heck is it being advertised for dandruff?