Buechee

I think flash is only good on a all flash site, like in games.

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forfeitclothing

Im trying to understand "Frames" And why they are bad.. so let me get this straight

a navigation bar is a frame, but another tip was to keep navigation easy. So if your nav. bar goes from page to page so you can go to any part of the website easier, why is this bad?

Maybe i have the wrong idea about all of this, can someone give me a "Do, and dont" or an example of a frame or a bad + good frame or something.

But im in the process of writing up a website guide for my designer, and This is sooo helpfull. Most of it applies to the pro. myspace i am creating as well. Except the music, Myspace and music are just going to be like that, And i only do it for my bands that I sponsor!

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Solmu

Quote: Originally Posted by forfeitclothing Im trying to understand "Frames" And why they are bad..

Frames are so out of date, it's possible they were before your time - you may simply have not seen them, or seen them enough to take notice. You don't see them around much anymore.

You can read a Wikipedia article on them here... I'm trying (and failing) to come up with a site I could link to for an example, but no major sites use them that I know of.

This google search is probably your best bet.

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TripleT

Flash intros take too long to load and they are sleeping pills

 

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Twinge

Quote: Originally Posted by Solmu This google search is probably your best bet.

The second result there (or first of 'why frames suck') is a good overview. They can't be navigated or bookmarked correctly and they can cause other hassles and problems as well. In short, they offer you nothing that you can't do another way - better and just as easy (or easier).

A simple example of this is using SSI (Server Side Includes). With this, you can reproduce the one advantage of frames - only having to edit a single file to change an element of multiple pages - without the downside. Basically, you'd have, for example, one file containing all the navigation menu code. Each other page references this one file (Google SSI for details - it's really simple). If you need to add a new option in your navigation, you simply edit this one file and you're good to go for every page.

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TomandBunny

Honestly I can care less if frames are so out of date, I use them because people always tell me they hate sites that don't have them because they feel my out of date frames site is faster and easier to navigate then joe blow over there.

I read every post and while reading I had to put my mindset into everyone is just giving their opinion for themselves and while valuable, will it work for my instance?

I figure that by reading more why people were saying the things they were saying vs just saying how it should be I came to understand the mindsets a little more.

I agree with allot of people, flash is useless, it looks pretty but people are not there to watch a movie, unless maybe if you give them an option to watch it or not! say a link that says "See our Ad or Commercial" I have been known to click those, but being forced to watch flash I look straight for the skip intro link or if none exist I leave the site!

Shipping, Tax and all those other "Hidden" cost I too hate those with a passion, so on my site I made everything a What you see is what you pay period! if I am charging 20 bucks, that includes shipping, handling, Tax and credit card fees! everything. so far I am getting good reviews on that.

payments/Shopping carts. we have on any screen your looking at our merchandise a way to add it to your shopping cart. we do this because we don't want to have someone go back to the original screen to purchase something for when they took the time to enlarge the image to get a better look we want them to buy on impulse right there on the spot.

We also do vinyl cutting for stickers and for one off shirts. we have now on all orders off the site, we wait 1 week and we mail them a surprise decal for their car! this really has shocked people and has made them not only ask us for our cards to give people but they now come to our site to buy more shirts! we could send the decal in the same package as others have suggested, but we thought that unexpected envelope a week or so later with a nice thank you letter and a cool decal for their car window just makes a bit more difference.

I really can't think of much more but hope this helps anyone and I would like to thank everyone who took the time to not just say what should be done but the time to explain why as that was more valuable then just the 5 quick reasons without the story behind it.

 

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Rodney

Quote: Honestly I can care less if frames are so out of date, I use them because people always tell me they hate sites that don't have them because they feel my out of date frames site is faster and easier to navigate then joe blow over there.

It really depends on what people are comparing your site to.

There's no real reason why your site should be faster than a site without frames or easier to navigate than a properly designed site without frames.

If your navigation is in the same spot on every page of your site and is very consistent, then it should be easy to navigate with or without frames.

I can honestly say that in 11+ years of designing websites and talking to customers, web surfers and clients, I've never heard someone say they hate sites that don't have frames. That's the first time I've ever heard anything like that

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TomandBunny

Quote: Originally Posted by Rodney I can honestly say that in 11+ years of designing websites and talking to customers, web surfers and clients, I've never heard someone say they hate sites that don't have frames. That's the first time I've ever heard anything like that

Let me say it this way, they like how easy my site is to navigate! good enough for me! therefore I see no reason to change my layout.

they say it is faster because my sites are easy to find everything quickly without having to look for it.

I see it being faster myself because personally I have seen sites where all the information is in the same place as it should, but everything has to load every time you click a page whereas on my frames site only the main window changes and nothing else.

I know your going to comeback with something else, let me save you the time, it works for me and is easy for my customers and I have not suffered any with my layout so I personally do not plan to change from the frames layout anytime soon and I get allot of compliments from people and those are the ones I am out to impress.

Just because you have not personally heard something doesn't really justify that it hasn't been said to me!

11+ years, Wow, impressive. that will make me sleep better tonight .

 

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toastynhere

Design, ease of use and up front pricing are crucial for me.

The last thing I've really been paying attention to is what sort of payment options do they offer. I've had some crazy situations lately with Paypal and steer away from doing business with sites that offer it.

just my 2 cents

kevin

 

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TomandBunny

Oh, lemme point out. I don't like sites that want me to create an account to buy one shirt. I have been on five sites now that when you go to pay it requires you to create a profile. I just click the close button on my browser. to me that is a pain and I see no need for it.

 

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Rodney

Quote: Let me say it this way, they like how easy my site is to navigate! good enough for me! therefore I see no reason to change my layout.

Nobody asked you to change your layout They just commented how frames aren't the most useable ways to make a site easy to navigate.

Of course it's your site to do as you please...if it works for you, then there's obviously nothing you need to fix. I'm not sure where you felt that people were trying to change you or your site?

Quote: they say it is faster because my sites are easy to find everything quickly without having to look for it.

That should definitely be a primary focus for anybody creating a website. Frames or no frames, the navigation should be consistent and easy to find.

Quote: I see it being faster myself because personally I have seen sites where all the information is in the same place as it should, but everything has to load every time you click a page whereas on my frames site only the main window changes and nothing else.

I can see how that would seem faster. But the navigation elements only add a few kb at most to the page reload, so it really shouldn't be that much faster

Quote: I know your going to comeback with something else, let me save you the time, it works for me and is easy for my customers and I have not suffered any with my layout so I personally do not plan to change from the frames layout anytime soon and I get allot of compliments from people and those are the ones I am out to impress.

Nobody asked you to change. Not sure why you feel someone is trying to change your mind on something. People are sharing their best practice tips that they've learned. It's up to anybody reading to decide whether or not to implement the tips on their sites. Nobody's forcing you to do anything

If you've got compliments on the site, that's great! No complaints about the site is nice too (although that could mean a new customer left in frustration without taking the time to comment, but that could also mean that the way you implemented your frames is very user friendly).

Quote: Just because you have not personally heard something doesn't really justify that it hasn't been said to me!

I never said that it hadn't been said to you. I said it was the first time I had heard anything like that. It wasn't doubting you... I have no idea what your customers say to you. Just commenting that it was the first time I had heard of a web surfer complain that other sites didn't have frames.

Even after 11+ years of doing this, I learn new things all the time. That was my new thing learned for today

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ClassicDisasterC

i tihnk the best thing to do is go on a competitors site and look at what they are doing. Would you buy the shirt? is it easy payment accessability? is there many kinds of payments accepted?
ask yourself what do YOU want as a customer
odds are if you want certain things out of a site then most people will want the same

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Solmu

Quote: Originally Posted by TomandBunny I have not suffered any with my layout

Cool. What kind of tests did you do to establish this? It's always so hard to know if you're missing out on sales from doing something stupid or if everything is just dandy, so your experience might be able to help others who are facing the same problem.

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TomandBunny

Quote: Originally Posted by Solmu Cool. What kind of tests did you do to establish this? It's always so hard to know if you're missing out on sales from doing something stupid or if everything is just dandy, so your experience might be able to help others who are facing the same problem.

The only real test I did was give some sites to just ordinary folks who are not computer savvy and asked them some questions and to rate some sites, I did this with both people I know (yup I am aware they will tell me what they think I want to hear) but honestly these friends are brutally honest with me, but a few are students and I asked them to take it to their classes and get opinions..

I don't want to mention the sites because I don't feel that would be nice and I will just say I selected sites that you all know or if not you have seen their shirts out somewhere and some in very well known stores in every mall in america, but I asked them to rate the following on each site.

Of all the sites, what did you find the best of the following.
1. Layout
2. Merchandise
3. ease of use
4. finding what your looking for
5. graphic design (did graphics play a role in you staying longer)
6. graphic design (what site did you like the best)
7. Domain Name (in order of the names, which did they like the best to worst)
8. Tell me anything I missed asking you

Inside the site, what did they feel about
Cost?
Shipping and Handling?
Time frame? (some sites claim to need 2 to 3 weeks to ship)
Return policy (I don't fully have one yet but I wanted to know who's they liked the best to model after)

any suggestions.

Right now I am still in the process of building my site, and I am making quite of few sales without really any promotions and mostly just word of mouth! the biggest suggestion was photos of people actually wearing my stuff! I agree fully with that 100% Now I have been on the hunt for models. I already have a few ho