Review My Site? Recommendations :)

[addz123]

Feel like I've reached that time where I ask everone to get frisky and give my site a good old fashioned PAL review...lol

Any recommendations welcome, I'd particularly like to know what your first impressions are. Also what you think of site overall (www.mosesbet.com).

With respect to what I've done so far, I've aimed to make it student friendly, whilst writing a ton of unique feature articles, strategy, hints tips and biographies - all with long-tail seo hits for general visitors in mind.

Site is around 4 months old, traffic is around 40-60 uniques per day. I'm link building at the moment and aiming to get to pr2 by new years.

Thanks
adam

[Guerreiro]

Is it the site in your signature or a different one?

[addz123]

yes sorrry it's the one in signature, just edited post to make it more clear (i realise i dont do student leagues anymore).

[Unknown Webmaster]

Having 2 menus at the top confused the hell out of me - I would remove the bottom one. It may make the site a bit harder to navigate, but I think you have "too much stuff" for people to decide what to do, and they will spend more time on your site, if you give them less choices.

Are you seeing results with the 3 articles you have featured on the front page?

What kind of tracking are you using?

[Guerreiro]

I agree with UW, the two menu bars are confusing. Also I would change the banner (for Carbon Poker) below the Current Promotions image/menu (with the arrows that do not work, at least not in the latest Firefox). This banner looks weird there. Other than that how is the composition working? Are all the latest articles on the left or are there only specific ones there. And what about the right column of the two. Try to get Video Section and Internet Poker Strategy at the same height.

I like the template. Nice and clean and slick. This might be just me, but to me it feels like you have to many headers, i.e. Internet Poker Strategy, Poker Player biographies, About us, Recent Posts and Latest Poker Articles + Top Poker Articles and Learn Internet Poker and Popular Poker Tips. It is just too much for me. How is the site doing for you?

[addz123]

Guerreiro Response:

Are you saying i should remove the carbon poker banner or just change it? arrows work fine in firefox for me and my friends. I understand what you mean about too many headers, I just thought it's better to have a selection of things on demand that are instantly available.

With respect to how is the composition working - all articles features on the page are the latest for their categories. THough I don't want to explain how my site works here. Just want to get a review firstly...

Unknown Webmaster response
i don't know what '3 articles' you are talking about as there are 6. Also, do you mean am i getting seo rsults for articles on first page, or results as in people are clicking on them when they come to my site?

i'm just using simple wp wassup to track visitors. I have a webalizer also but i find wp wassupt plug in nicer and easier to use.

[Unknown Webmaster]

I meant the 3 articles shown in the "Current promotions for Our Players" box on the front page. The box is taking up a lot of space on the front page, and most of the sites I have seen use a box like that try to hoard people towards guides that lead people to sign up at at poker room. Therefore I'm wondering if you are seeing the results you want...

-----

There are a lot of good content on the site, however, the articles I read weren't really "selling" anything. In an article like this one, I would include something like "you can follow the action yourself on Full Tilt Poker", or link to one of your own articles that has a focus on getting the visitor to click through to a poker room. I'm absolutely horrible at doing this on my own sites, so you are probably better off reading this description than listening to me.


Consider setting up a /goto/ folder for your affiliate links. It will make it much easier to change them if you should need to replace one at some point.

[FirstTimePokerPlayer]

First impression: it looks professional because of the template, but it is also cluttered and lacks an own ‘identity’ (originality). The logo is nice and maybe you could do something with the yellow combined with the black to create some of that identity in the rest of your design. You could start with your favicon .

About the navigation menu’s: two rows is too much, and some of it is double. Internet poker, internet poker strategy, poker strategy, learn internet poker, poker hints and tips: . Just some ideas: bring it back to just one row, like the upper one now. Lose the ‘home’ tab and just make your logo clickable. Ad a tab ‘videos’ and ‘Student Forum’ (its in your tagline!) to the top row, ad ‘Promotions’ with the ‘Student promotions’, ‘poker promotions’ and ‘rakeback’ dropping down. Keep all descriptions in the dropped down menus on one line. Ditch the second top navigation menu and ad a ‘categories’ list in the right column instead.

The top of your homepage is indeed a bit too much I think. Not only two rows of menu’s, but below that a huge banner (clicking the arrows works in FF 3.5.5) AND a carbon poker banner. And next to that “Learn poker strategy!” is also pulling some attention and I would be ready to hit the panic back button if it wasn’t for my huge screen that also shows some interesting titles of articles somewhere below the crowdedness.

Although..., I think that 3 columns next to each other isn’t easy to navigate through and still looks pretty busy. Maybe if you merge the middle and left column by extending the headings (the black bars with for example latest poker articles) over the width of both these columns and then dividing the content below each heading in two columns (Phil Ivey and Durrr next to each other) it would be better. I would separate the right column more from the other two columns in its content. At first I thought it was an add column, then I saw some articles listed also, and two of the perceived adds are actually links to one of your pages.

Does it work to tell new players to play poker ‘here’ and then throw 4 rooms at them? Why not just one and tell them why also? If I where a new player, I would have to go through the hassle of finding out which of the four would be best, but do I have to do that on another site, because… I can’t see something like ‘poker rooms’ or ‘room reviews’ on your home page? After a serious search I found the link ‘where to play poker’ and found 4 reviews listed (but not one for Party, which I happened to be most interested in… ;-). Edit: also discovered it under ‘internet poker’ at the top now.

I was actually interested in reading where the name mosesbet came from, but was heavily disappointed by your ‘about us’ page, which is basically not there (directory/sitemap from top nav or just a big add following the banner in the right column under about us to ‘internet poker’). Also, what makes your site a ‘Student poker site’ specifically? Should be a more of a theme in your content I think if that's what you want people to associate your site with.

I don’t know anything about sports betting and your site doesn’t help me with that. My gut feeling is that it comprises more than just football. This looks like it has to be developed more to become sports betting instead of some football info? (Also, the scores are displayed with a horizontal scrollbar).

You have the same banner (‘learn poker’ with a chick) displayed very often and pointing to different pages. (I go to a page clicking on her, and then she’s there waiting on that page to take me to another one). I wouldn’t do that. Then I’d rather have a text link that tells me more about where I’m going.

Your ‘how to bluff’ section is quite extensive. It is clear that you are aiming for Google to pick up on your phrase ‘how to bluff in poker’ seeing it is bold every time it is used. That doesn’t seem functional for the reader to me. Also, maybe your titles could be a bit more descriptive. I was confused about the difference between ‘how often’ and ‘when’ should you bluff and expected something like ‘most effective bluffs to use’ or ‘what makes the best bluff’ in the ‘best poker bluffs’ article instead of a listing of ballsy moves by the pros.

Your poker strategy main page is very clear, a nice image is used, great overview! I guess it is debatable what could be categorized as beginner, medium and advanced strategy though. You could make your articles clearer by using summarizing tables (in the bankroll management article for example) or using better titles/headings (trouble hands in Texas hold’em: what are the trouble hands? Guess I have to read the whole scenario, else I won’t know what I’m avoiding later, probably trouble though).


Wow, this might sound very harsh all-in-all. (Decided to post it eventually anyway as you can see ). Don’t understand me wrong though, I think with some attention to the navigation, the arrangement of your home page content and your articles (titles/subtitles/use of a summarizing figure or bolded keyphrase here and there) things will be much better.

Also, I’m just a beginner with all this myself. Probably not much of a help when it comes to converting players and whatnot because of that. So, take it for what it’s worth and especially don’t let yourself be discouraged by all my rambling.

[Guerreiro]

Sorry, I would remove that banner. It just looks like it is breaking up the design there.

[Dave]

Who cares what your site looks like?

Are you making any money for all your effort?

I PM'd you my advise.

Ignore it at your own peril.

Stay a wanabee poker affiliate portal owner with an awesome looking website you can show off to your friends and family ...... or nuckle down and make some real money.

The choice is yours.

A simple affiliate text link in front on enough people can make you rich.

Targeted buyer traffic multiplied by conversion percentage = recurring money in your pocket in the poker affiliate game.

It really is just that simple.

Dave