What do you expect out of a fishing website

I started a thread on this subject a while back and you guys gave a lot of
great suggestions. I could not find the original thread so I started a new
one. (maybe it was somewhere else where I started the thread) Anyway, here
is what I have done with my personal site based on what you guys had to say.

After much review I have taken a lot of the advise you guys gave me and
revamped one of my websites:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

I cleaned up the front page to make navigation easier. (I hope) If it
works out I'll make it the template for every page on the site.

I added a discussion forum. I'm still skeptical about the worth of this,
but we shall see. I also tied in pro specific groups that are linked in
from those websites. (A couple local pros I know personally) Who knows.

I added last updated dates to many of the in text links so people can see at
a glance if those pages have anything new since their last visit.
--
Bob La Londe
www.YumaBassMan.com
All about fishing in Yuma, Arizona
Promote Your Fishing Website FOR FREE

On Thu, 26 Feb 2004 08:04:35 -0700, "Bob La Londe"
wrote:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

I cleaned up the front page to make navigation easier. (I hope) If it
works out I'll make it the template for every page on the site.

I added a discussion forum. I'm still skeptical about the worth of this,
but we shall see. I also tied in pro specific groups that are linked in
from those websites. (A couple local pros I know personally) Who knows.

I added last updated dates to many of the in text links so people can see at
a glance if those pages have anything new since their last visit.

A template for every page will make your life easier in the
longrun for updating your fishing site, etc. The discussion forum is
cool. Why not have one? Chances are that your fishing site will get
very popular over the years (especially in your region) and your
discussion forum will really take off..

I did my fishing website
http://www.hoosierwebsites.com/onthewater/ a long time ago (somewhere
btw 1995 and 1997) and wanted it to be something different (story
format) to highlight and encourage fishing. Over the years, I've
received a ton of emails from guys that I have fished with in the past
to newcomers to the sport to local fishermen who wanted more info on
something that they thought I might be ablie to provide. IMO, my site
has been a huge success and I'd strongly encourage as many fishermen
as possible to make their own fishing sites to help grow fishing...

--
Dwayne E. Cooper, Atty at Law
Indianapolis, IN
Email:
Web Page: http://www.cooperlegalservices.com
Personal Fishing Web Page: http://www.hoosierwebsites.com/OnTheWater
Favorite Fishing Web Page: http://www.hoosiertradingpost.com/FishingTackle
1st Annual ROFB Classic Winner

I like it!
Thanks Bob for sharing.
Good luck and your favorite partner!
John
"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
I started a thread on this subject a while back and you guys gave a lot of
great suggestions. I could not find the original thread so I started a
new
one. (maybe it was somewhere else where I started the thread) Anyway,
here
is what I have done with my personal site based on what you guys had to
say.

After much review I have taken a lot of the advise you guys gave me and
revamped one of my websites:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

I cleaned up the front page to make navigation easier. (I hope) If it
works out I'll make it the template for every page on the site.

I added a discussion forum. I'm still skeptical about the worth of this,
but we shall see. I also tied in pro specific groups that are linked in
from those websites. (A couple local pros I know personally) Who knows.

I added last updated dates to many of the in text links so people can see
at
a glance if those pages have anything new since their last visit.
--
Bob La Londe
www.YumaBassMan.com
All about fishing in Yuma, Arizona
Promote Your Fishing Website FOR FREE

Bob,

A template will make things easier, and more "professional" looking by
keeping things consistent from page to page. I have been visiting
your site for a while now, I agree this layout is easier than the old
one. Lots of good info on your site (still) - I really appreciate
your honest reviews as much as anything.

The Forum is a good idea. If the pros are locally known, it will help
to increase traffic, and provide value to the visitors.

The only other comment I have on the layout is that it is too wide.
Users have no problem scrolling down a page, but they do not like to
scroll right/left. Even full screen at 1024x768 I had to scroll to
the right to see the entire page. Visitors using 800x600 will be
missing a large portion of the page. (30-40% of web surfers are still
running 800x600, and most people surfing 1024x768 are not running full
screen - use % tables, or fix width for 800x600)

Overall, a good start to a redesign (not an easy task).

Kurt



On Thu, 26 Feb 2004 08:04:35 -0700, "Bob La Londe"
wrote:

I started a thread on this subject a while back and you guys gave a lot of
great suggestions. I could not find the original thread so I started a new
one. (maybe it was somewhere else where I started the thread) Anyway, here
is what I have done with my personal site based on what you guys had to say.

After much review I have taken a lot of the advise you guys gave me and
revamped one of my websites:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

I cleaned up the front page to make navigation easier. (I hope) If it
works out I'll make it the template for every page on the site.

I added a discussion forum. I'm still skeptical about the worth of this,
but we shall see. I also tied in pro specific groups that are linked in
from those websites. (A couple local pros I know personally) Who knows.

I added last updated dates to many of the in text links so people can see at
a glance if those pages have anything new since their last visit.

"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
I started a thread on this subject a while back and you guys gave a lot of
great suggestions. I could not find the original thread so I started a
new
one. (maybe it was somewhere else where I started the thread) Anyway,
here
is what I have done with my personal site based on what you guys had to
say.

After much review I have taken a lot of the advise you guys gave me and
revamped one of my websites:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

SNIP


Bob,
Looks good.... Only thing I would suggest is to set your resolution to
at least 800 X 600 (maybe a little lower) and review your layout. It's a
little wide, requiring a lot of horizontal scrolling. People will leave
your page out of frustration because of this seemingly minor issue.
At the same time, try resizing your browser smaller, and watch how your
page adjusts to that new window size. It really shouldn't immeidately
require horizontal scrolling. Obviously, there are limits to what you would
like your minimum viewable area to be, but many people work with several
windows open at a time and will not be viewing your page with a full width
or height browser. Height isn't nearly as important, since people are
already used to scrolling, but an endless lenght of vertical height will
also detract from your site. Better to make links to other content after
they have scrolled about a full browser down into your page....And as
always, there are exceptions to this. A page like the Fishing Directory on
the ROFB site is a good example (http://www.rofb.net/comm_links.htm).
That's why it has the hyperlinks at the top, to quickly jump to the section
of the page people are interested in...


Just my two cents... Good luck with your site!
--
Andrew Kidd
http://www.amiasoft.com/ - Software for the rest of us!
http://www.rofb.net/ - ROFB Newsgroup Home

Set your monitors resolution to 800x600 then reformat you pages to conform
to that size. That is the standard resolution, i.e.. most common, at this
point in time. You have to appeal to the majority of systems out there with
the lower resolution. I have been doing web's for 6 years, you have a good
start, Bob. Look at other pages out there from well known sites like
Bassmasters, NAFC, In fisherman .... A template - one uniform layout sheet
for all your pages is more pleasing.




"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
I started a thread on this subject a while back and you guys gave a lot of
great suggestions. I could not find the original thread so I started a
new
one. (maybe it was somewhere else where I started the thread) Anyway,
here
is what I have done with my personal site based on what you guys had to
say.

After much review I have taken a lot of the advise you guys gave me and
revamped one of my websites:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

I cleaned up the front page to make navigation easier. (I hope) If it
works out I'll make it the template for every page on the site.

I added a discussion forum. I'm still skeptical about the worth of this,
but we shall see. I also tied in pro specific groups that are linked in
from those websites. (A couple local pros I know personally) Who knows.

I added last updated dates to many of the in text links so people can see
at
a glance if those pages have anything new since their last visit.
--
Bob La Londe
www.YumaBassMan.com
All about fishing in Yuma, Arizona
Promote Your Fishing Website FOR FREE

That size is much better.


"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
I started a thread on this subject a while back and you guys gave a lot of
great suggestions. I could not find the original thread so I started a
new
one. (maybe it was somewhere else where I started the thread) Anyway,
here
is what I have done with my personal site based on what you guys had to
say.

After much review I have taken a lot of the advise you guys gave me and
revamped one of my websites:

http://www.YumaBassMan.com

I cleaned up the front page to make navigation easier. (I hope) If it
works out I'll make it the template for every page on the site.

I added a discussion forum. I'm still skeptical about the worth of this,
but we shall see. I also tied in pro specific groups that are linked in
from those websites. (A couple local pros I know personally) Who knows.

I added last updated dates to many of the in text links so people can see
at
a glance if those pages have anything new since their last visit.
--
Bob La Londe
www.YumaBassMan.com
All about fishing in Yuma, Arizona
Promote Your Fishing Website FOR FREE

"Illinois Fisherman" wrote in message
om...

That size is much better.

Thanks, Now to make the page more visibly appealing. Then I can use it for
a template for the rest of the site.

Try this for a clean layout, its one of mine.

http://www.annard.com/


"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
s.com...
"Illinois Fisherman" wrote in message
om...

That size is much better.

Thanks, Now to make the page more visibly appealing. Then I can use it
for
a template for the rest of the site.

"Illinois Fisherman" wrote in message
om...
Try this for a clean layout, its one of mine.

http://www.annard.com/


"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
s.com...
"Illinois Fisherman" wrote in message
om...

That size is much better.

Thanks, Now to make the page more visibly appealing. Then I can use it
for
a template for the rest of the site.




I like that, but it would be nice to figure out how to maximize the width
based on the browser size.

In a 1280 by 1024 screen that page has a lot of white space in the middle.

Is there a way to fix it at a max width of 800 and a percentage of width
instead at lower resolutions?

Also, some sites I have noticed have an extra navigation and information bar
down one side when viewed on a wider resolution, and the bar doesn't show
when the page is loaded on a browser when the resolution is lower. How do
you do that?

I imagine it has to be done with JAVA or maybe PHP if the user sends stats
to the server when they visit the site, but I haven't wuite figured out how.
I know visitors behind a firewall often don't send any stats back to the
server when they visit, but most do.

If you want to help more lets take this to e-mai since we are getting a
little off topic.

webmaster @ yumabassman dot com

--
Bob La Londe
www.YumaBassMan.com
All about fishing in Yuma, Arizona
Promote Your Fishing Website FOR FREE