Please Be honest/blunt

[yana2010]

I am working on a new site aimed towards parenting and networking. The address is http://parentpalace.com
What I'm looking for is honestly blunt reviews of the site. There is little to no content at the moment, it just went live. Content is being added very slowly. I mainly want critiques on the layout/ease of use/overall appearance and whatever else you think of it!
I have very little design experience, this is my first site attempt. I've made several templates, the one up now is the one I like the best, but am looking to please an audience, not myself.

 

[MaestroFX1]

Hey yana!

1.Enable mod_rewrite/SEO friendly urls.
2.It is slow/heavy.I'm on 8mbps,but it is slow and heavy(comparative basis).Probably due to chat script.
3.Usability - Drop-down menu,can't go wrong with that!
4.Usability - Add a sitemap for better navigation.
5.Looks - okay.
6.Take measures to secure your website,won't comment further!
7.Add search box in your homepage.

Best of Luck!

 

[cybrax]

Definitely suffering from something and the meebo/facebook style chat widget really needs to come off the landing page. If you really must have it there then it needs to be swapped in after the page has loaded with "document.getElementById" or called up from javascript/ iframe combo.

Plenty of nice javascript/css menu scripts about the web as well as gallery/ slideshows something should appeal from dynamicdrive.com.

Search box never hurts, perhaps even some language translation capability

Security wise... I'd slap up an "under construction page" asap

 

[istcse2008]

Hi Yana,

Looks Good but surely needs a decent banner. I would prefer dark blue or green on the banner.

You can check out our company site Unique Webers

That site has three themes which can be changed with just a button chick. But the banner is the same. So use dark colors on light background so that the banner is highlighted.

Nahin