Calling out Overclockers!

Jakeee · 25 Mar 2011 at 15:16

I can see your having issues putting everything together on your homepage, be careful as I've made similar mistakes in the past. A website needs to work in synergy when it comes to design and structure, this balance can start to corrupt when you start updating panels and changing colours, fonts etc.

Consider a colour scheme and keep to it, its very easy coping design aspects off other sites such as Facebook (Image below) which ends up clashing the whole design. The issue with this is, you'll make the site look cheap and also you'll have problems making the right bits stand out to customers (Such as the bundles and portable section, those buttons don't go with with the website design and blend into the background too much).

Usability is major part on any e-commerce site! When it comes to the web, people don't read, they scan! You need the right parts to jump out such as today only offers and the bundles buttons . . . whilst keeping the websites theme and clear layout.

Notice the grain? That is because you reduced the quality when saving it for web.

If you want help on your website design or updates, It would be an honour

gord · 25 Mar 2011 at 17:20

OcUK are weak on the attention to detail with their site.

That new bundles/systems graphic, its images. Images that don't give any benefit to SEO because they have no alt tags and have been saved with enough compression to give a visible loss in fidelity. Which for something so primarily positioned is quite mad. There's a white bit on that left border too.

And those blue headers, I thought you had mocked them up but they are on the site! They are really in-congruent. The homepage is looking quite messy nowadays, like several designers have had a go but no single designer has evolved the entire page properly.

fez · 25 Mar 2011 at 17:39

Thats quite an odd choice to have an image with that text on it. Why not just use css3 and leave them square on old browsers; or just have a background image and html over the top.

Controversial.

reflux · 25 Mar 2011 at 17:43

gord said:
And those blue headers, I thought you had mocked them up but they are on the site! They are really in-congruent. The homepage is looking quite messy nowadays, like several designers have had a go but no single designer has evolved the entire page properly.

Aye, think you've hit the nail on the head there. Nice logo, but the site itself is rather messy and there isn't a lot of branding going on vs. competitors.

PoD · 25 Mar 2011 at 20:08

Yeah all as said above, this site has a colour scheme and it needs to stick with it.

The main page does look cluttered, I hate to use the popular expression, but minimalism is certainly the road to strong design.

One major point why are there two menus (top and left) doing essentially the same thing?

atmax1 · 25 Mar 2011 at 20:47

I think the site needs a new design but please don't shrink the images so much that you can tell.. It looks tacky.. but I like the blue and red, the blue stands out and my eyes go to it

But I see you guys are still using tables :/

SoapSurgeon · 25 Mar 2011 at 21:11

the favicon is poor too

FabienO · 25 Mar 2011 at 21:27

The site is too wide too.

TidyWorks · 25 Mar 2011 at 22:05

It looks dated, I agree it needs a redesign, and less of the tacky slideshow on the homepage.

AHarvey · 25 Mar 2011 at 22:25

I think the site is far too crowded now and a redesign would be good.

As for photos, some nice big photos would be nice to really view the products. Would certainly be willing to swap PC bits for photography

MuGeN · 25 Mar 2011 at 22:26

C'mon guys you know full well they won't change anything on their site based on anything said on the forum (despite the fact that the forum is what made the shop what it is today imo

)

Mr Gimp · 25 Mar 2011 at 22:34

I adore the site for its simplicity and speed, and admire the fact that things are being changed for good reason, but it almost comes across as if a junior designer has stepped in some very big shoes! Bring back the old site <3

azteched · 25 Mar 2011 at 22:50

TBH the OCUK site is still infinitely more usable than many of its competitors' sites.
Sure stuff like grainy images is a bit poor, but for non-web designers, it's not particularly important.

atmax1 · 25 Mar 2011 at 23:23

A Problem with IE9

I wonder if I designed a more modern clean layout in my spare time If ocuk would look at it... But MuGeN is right, they wont change anything.

Mr Gimp · 25 Mar 2011 at 23:30

You never know. Mark (Spie) designed the original site IIRC, and the bloke obviously has an eye for design as that stayed for years without complaint, so I'm sure some constructive criticsm if things are getting a bit squiffy may be taken on board?

atmax1 · 25 Mar 2011 at 23:52

May have to give it a try, others should as well.. get a concept design thread going for overclockers lol

The design was good for it's time though, It is still useable If they fix the IE9 bug.. just would be nice to see overclockers fix up the website and forums and get rid of them dam tables lol

stoke1863 · 25 Mar 2011 at 23:53

atmax1 said:
May have to give it a try, others should as well.. get a concept design thread going for overclockers lol

dont do free work. They hire a graphic designer for a reason. Let them sort it out them selfs

Mattus · 26 Mar 2011 at 00:10

Jakeee said:
Notice the grain? That is because you reduced the quality when saving it for web.

It looks plain nasty. Even if they're set on using an image where HTML and CSS would be better, they could at least use a PNG or GIF image to avoid the artifacting around the text. JPEG for photographic content, not for line art. That's basic stuff.

Jakeee · 26 Mar 2011 at 01:12

Glad all you guys have the same feeling towards the design.

I've used this website for around 6 years now and love it but since the new design, I've found myself more on the forum and less looking at the new arrivals and what not. Calling out the designer, here's some advice:

1. Create a mock up of the overall new design including layout and colour scheme. This will give you an idea on how the outcome will look and prevent another Clash of the titans

2. Don't add too many colours, that includes shades

You want to be able to bold certain objects like the buttons, today only and other areas that you want to attract customers.
3. Drop the horizontal tab, it was born on Amazon and should have died on Amazon

I can't speak for everyone but I don't think I've ever used it haha, the vertical navigation is structured nicely.
4. I'm pretty sure I know why a lot of the website is not changed and that is because your scared to mess with the current PHP code/login area

I noticed the job ad earlier.

Mattus said:
It looks plain nasty. Even if they're set on using an image where HTML and CSS would be better, they could at least use a PNG or GIF image to avoid the artifacting around the text. JPEG for photographic content, not for line art. That's basic stuff.

For such a large site it is unprofessional, I would love the opportunity to work on a website as big as OCuk, and I know for a fact I would do a much nicer job

T

Rroff · 26 Mar 2011 at 01:24

I dunno - one of the reasons I tend to shop with OcUK is that the design is very simple to get to exactly what I want with the minimum amount of visual "noise" and minimal navigation.

Some of you guys might do a more "professional" job on the site I'm sure but it would end up exactly like every other ecommerce site that I hate where you have to look about 3 times to find what you need to click on to go where you want next.

The odd attention to detail aside not much wrong with the site really.