new solicitors' website - www.carmodymoran.ie

[seoda]

Interested in your feedback. Have tried to optimize it by both location and by areas of practice. Have also tried to give it a more 'friendly' vibe (most solicitor websites are quite austere). Tell me what you think. Thanks!

www.carmodymoran.ie

 

[Dublin Domainer]

I think the site looks very well. As you say, it's not too austere, yet at the same time it does have that aura of professionalism that is necessary for the website of a firm of solicitors.

I just glanced at the first two pages, and there are some grammatical issues on the second page - where the firm is described. These are mainly to do with a confusion between singular and plural, as with the 'are' in Carmody Moran Solicitors are a dynamic full service law firm, which should be 'is.' The trend continues with 'provide,' which should be 'provides, and so on.

Where it says 'We . . .' it should say 'We at Carmody Moran Solicitors,' as otherwise there is too jarring a switch from 'the firm' (third person) to 'we' (first person plural).

When you read down through the page, you will see what I mean and be able to fix it quite easily.

I would also suggest that 'with combined experience and expertise' be qualified by inserting 'their' in between 'with' and 'combined,' as you have been talking about two companies (rather than the two people in the pic, presumably.) In fact, I think a better phrase would be: 'Drawing on their combined . . . etc,' as otherwise it could be taken that one firm is providing the experience and the other the expertise, whereas I expect both firms are bringing both to the new company.

This probably sounds like nitpicking to you, but I hope that it has been helpful in some way.

 

[mneylon]

Overall I like it, though you shouldn't be hotlinking to images on other sites

 

[link8r]

Just to echo Blacknight re: hotlinking.

Also, your CMS is redirecting the home page to Carmody Moran Solicitors - solicitors in Dublin 15 and Dublin 7 - from an SEO point of view, you're probably going to have some issues, depending how you manage it.

 

[seoda]

Thanks Guys.

@DublinerDomainer - Good spot on those grammatical sins - I will correct them as per your suggestions. Chuffed with your "aura of professionalism" comment, so all other "nitpicking" forgiven!

@blacknight - glad you like it. I'll look at those image links and have some stock photo credits which I need to use up anyway.

@link8r - Concerned about "SEO issues" you speak of. I know that the site is really in a sub-directory .../cms. If this could become a serious issue in terms of seo I may have to change it - I was just thinking of seeing how it goes re Google et al, but if this is a bad idea I might consider again. Thanks.

 

[link8r]

There are always issues with a redirect. I sometimes compare re-directs to a hack. A lot of people believe that redirects work 100% without fail. I disagree completely.

I dont think they work well for users. I would strongly suggest re-homing this to the root.

 

[seoda]

@link8r

I didn't use relative urls in the build, so I'll have to reformat the internal links etc. I suppose I should make the change though :-(

 

[link8r]

Its not earth shattering - lots of sites redirect. But you're better off using relative urls. Can you do a search and replace?

 

[seoda]

I don't really mind doing it manually. I'm a bit more worried about the links in the left sidebar - these are actually hardcoded 'category' links created from a wordpress plug-in - another dirty hack

I'm just a bit concerned that there might be some unforseen issues, but I guess I can do a back-up and revert to the current one if there are problems.

 

[I4Visual]

Hi

I think you've done brilliantly, with the friendly approach, you're totally right that most solicitors just have this cold, money stealing look to them.
A great site, I would only suggest adding more content a the amount you have seems very minimal and not great for SEO purposes.

 

[tricky_d]

There's a colour inconsistency in your header. Either the logo background should be transparent so that the grain in tail.gif shows for all the header or the tail.gif dark grain should be replaced with black. (If replaced with black remember footer has same grain effect)

Not a fan of the homepage photo: the background seems a bit too dark, folded arms appear a bit defensive and hands in pockets just doesn't seem right.

You have 5 calls to action (How can we help you today?) which is great, but imo they don't quite look right.

page_id= could be more SEO-friendly URLs.

The fees disclaimer could be darker with better contrast for readability.

About Us could mention your years of experience.

Could use rel="nofollow" for the resource links.

Contact Us page has unlinked email addresses and social media URLs. I'd use the regular social media graphics as opposed to the wooden 'scrabble' pieces.

The form doesn't use https so probably isn't really secure.

After the form is sent the message sent text appears below the fold - it should be the main message on that page. Users are also sent back to the contact page without the form. You could check logs to see where users go after the form sent page and out those links into the main body of that page.

I'm not a fan of captchas for a few reasons. Is the volume of form spam really enough of a problem to warrant their use?

You could add a css style for your submit button.

404 (page not found page) is unhelpful and its appearance is inconsistent with the rest of the site. Put a sitemap in as content.

Some of the personnel photos could do with a bit of treatment to make them appear more consistent.

hth

 

[seoda]

Thank you I4Visual, you are most surely a person of impeccable taste

With blog postings and options to split/add more content to the practice pages going forward, we'll get Google to fall in love with us eventually.

Hi

I think you've done brilliantly, with the friendly approach, you're totally right that most solicitors just have this cold, money stealing look to them.
A great site, I would only suggest adding more content a the amount you have seems very minimal and not great for SEO purposes.

 

[tommurphy]

The site is fine but on first impressions maybe it lacked a little bit of colour.I thought it was a little black and white with an occassional splash of red if know what i mean.It is very informative however and easy to find what you are looking for.I thought one of the pics under the tab PEOPLE was of poor quality and could be changed-otherwise good job