TrailBadger.com has re-launched!

[banjoboy]

We have had a crack at improving the TrailBadger.com site. There are a few bits and pieces not quite as they should be with it, but we were keen to get it out there. Call it a beta-site!

Would really appreciate any comments or suggestions to improve.

Cheers.

Visit the new TrailBadger.com website (http://www.trailbadger.com/).

[TrixR4kidz]

Has potential and looks the part, but my suggestion would be to take it away and fix it.
Only a few of the pages actually loaded up for me, and they were really slooooooow.

[Steveb]

Looks damn good, but...

A few years ago site were very simple and plain, so designers started jazzing them up, making them more departmentalised, yours is a fine example of this design. With the advent of broadband sites have got much more bandwidth intensive. But things are going back to plain and simple. Look at the most successful informative sites and they're going back to single menus, less graphics and minimal flash. You need to be careful that your new design doesn't look dated in the near future.

This return to basics is driven by the average attention span of your viewers. Sadly it's dropping. If a user can't find what they want REALLY quickly they'll hit the back button to the Google results and try another site. Try this: Get an occasional web user to find something on the site. If they've not found it within ten seconds, rethink your site.

Don't take this the wrong way, you guys do great work so keep it up.

[trailfox]

A good improvement, all pages load up quickly for me on FF3 and the trail finder module is a good way to perform the task once you find out what the buttons do.

As far as layout goes, as steve says, there are alot of modules and text so it can look a bit 'noisy' but that is really just isolated to your home page (but it is one of the most important). Your designer probalby drew up a wire frame for the site (a page with just lines and boxes of basic elements in the site) so really the simpler it is whilst still performing its function well the easier it will be for people to find their way about..

Oh and your header background image seems to have a bit of a problem with size:
http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/7763/94677239.jpg
maybe thats just with me but its the same on IE7 and FF3

[TrixR4kidz]

Seems to be working faster now. The search didn't work earlier but works grand now. No issues with image sizes (mac - Firefox3).

Looks wise, it's obviously aimed at girls and XC riders :D

Good to see you got a bit of sponsorship too. Keep it up laddo.

[timH]

Looking good. (http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/)

[Steveb]

Looking good. (http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/)

Still brilliant.

[suspectmonkey]

This return to basics is driven by the average attention span of your viewers. Sadly it's dropping.

I think part of this is also driven by people browsing the internet on more portable devices now, such as the iPhone or the mobile Opera browser. Even netbooks for that matter running lower resolutions. It's a real hassle trying to navigate a site crammed with info on a screen that measures 3" x 2", and even worse if you hit a Flash site on the iPhone ;)

The new site looks great on my home computer running Safari, but is an absolute dogs dinner on my work computer running IE6. Most likely down to the lower resolution of my work computer which is painfully stuck in the dark ages! Aesthetically I think the new trailbadger.com is a lot better to look at, but I do agree with some of the comments that its less convenient to navigate. I really do like the website for its content though, its a great resource and I think a real benefit to the MTB community.

[banjoboy]

Thanks for the feedback so far, guys. All fair and gratefully received. I have been out of the picture for the last ten days or so, so am slow getting to this.

I think what we are likely to do is just run it like this for a couple of months, and then maybe refine various bits and pieces and simplify how things work, based on user feedback comments and analytics.

Any other thoughts, good or bad, very much appreciated. Cheers.

[Aidso]

Looks wise, it's obviously aimed at girls and XC riders :D


If you navigate to the "about us" page, it clearly states his intentions :). I spent about an hour on this site on Saturday and especially like the search on the left hand side that shows you trails based on your criteria - "Forest", "Open riding..." etc. Most of the time people go straight for a menu and this is what jumped out at me first.
I also like the YouTube videos of trails although i had no sound at the time.

Grand job!

[mattias-law]

i think that that is a brilliant site, the pages loaded up instantly and worked great for me much better than the last and i already made a review of the woodburn forest trail

[JAC]

Woodburn round Carrick?