31–40 of 56 posts
You never actually mention the size of the bottles. So, $15 for what? Okay if I look at the image maybe I see 7.95 fl oz? Maybe 2.95 fl oz? 235 ml. How big is that? How big is that bottle I usually buy at Trader Joe's for $4? e.g. am I paying a 2x, 3x, 4x, 5x premium for this balsamic? How much different does nice balsamic really have in the taste anywhere? These are all my questions as a low-end balsamic buyer.
Some thoughts: 1. Get a better hero photo. The JPEG artifacts were the very first thing that caught my eye, even before I fully processed what the photo was of. The photo is also too close-up. It's a caprese salad, but because it's so close to the black beads of liquid, that context is lost. Consumers of balsamic use it in context, not alone. The context is lost in this photo. 2. Tune up spacing, padding, margins, li…
No one calls it Balsamic Glaze in the US. We call it Balsamic Dressing.
No one calls it Balsamic Glaze in the US. We call it Balsamic Dressing.
• White slide text against bright background photos is difficult and unpleasant to read
• A small yellow "Order now" or "Read our story" button with ordinary black text is easy to miss and not enticing to click on. Try CSS Button Generator instead: http://www.cssbuttongenerator.com/
• Lots of things on homepage saying "Order now!" but I have no idea what it is I'd be buying or why I ought to want to buy it
• Lots of emphasis on "Read our story" but I don't have any reason to want to do this right now (maybe you're targeting only highly qualified leads who are already brand fans?)
• The homepage itself is confusing - it looks more like a restaurant's page designed to cater to people who are already deciding whether to dine there... that is, a page that simply needs to create the right ambiance to get people to take action offline. This design is not well suited to online commerce, though. If you want better conversions, benchmark websites that already convert - e.g., see Amazon.com; it tests religiously, and also sells food
Overall, if I'm hitting this website with no idea what it is, it's too confusing (too much info / too hard to read / calls to action to buy something or read something I know nothing about and do not yet want) and too generic-looking for me to stay.
It seems like you went for style first - and the style, from a purely artistic standpoint, is indeed very sleek and very nice.
It's just better at being pretty than it is at selling me anything. I might suggest a redesign focused on hard, practical sales, and once you've figured out what sells best in your niche, then work on prettying things back up, without sacrificing what you've discovered makes the site convert.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is that like "WTF, the primary market for this is not upper middle class women" or "WTF, you are being very blunt about this." If the second, guilty as charged. If the first, I'd very much like to hear who you think buys premium-priced balsamic.
Let's focus on your "moms of the PTA" comment.
Some thoughts: 1. Get a better hero photo. The JPEG artifacts were the very first thing that caught my eye, even before I fully processed what the photo was of. The photo is also too close-up. It's a caprese salad, but because it's so close to the black beads of liquid, that context is lost. Consumers of balsamic use it in context, not alone. The context is lost in this photo. 2. Tune up spacing, padding, margins, li…
What is the purpose of using JPGs instead of PNGs.
For logos, text, geometric imagery, etc, you generally need the image to remain relatively undistorted, so PNG is the way to go.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is that like "WTF, the primary market for this is not upper middle class women" or "WTF, you are being very blunt about this." If the second, guilty as charged. If the first, I'd very much like to hear who you think buys premium-priced balsamic.
> Is that like "WTF, the primary market for this is not upper middle class women" or "WTF, you are being very blunt about this." [...] If the first, I'd very much like to hear who you think buys premium-priced balsamic. Upper-middle class foodies . Who are probably less likely to be women than the market for non-premium balsamic.
http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/newswire/2011/in-u-s-men-are-sh...
...which suggest that men make 38% of retail grocery shopping trips. So, if you're going to envision a representative person who is looking for a grocery item, you should probably start out by envisioning a woman.
It is, unsurprisingly, difficult to find more specific information online for free. Instead, by googling "market analysis salad dressing", I find approximately six market research organizations that offer to sell me a report. Perhaps the OP has bought such a thing, but none of the rest of us are likely to bother.
Of course, what actually matters when trying to convert website visitors is not the demographics of the universe, or of US grocery buyers, or even of US buyers of balsamic vinegar, but the behavior of the people who are actually reaching the website. About whom we really know nothing.
After my first click, my initial guess is that your links are broken. e.g. The "Order Now" button on your first banner links to this page: http://www.balsamicsauce.com/collections/frontpage/products/... which is a 404.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's focus on your "moms of the PTA" comment.
OK. Can you articulate why you object to me using those words, now that we're in apparent agreement that the target customer is actually an upper middle-class woman? I mean, I know why it would cause a few of my professors to sputter, but their rationale for that isn't persuasive. Maybe yours is.