New website discussion
- Thread starter fernando
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I just noticed this. From my business experience selling to all customers, a mobile site is a HUGE requirement for search engines. Dash is going to mainly be used with mobile devices. It is very important to have a mobile site as fast and friendly as possible.
As for splitting layouts from mobile to desktop, the browser detects the device viewing the layout and adjusts for the best viewing experience. GreyGhost will no doubt understand how to best utilize mobile and desktop versions to maximize search potential.
Well, since the advent of responsive web design that "makes your web page look good on all devices..." everyone has gotten lazy and does not create a separate mobile version of a site anymore. What Google is pushing, "Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages" is something I suspect they'll push even harder and the sites adhering to the big G. tyranny will fare better.
Page speed is an algorithmic, ranking factor for years now and it will only get more important.
Page speed is an algorithmic, ranking factor for years now and it will only get more important.
Hi, quick update from me. I will post these layouts tomorrow or if I get delayed then over the weekend.
Just to clarify - these aren't mockups, it's more of a site plan with a boring html implementation of how that could be interpreted based on Fernando's last proposal, purely to illustrate the main point - the UX and navigation structure, i.e. the user flow from when they land to each major area of Dash they might be interested in, and how to make sure they get all the right info along that journey. So don't expect to see a finished site, this is more of a plan we can use to actually build the finished site
Andy
Just to clarify - these aren't mockups, it's more of a site plan with a boring html implementation of how that could be interpreted based on Fernando's last proposal, purely to illustrate the main point - the UX and navigation structure, i.e. the user flow from when they land to each major area of Dash they might be interested in, and how to make sure they get all the right info along that journey. So don't expect to see a finished site, this is more of a plan we can use to actually build the finished site
Andy
It's Mondayyyyyy ;]Hi, quick update from me. I will post these layouts tomorrow or if I get delayed then over the weekend.
Just to clarify - these aren't mockups, it's more of a site plan with a boring html implementation of how that could be interpreted based on Fernando's last proposal, purely to illustrate the main point - the UX and navigation structure, i.e. the user flow from when they land to each major area of Dash they might be interested in, and how to make sure they get all the right info along that journey. So don't expect to see a finished site, this is more of a plan we can use to actually build the finished site
Andy
<3
Just excited to see what you've got honestly, i'll be gentle!
I am a regular guy. It has taken a couple of thousand hours, since last july, for me to get my head wrapped around the crypto space. Starting with bitcoin. Then moving through Andreas Antonopoulos' "mastering bitcoin" (Twice, third read is on the way) then becoming comfortable with wallets, paper wallets, transactions, trezor, blockchains in general, reading everything on the space available..etc etc.. +2000 hours. My wife hates all of you and has never heard or met you! It is all so foreign to the regular person and too much work. Most can barely remember their PIN!
Nobody understands this space at all! 1 in 100 maybe.
The UI's are made for engineers. No problem after immersing yourself for months. But regular people need to be able to use the system.
K.I.S.S.
or if there is the option then have the Engineer page and a Proletariat page
the masses have to be able to adopt for this to work
My 2 cents
It is all so foreign to the regular person and too much work. Most can barely remember their PIN!Nobody understands this space at all! 1 in 100 maybe.
The UI's are made for engineers. No problem after immersing yourself for months. But regular people need to be able to use the system.
K.I.S.S.
or if there is the option then have the Engineer page and a Proletariat page
the masses have to be able to adopt for this to work
My 2 cents
OK here is the proposal...I thought it would be quicker to just build it in HTML using a responsive layout to see what the structure and user experience feels like. That way you also have something to build on.
I decided to spend a bit more time on it than planned because this really ties in with Evolution and how we are moving from a tech-user focused hobby technology to a mainstream product aimed at 'noob' users, so a lot of this can be reused so we don't have to renovate again when Evo is launched.
target audience:
1. marketing and converting new users (with low to zero awareness of Dash)
2. investor info / news / resources (mn owners / miners / investors etc)
3. developers / contributors
notes:
Layouts: http://demo.dash.org/v2/
Source: https://github.com/andyfreer/dash-org-layout
I decided to spend a bit more time on it than planned because this really ties in with Evolution and how we are moving from a tech-user focused hobby technology to a mainstream product aimed at 'noob' users, so a lot of this can be reused so we don't have to renovate again when Evo is launched.
target audience:
1. marketing and converting new users (with low to zero awareness of Dash)
2. investor info / news / resources (mn owners / miners / investors etc)
3. developers / contributors
notes:
- Ignore the look & feel or structure of the page content because it's just bootstrap css based used in a lot of sites for some time now - it needs some creative TLC from a graphic designer to start to look ok
- The core of the idea is the nav structure and the flow of guiding new users / onboarding them then the other key areas, that's the key thing to get right, and it can be represented in lots of different ways graphically.
- You can test the responsive by narrowing your browser to simulate portrait screen
Layouts: http://demo.dash.org/v2/
Source: https://github.com/andyfreer/dash-org-layout
9/10
I am in love with your direction, so I won't nit-pick at anything.
Lets just make sure we can find any and all information we want/need in under 3 clicks.
1-2 clicks would be ideal.
Can you add in a massive dropdown menu? It would help with usability and ease of finding stuff in general.
Maybe this?
http://geedmo.github.io/yamm3/
Also, being as this websites main user might be someone whos never ehard of dash, might we also add in secondary & tertiary links under the calls to action with simple supporting links to stuff like "what is dash?" or whatever the necessary content may be.
Other than that, this is a MUCH better direction for the dash.org website IMO and I would love to help out if I can find the time to get this turned into a fully fleshed out website, it's definitely a step forward.
Also, maybe less links in the footer, and more in the dropdown area? Just because it looks really busy and cluttered.
Good job AndyDark !
AndyDark this is great, I fucking love it!!! As we discussed yesterday, now you're gonna have to work a lot more that you expected
I think the equilibrium between a very long homepage with everything on it and many short ones is quite good here. I still don't like scrolling myself, but the links you shared convinced me that most humans do indeed scroll. For those who were not convinced either:
http://blog.apterainc.com/digital-m...o-scroll-why-above-the-fold-is-bad-web-design
https://moz.com/blog/life-above-and-beyond-the-fold
http://www.oliverrussell.com/better-user-experience-above-the-fold-ui
http://uxmyths.com/post/654047943/myth-people-dont-scroll
There are gonna be as many opinions on the specific menus/groupings/wording as people and we'll be talking a lot, but I'll make a few comments anyway to keep the discussion open:
-I would add Support as a main item on top. We can't provide support as a company would, but I think we can have a decent solution with Atlassian Questions (https://dashpay.atlassian.net/wiki/questions) and maybe a simple ticket system we can help a lot of people. Currently we say explicitly we don't provide support and still most days I get several emails through the contact form of users needing help. Given that the website is focused on new users support will only increase, so we need to integrate something.
-I'm still not sure if I agree with TheDashGuy about a drop-down menu, but I think I'd have it. I would just do it for the Project item so we don't abuse the idea too much (as GreyGhost has said supra, they are disappearing for most sites), but I think it would be useful so users can get to those pages inside that section with one less click. However, I would still keep as much information on the bottom menu too. If someone goes to the bottom he is clearing still searching and has already invested quite some time, so we need to give him as much as possible. I'm probably weird, but when I get to a big page first thing I do is ctrl+F so I can find the keywords I'm looking for, so a big menu on the bottom is always great for me.
-I would add a top bar on top of the menu with social media and the language selector. Something like what slock.it has.
I think the equilibrium between a very long homepage with everything on it and many short ones is quite good here. I still don't like scrolling myself, but the links you shared convinced me that most humans do indeed scroll. For those who were not convinced either:
http://blog.apterainc.com/digital-m...o-scroll-why-above-the-fold-is-bad-web-design
https://moz.com/blog/life-above-and-beyond-the-fold
http://www.oliverrussell.com/better-user-experience-above-the-fold-ui
http://uxmyths.com/post/654047943/myth-people-dont-scroll
There are gonna be as many opinions on the specific menus/groupings/wording as people and we'll be talking a lot, but I'll make a few comments anyway to keep the discussion open:
-I would add Support as a main item on top. We can't provide support as a company would, but I think we can have a decent solution with Atlassian Questions (https://dashpay.atlassian.net/wiki/questions) and maybe a simple ticket system we can help a lot of people. Currently we say explicitly we don't provide support and still most days I get several emails through the contact form of users needing help. Given that the website is focused on new users support will only increase, so we need to integrate something.
-I'm still not sure if I agree with TheDashGuy about a drop-down menu, but I think I'd have it. I would just do it for the Project item so we don't abuse the idea too much (as GreyGhost has said supra, they are disappearing for most sites), but I think it would be useful so users can get to those pages inside that section with one less click. However, I would still keep as much information on the bottom menu too. If someone goes to the bottom he is clearing still searching and has already invested quite some time, so we need to give him as much as possible. I'm probably weird, but when I get to a big page first thing I do is ctrl+F so I can find the keywords I'm looking for, so a big menu on the bottom is always great for me.
-I would add a top bar on top of the menu with social media and the language selector. Something like what slock.it has.
Huge progress AndyDark -- thanks!
I only worry about the home page being too "heavy" (loading time) but this is an issue for development that must have it in mind. I agree with fernando - Dash is a complex project and it has a complex website so a double Nav bar would solve many a problem. Namely:
-- the languages versions option would best serve us as prominently displayed on the upper right nav bar;
-- social networks sites icons should be displayed there as well, but it is very important to think about social sharing icons -- those are best placed withing the articles / pages, both on the top and the bottom of each page (Shareaholic comes to mind) -- that would enable visitors to spread the word.
The wording is a big thingy -- if the Home Page says:
-- "Dash is Digital Cash" than it Nav has to have Digital Cash as the Menu item;
-- "Focused on privacy & financial freedom" than it Nav has to have:
a) privacy as the Menu item;
b) "financial freedom" as the Menu item (likely re-worded)
etc...
Dash is meant to become (1) digital money; it is (2) aninvestment opportunity and it (3) enables our right to be left alone. Privacy Sentinel as a small token of respect to eduffield own Sentinel sounds perfect to me.
But those would best serve us if pushed up to the Main Nav and than the content is organized around the topics.
I only worry about the home page being too "heavy" (loading time) but this is an issue for development that must have it in mind. I agree with fernando - Dash is a complex project and it has a complex website so a double Nav bar would solve many a problem. Namely:
-- the languages versions option would best serve us as prominently displayed on the upper right nav bar;
-- social networks sites icons should be displayed there as well, but it is very important to think about social sharing icons -- those are best placed withing the articles / pages, both on the top and the bottom of each page (Shareaholic comes to mind) -- that would enable visitors to spread the word.
The wording is a big thingy -- if the Home Page says:
-- "Dash is Digital Cash" than it Nav has to have Digital Cash as the Menu item;
-- "Focused on privacy & financial freedom" than it Nav has to have:
a) privacy as the Menu item;
b) "financial freedom" as the Menu item (likely re-worded)
etc...
Dash is meant to become (1) digital money; it is (2) aninvestment opportunity and it (3) enables our right to be left alone. Privacy Sentinel as a small token of respect to eduffield own Sentinel sounds perfect to me.
But those would best serve us if pushed up to the Main Nav and than the content is organized around the topics.
9/10! Very happy with that!
...and relieved thanks everyone for the feedback. I will try a few things based on these ideas and update it over the next few days. then we should think about how to take this forward and get more of us designing / building it
Andy
"I would love to help out if I can find the time to get this turned into a fully fleshed out website"
BTW I think it would be great if you have some time for this, it needs some design skillz
Just let me know where you need me, I'll do my best to make some time for this stuff."I would love to help out if I can find the time to get this turned into a fully fleshed out website"
BTW I think it would be great if you have some time for this, it needs some design skillz
and fernando I don't mind if we avoid mass usage of such a drop down menu, I just feel that the Dash-o-sphere is too massive to make so much info fit into a nav without dropdowns.... I just want us to avoid having to send everyone obscure links to other sites, youtube, social media, etc just to teach them about Dash, so the new website should cover EVERYTHING it can for an end-user. Whether its in wiki or not is another conversation, I just hope we don't skimp on the content, because so far the direction seems on point. If it has some quality content, SEO, graphic design & a little bit of marketing juices, we'll easily have the best crypto website out there.
AndyDark this is great, I fucking love it!!! As we discussed yesterday, now you're gonna have to work a lot more that you expected
-I would add Support as a main item on top. We can't provide support as a company would, but I think we can have a decent solution with Atlassian Questions (https://dashpay.atlassian.net/wiki/questions) and maybe a simple ticket system we can help a lot of people. Currently we say explicitly we don't provide support and still most days I get several emails through the contact form of users needing help. Given that the website is focused on new users support will only increase, so we need to integrate something.
YES PLEASE!
24x7 Dash Decentralized Customer Support. Seems like a requirement IMO for the first real DAO, no? I bet the DGBB would fund a weekly tip for that team....
On the homepage where we advertise spending dash I think we should have the quote "spend dash anywhere that visa is accepted ". This news from Shake labs is huge and definitely something we should straight away advertise to users. I told a friend today about the shakepay.co news and he was amazed and instantly wanted to buy some dash.
Hi, here is an update to the layouts, i included some of the feedback from here and slack, but not everything - I need to get back onto Evo coding now with the team although I will stay as an adviser on this project to help on the dev / production side.
Layouts: http://demo.dash.org/v2-1/
Source: https://github.com/andyfreer/dash-org-layout
Andy
Layouts: http://demo.dash.org/v2-1/
Source: https://github.com/andyfreer/dash-org-layout
Andy
Hey. what do you think about styling up the layouts I did? E.g. colors / typography / layouts, make it look nicer. Either flats that we can style up or actual CSS/HTML work?
This is getting better and better AndyDark; such a great work organizing so much info! I am clueless re: the color scheme and my concerns are the same: will the home page be to "heavy" (loading time) and the URL structure. And we should not forget 301s before migrating the old to the new site -- it would require a bit of work for it would be much, much better to 301 as many individual pages as possible than to just 301 the whole site. (dashpay.io already re-directs to dash.org but frankly, I've forgotten would too many re-directs pose any problem for the big G. -- I think not at all, but one can't be too cautious with them so I will double-check soon)
One small suggestion. "F" pattern of the eye movements on the website. The most valuable space on the page -- where the eyes go first -- is the upper left corner -- so DASH logo AND a tagline or a slogan ("Dash is Digital Cash" might be all we need but it's a detail worth mulling over) would serve us best if placed there. Than, despite the upper nav being a tad too busy with all the icons, they can be squeezed into the upper right corner.
It's quite an important detail, a new visitor needs to get the sense about the site / page she landed, immediately. (upper left corner is what gives that first impression and the nice little flags would be a moment of confusion we need to avoid)
One small suggestion. "F" pattern of the eye movements on the website. The most valuable space on the page -- where the eyes go first -- is the upper left corner -- so DASH logo AND a tagline or a slogan ("Dash is Digital Cash" might be all we need but it's a detail worth mulling over) would serve us best if placed there. Than, despite the upper nav being a tad too busy with all the icons, they can be squeezed into the upper right corner.
It's quite an important detail, a new visitor needs to get the sense about the site / page she landed, immediately. (upper left corner is what gives that first impression and the nice little flags would be a moment of confusion we need to avoid)
Hey GreyGhost,
Loading time should be fine, the content isn't much so no reason why that can't be wired quick and that HTML is pretty light weight. A lot of sites now use MVC/MVVM and just cut and paste it in without thinking about the architecture which is where the delays come in, like too many round trips for data, bloated frontend frameworks, bad caching strategies etc. It shouldn't be a problem for us - not sure what the implementation is going to be because I understand it's WP right now, I will get input in to this though so can advise on it.
301s would be a good idea. About the design, agree the upper left should probably just be the logo and alex-ru said the same on Slack. I need to leave the build though for now because i need to get back in to Evolution...the quickest way to move this forward would be to get a designer to style my HTML then a dev to wire the backend for CMS (for some of the pages). should be fairly quick that way I will be in the loop on it too although i probably won't have much time for the actual implementation.
Andy
As far as styling goes I think we keep it more modern looking with real-life usage imagery and heavy usage of whitespace and useful content.
Think: https://www.paypal.com/home
https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/pay-in-stores
They just relaunched their website (a while ago), and I have gotta say its much better than the previous ones, and they hit their target audience perfectly, and that just happens to also be our target audience.
And yea, I can do that stuff, and help implement GreyGhost's SEO stuff and some of my own as needed. Maybe we get a list of photography needed, and see if we can't get some photographers like tungfa to get us some awesome Dash-related stock photography (think person using our mobile apps on a iphone or something in a coffee shop setting.)
Sidenote: I honestly think we need to run a full on marketing-blitz aimed at Paypal being inferior once 12.1 is out and bug free.
Wow, would you look at that! Maybe you aren't such a troll after all...
You have a great talent that would be perfectly suited here.Get this man on this!
#DashNation
I made a few html edits to make it easy to see what I mean but could we add some supporting text under the nav links?
Just trying to make it more "crypto noob" friendly.
View attachment 2404
edit: just added <span style="font-weight:300;">Subtext</span> into the <a href="">text-HTML HERE-</a> btw
Just trying to make it more "crypto noob" friendly.
View attachment 2404
edit: just added <span style="font-weight:300;">Subtext</span> into the <a href="">text-HTML HERE-</a> btw
Last edited by a moderator:
That's weird because I spent a day with a friend who's a UX guy at an agency in the UK when I started on the website and after explaining the whole Dash vision, paypal.com came out as the perfect way to sell Dash - and my original version had just 3 menus Personal, Business and Partners. Basically with PayPal's funds and skills they have nailed it in terms of how to present to the different end-users and can't really better it. But after chatting with Dash people though the conclusion is it's just too early for that for us because our product isn't ready for the mass market yet - with the download requirement and how hard it is for average person to understand the process of installing wallet, syncing, backing up, buying Dash, sending to address, pasting address into Merchant, it just wouldn't really work (compared to PayPal's signup and use without leaving the web-page process). On a sidenote that's why I was saying on another thread I don't think these marketing efforts are going to have the desired effect, and instead we should be hiring full time engineers, designers, UX, QA people to build the mainstream product first. Anyway - so the site I came up with is the best I could think of in the interim, with trying to draw in a techy/investor/hobby crowd who don't mind the hassle / downloads / .dat files, but leave the door open to go the PayPal route when Evolution is ready later - interesting you came to the same conclusion though
It would be great if you can continue and polish up the layouts, whether that's HTML or just pointers we can add that into the mix.
I mean I have been doing web design/marketing/ux/ui/graphic design/seo and all that jazz for like 11 years now? I better know a thing or two about my job ;]That's weird because I spent a day with a friend who's a UX guy at an agency in the UK when I started on the website and after explaining the whole Dash vision, paypal.com came out as the perfect way to sell Dash - and my original version had just 3 menus Personal, Business and Partners. Basically with PayPal's funds and skills they have nailed it in terms of how to present to the different end-users and can't really better it. But after chatting with Dash people though the conclusion is it's just too early for that for us because our product isn't ready for the mass market yet - with the download requirement and how hard it is for average person to understand the process of installing wallet, syncing, backing up, buying Dash, sending to address, pasting address into Merchant, it just wouldn't really work (compared to PayPal's signup and use without leaving the web-page process). On a sidenote that's why I was saying on another thread I don't think these marketing efforts are going to have the desired effect, and instead we should be hiring full time engineers, designers, UX, QA people to build the mainstream product first. Anyway - so the site I came up with is the best I could think of in the interim, with trying to draw in a techy/investor/hobby crowd who don't mind the hassle / downloads / .dat files, but leave the door open to go the PayPal route when Evolution is ready later - interesting you came to the same conclusion though
It would be great if you can continue and polish up the layouts, whether that's HTML or just pointers we can add that into the mix.
And yea of course, I'll download the files tonight and work on it this weekend and see what stuff I can come up with, content wise are we happy with it as is? Because one thing I am not is a writer... sadly.
I know bud I was just saying!
I think content is ok to run with and we have copywriters, main thing is design right now.
Awesome anyway, nice one
EDIT: BTW theres a zip of the full html/assets here https://github.com/andyfreer/dash-org-layout/archive/master.zip
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