Wife convinced me to start a website to transition into paid photography. please critique.

so this is my first website ever. i just built it today so i am sure there are many features of zenfolio i need to figure out. i tried building one with smugmug and hated the user experience. zenfolio took me about 1hr to understand what i was doing.

what do you all think? right now i havent made it public or marketed it since i just did it. i threw some pics up there and made some categories which may not be quite what i will be showcasing most often.

any advice and or critique is welcomed.

thank you.

www.antoniomartinezpho​tography.com

If you are marketing yourself as a family (and similar) photographer, I'm not sure you should be showing an endless loop of car photos on the home page.

Agree 100%.

I must agree, I didn't see any Engagement, Newborn and Family photography based in new york city, NY. Capturing life's most precious and unforgettable moments. at all on your home page. All of your photo's should reflect what you are trying to advertise.

photog_rob wrote in post #17962212
If you are marketing yourself as a family (and similar) photographer, I'm not sure you should be showing an endless loop of car photos on the home page.

FarmerTed1971 wrote in post #17962215
Agree 100%.

Chet wrote in post #17962226
I must agree, I didn't see any Engagement, Newborn and Family photography based in new york city, NY. Capturing life's most precious and unforgettable moments. at all on your home page. All of your photo's should reflect what you are trying to advertise.

i know. hence why i put this up top "i threw some pics up there and made some categories which may not be quite what i will be showcasing most often."

right now i am just testing the website presentation. what do you all think about that.

i am trying to schedule some shoots for portfolio purposes right now and will edit some photos more in line with my marketing in the next couple days.

thank you.

is it easy to navigate? is the presentation smooth? does it look professional? etc.

FarmerTed1971 wrote in post #17962215
Agree 100%.

+1

smh

It's a nice, clean presentation. I was a little confused by the thumbnails under the slideshow, which do not correspond with the order of the slideshow. Also, I'd lose the select, buy and share options from your slide show. You are selling your services as a portrait and event photographer -- I'd be weirded out if I thought you were selling (or making it easy to share) my portrait to anyone on the web.

What purpose does the search have? It seems out of place.

Other than those small quibbles, I think it's a nice site.

OMG can you guys NOT read? He literally said in the OP "i threw some pics up there and made some categories which may not be quite what i will be showcasing most often." Stop giving him advice on those photos! lol jeez

I'm on my desktop on google chrome...
-Overall look is good.
-It's easy to use.
-Pretty straightforward.
-Everything loads quickly for me but you may want to see what google thinks here>>> https://developers.goo​gle.com …artinezphotogra​phy.com%2F.
-Be sure to fill out all of your meta information before you start marketing.
-Not sure how I feel about the "guest book." Maybe call it "Reviews" instead?
-You may also want to consider putting up some sort of package information with or without pricing (weather or not to include pricing is a never ending debate).

Make sure you test it on different browsers & on mobile - android, IOS, tablets, etc.

AlFooteIII wrote in post #17962558
It's a nice, clean presentation. I was a little confused by the thumbnails under the slideshow, which do not correspond with the order of the slideshow. Also, I'd lose the select, buy and share options from your slide show. You are selling your services as a portrait and event photographer -- I'd be weirded out if I thought you were selling (or making it easy to share) my portrait to anyone on the web.

What purpose does the search have? It seems out of place.

Other than those small quibbles, I think it's a nice site.

yes the slideshow is set to randomization so it doesnt follow the order, good point. i am also trying to decide if i want the thumbnails under the slideshow since the show has its own thumbnails. its redundant but not sure if the site will let me take them off. i agree with removing the options. right now this is just to present my porfotlio so i do not need purchase options. i am not quite sure what search does but i thought it was to search for images on my website. i guess with how i title them?
thanks for the feedback.

BlakeC wrote in post #17962585
I'm on my desktop on google chrome...
-Overall look is good.
-It's easy to use.
-Pretty straightforward.
-Everything loads quickly for me but you may want to see what google thinks here>>> https://developers.goo​gle.com …artinezphotogra​phy.com%2F.
-Be sure to fill out all of your meta information before you start marketing.
-Not sure how I feel about the "guest book." Maybe call it "Reviews" instead?
-You may also want to consider putting up some sort of package information with or without pricing (weather or not to include pricing is a never ending debate).

Make sure you test it on different browsers & on mobile - android, IOS, tablets, etc.

yes, the guestbook i was going to use a testimonials page. i will def rename it and possibly remove it and make a new page altogether since the guestbook is open to anyone who wants to leave a message.
yes, i am working on packaged and rates but not sure yet if i want to put up concrete pricing. there are cons and pros to that. well see.

thank you both for your feedback. i am glad you guys didnt critique me on something i had already acknowledge. lol.

Astheros wrote in post #17962607
yes, the guestbook i was going to use a testimonials page. i will def rename it and possibly remove it and make a new page altogether since the guestbook is open to anyone who wants to leave a message.
yes, i am working on packaged and rates but not sure yet if i want to put up concrete pricing. there are cons and pros to that. well see.

thank you both for your feedback. i am glad you guys didnt critique me on something i had already acknowledge. lol.

I highly recommend encouraging people to leave you google reviews and setting up your google places page. This will help you a ton in google searches.

You can then embed the reviews here like i did. http://blakecpics.com/​reviews/

Text ! text ! text!

• The most common error of a website's photographer is the huge lack of texts... on each page! especially with the gallery.
  Text = keywords for google to know what your website is about (you are not Ansel Adams to get thousands of backlinks), so you need text speaking about photography EVERYWHERE.
  
  
• Price: by far it is a lot better to put prices for many reasons. IMHO it is not arguable! and BlakeC did very well with it: he commented each price = keywords (in fact the BlakeC price list might be one of the best SEO oriented I had ever seen)
  1)people will know where they are going with you, no hidden things = more confident visitors.
  2)Price = more text for google to ingest = more keywords for google.
  3)Price = you will get more chance to get listed on Dmoz (even if Dmoz is totally useless and are a bunch of #$%^&@)
  4) there are so much more reasons to put prices for your visitors behavior, especially for a local photographer, that it's too long to list it here.
  

Wow Amazing sharp images. Very inspiring. There are no people with your car photographs. And no environment. They are just of cars. I want to see a picture with the guy who owns the car and I want to see the car and the guy next to a water tower or old factory or old brick wall. Something that would make me want you to take a picture of me with my car. I mean. I have a picture of my car.