Do you think my simple design website reflects my product better or worse?

[whitbycottages]

Its been suggested my holiday cottage letting website maybe could do with a professional polish up and maybe restructure and navigation and if it would improve bookings I wouldn't hesitate. My only thought pattern is that this particular website is certainly not high-tech (this website was designed by me in Dreamweaver) I have a great guy working for me which is much better web design than me and technically more capable of producing a professional standard website, but with this new sideline I'm presently a small home-based company currently only letting eight old cottages. My thinking was keep the website simple, personal and homely for the moment.

http://www.endeavourcottage.co.uk/ 

The website tends to be competing against large agencies which have often hundreds of properties on their books and you have to go through their filtering system to find the small number of properties that might be of interest.

I can see that if I was selling large quantities of electrical equipment or something similar you just in a very polished well-designed website.

The feedback I get from customers is that like the website and they like to know they can get hold of the person behind it.

Which direction would you go? polished professional company styled WordPress website or simple design website with lots of pictures and descriptions.

If I ever hit the big time and have hundreds of cottages I would have to join the design and more complicated navigation of the other agencies websites but whilst I’m small maybe not?

Thanks for reading Alan

[danatanseo]

For the most part Alan, I'm with you. I like the "homey" low-tech nature of the site. The only thing I would say you could improve would be making it easier to read (maybe larger fonts on a white background as opposed to light blue)....maybe keep your layout but improve the quality of your header image, fix some spacing issues in your CSS. These are all just little "housekeeping" details that really wouldn't change the overall look and feel, but would just tidy it up a bit.

You might also want to consider an update because a lot of platforms like WP include some nice built-in functionality that make your website easier to read and navigate on mobile devices.

I'd address the housekeeping issues first (for example, you have the Google+ like button twice at the bottom of this page http://www.endeavourcottage.co.uk/endeavour-cottage.html). You might find that alone produces more bookings, simply because it's easier for your visitors to read your information and they'll be more inclined to trust the site if it appears to be well cared for.

Hope that's helpful! The cottages look really cute!

Dana

[EGOL]

Missing is a strong, short, clear and convincing statement at the top that communicates your value proposition.

Can you come up with a way to promote cottages on other domains without giving them sitewide links?

[whitbycottages]

Yes I can see the logic of the quick company statement making a first impression but I'm not sure about the side links, I'll think about it.

[whitbycottages]

Thank you Dana  for your points, and was discussing a few weeks back with a web designer the idea of making the site completely compatible with mobiles and the other small devices, but thanks for reaffirming this idea. The website is working as it is at the moment so there's no rush but I do understand your points about tidying up. I was just asking if other people thought I should make the website look more businesslike and streamlined even at its small stage of representing only several properties. I personally at this moment in time felt I didn't want to make it too cold and impersonal like some of the larger companies website,  until I become one of those larger companies

[whitbycottages]

Excuse my lack of knowledge EGOL but don't understand what you mean about promoting cottages on other domains?

[EGOL]

There are sitewide links to http://www.whitby-holiday-cottage.com/ and http://www.northyorkmoorscottages.co.uk/ in the left navigation.

I would not do that.  I would have a page on the site that received traffic from those links and then one link on that page to the other domain.