# I finally made us website!



## merrimacmill (Apr 18, 2007)

I've been working the last 2 days in photoshop, aperture, and site builder making this thing. Heres what I have so far. Its getting close to done. Not there yet though. I'm going to add more to the snow removal section, and available office space. The buttons on the side are out of order. I would rather have them in a different order but I cannot fuiger out how to do it. Anyone out there using Yahoo sitebuilder know how to do this??

www.merrimacmill.com

What do you guys think of the site so far?

Thanks,

Collin


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## iceyman (Mar 1, 2007)

screw the site nice building...:salute:


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## JD Dave (Mar 20, 2007)

Looks good. The building looks really nice. Your miissing a "your" in your snowplowing section but other then that I'd be really proud! Good job.


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## merrimacmill (Apr 18, 2007)

iceyman;495162 said:


> screw the site nice building...:salute:


Thank you, we try our best to keep her looking as good as possible. In a few years it will be 100 years old.


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## MIDTOWNPC (Feb 17, 2007)

That is a great way to showcase your building. The site allows people who might not want to book an appointment view the place and get to really like it. It will also help you weed out tire kickers. The design is simple and clean which is most important with websites. Did you do the work on the building yourself?


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## Kennedy81 (Oct 8, 2007)

not to bust your balls or anything, but I found a typo on the snow removal page... 


> We also offer snow plowing and salt
> spreading services your commercial or
> residential property.


needs the word "for" after "services"

Other than that, awsome site, looks good!

Oh, and why isn't plowsite on the links page? lol


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## LoneCowboy (Jan 2, 2007)

front page. many of the pictures are not high enough resolution, you can see the pixels. The bottom right one is "squished", the aspect ratio isn't right.

this page: http://www.merrimacmill.com/listings.html is empty, the pictures don't fly.

lose the page counter (or make it invisible), professional pages don't have a page counter.

in the contact page, you have your email address listed. If you are going to list it, it should be a "mailto", so you can just click on it and it pops up a letter.


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## tjlands (Sep 29, 2005)

Just a suggestion, Change the "salt spreading" to Ice control or something similar.
It just sounds more professional.

Good Luck with it! And yes nice building!


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## merrimacmill (Apr 18, 2007)

MIDTOWNPC;497744 said:


> TDid you do the work on the building yourself?


Yes I do, I am the maintenance superintendent there. We don't contract to many jobs out, unless they're big jobs, or very time consuming ones. Like this fall we had a new paver plaza put in, which would have taken me a very long time to do. But was a 3 or 4 day project for the pros. Heres a pic of it. That bit of water on there was a little bit of ice that I threw some melt on, not a puddle. And the half circle is tan, not grey but since its brand new the color hasn't come through yet. But for the most part I do all the work on the building myself and have the other maintenance guys do the routine clean-ups of the grounds, lawn mowing, changing light bulbs, and stuff like that.

Thanks for all the comments on the site. Its still a work in progress. Thats just what I have so far. The listings page I have not even started yet. Thats why there's no pictures or anything yet. As to the photos, I have herd that it does that before. My reason for making them such small resolution was because I wanted to save server space. I made the website on a very high resolution Apple monitor, so everything, even text and pictures, appears small on all my computer screens. Thats why I didn't notice that it was a problem. I'll have to upgrade the pictures. Thanks for letting me know about the typos too. When I sit there all day and write it, I never notice the typos no matter how many times I read it over lol.


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## IMAGE (Oct 21, 2007)

It looks really good. But you need titles on your pages. It should be hidden in the html as XXXXXXXX Just change the XXXXXXX to whatever the name of that page should be. You want the page title to use key search words, because googlebots use page titles for page ranking.

Also if you dont own, or have a very close tie, to that company your linking to then I would hide the links page some. No need to drive viewers off your site.


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## merrimacmill (Apr 18, 2007)

Ya, I'm having trouble fuigering out how to re arrange the order that the pages appear on the menu. Also, since I used a template, the address will say "about me" but the text on my buttons is different. I can't fuiger out how to change that either. I'm using Yahoo site builder.


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## IMAGE (Oct 21, 2007)

is there a "page discription" or something similiar? I have never used yahoo, but most templates have a page discription area you can change the title on. 

You may be able to click and drag the links into the correct position, or there maybe a navigation area where you can promote links up and down on the list. You should also be able to make one page a "parent" of another. That would mean that the links for the "child" pages only show when the parent page is open.


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## IMAGE (Oct 21, 2007)

IMAGE;500926 said:


> It should be hidden in the html as XXXXXXXX Just change the XXXXXXX to whatever the name of that page should be.


Sorry that didnt make the most sense! html tricked me and hid part of my post! anything inside these >< , but when they are inversed, will be hidden. If you can view the html look for the *title *area inside those markers, it should be near the top of the html source, in the head area.


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## BREAULT69 (Jan 15, 2008)

Really a beautiful building. Way more class than new construction these days.


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## QuadPlower (Jan 4, 2007)

Before I get too far into my comments, I have a question. Do you own the building or do you work for the owners?

Let me start by saying that I think the building and the web page look great. There are just a few things I would change if it were my site.

On the HOME page you say.

Welcome to our website. Please take a moment to look around and check things out. If you are interested in office space, please feel free to contact us via phone or e-mail. Thank you,

Merrimac Mill, Inc.
978.462.1071

I would say:
Merrimac Mill, Inc. offers office space from a single room up to 4000 square feet, offering our tenants options for future growth. The building has on site parking, central elevator, and all amenities expected in a first class office building. For more information please follow the links on the left. If you have any questions please feel free to Contact Us. 

"Contact Us" will be a link to your contacts page.
The reason I would change it is because this is your HOME page. This is the page that comes up when people type in your address or do a search. You need to hold them there. The reason they are searching is to find office space (you hope)

On the HOME page, the back ground of the LINKS is a picture of a building (not your building) On all the other pages it is blank with your info at the bottom. Change the HOME page to match the other pages.

I haven't use Yahoo web page builder, but there has to be a place where you can edit the HTML. Something like Form Editor. Once in there you will see where you can change the About Me and other titles to what ever you want it to say.

Again, If it were me, I would set up a seperate web page for the snow plowing. The page you have linked us to is there to get people to rent office space. The snow plowing seems like an add on. Build another site for the snow plowing business and link to it from the links page on this one. 

On the snow plowing page you say "We also offer snow plowing and salt spreading services your commercial or residential property. We are fully insured and have years of experience. We service Newburyport, Amesbury, Salisbury, Merrimac, West Newbury, 
Rowley, Georgetown, and some of the Southern New Hampshire towns. So feel free to give us a call today and set up a contract.

I would say something like "We offer snow plowing and ice management services for commercial & residential properties. We are fully insured. We service . . . If you are looking for an experieced snow removal company, then give us a call. We offer FREE estimates.


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## cjcocn (Feb 17, 2006)

> ... So feel free to give us a call today and set up a contract.


No offense, but when I read this I get the feeling that if I call you I will have to fend off your attempt to push a contract on me.

What if I just want to call and learn more about the services that you offer?

Would you consider something like this? .....

(I included the changes suggested by tjlands and Kennedy81)



> Our fully insured crews have years of experience and, as a contracted client of Merrimac Mill Inc., you can rest assured that your commercial or residential property will benefit greatly from our services. We offer our services via contract so that you receive the assurance of knowing that we have taken the time to learn of and account for all of your snow clearing and ice control needs.
> 
> Our service areas include Newburyport, Amesbury, Salisbury, Merrimac, West Newbury, Rowley, Georgetown, and some of the Southern New Hampshire towns.
> 
> Feel free to contact us *[make "contact us" a live link]* today and discuss your snow clearing and ice control needs with our helpful and friendly staff.


HTH


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## merrimacmill (Apr 18, 2007)

QuadPlower;501077 said:


> Before I get too far into my comments, I have a question. Do you own the building or do you work for the owners?


My mother owns and manages the building. She started the company from nothing, using a 10' by 10' office with a fold out table for a desk. When she started with it, it was an empty shell of a mill building. She then restored the entire building into office space. I started there when I was 14 watering plants and cleaning floors, and since then I've worked my way up to Maintenance Superintendent. Right now I'm in college for an associates degree in Business Management, and after that I will be taking over her position and continuing the family business she started (I was an only child, with a single mother which is why theres no brothers or sisters in this story). Every month that goes by, it seems that my work load has been slowly shifting from the maintenance department workshop, to the office. But I'll bet that once I'm in her position I'll still be out plowing the lots .

Thanks for all the helpful comments on the site guys, I'm going to work on it again tomorrow and take all these comments into consideration. This is all stuff that I would have never thought of. But that IS why I posted it on this site.

Thanks again,

Collin


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## merrimacmill (Apr 18, 2007)

cjcocn;501094 said:


> Our fully insured crews have years of experience and, as a contracted client of Merrimac Mill Inc., you can rest assured that your commercial or residential property will benefit greatly from our services. We offer our services via contract so that you receive the assurance of knowing that we have taken the time to learn of and account for all of your snow clearing and ice control needs.
> 
> Our service areas include Newburyport, Amesbury, Salisbury, Merrimac, West Newbury, Rowley, Georgetown, and some of the Southern New Hampshire towns.
> 
> ...


That is perfect wording right there. You wouldn't mind if I used exactly that would you?

Thanks again for all the help. I'm still learning a lot about making a website, so its going to take some fuigering to learn how to do the live links, and automatic email things and all that.


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## BREAULT69 (Jan 15, 2008)

I gotta say you guys are throwing some great ideas out there. I'm impressed. Bet your a** next time I need to do a website I'm gonna get opinions on this site.


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## cjcocn (Feb 17, 2006)

merrimacmill;501105 said:


> That is perfect wording right there. You wouldn't mind if I used exactly that would you?
> 
> Thanks again for all the help. I'm still learning a lot about making a website, so its going to take some fuigering to learn how to do the live links, and automatic email things and all that.


I posted it as a suggestion that you would be more than welcome to incorporate into your site, so feel free to use it!

As for the live link, try this (remove the two & symbols and it should work)
<&a href="contact_us.html">contact us<&/a>


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## PerfiCut Inc. (Jan 31, 2008)

looks prety good for a first timer. Keep it up.


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