New Site Homepage Under Construction!
Posted by Blain Reinkensmeyer
December 11, 2007 at 12:58 pm
After a few talks and strategic thinking sessions it has been decided that Stock Trading To Go . Com will take on what will be a brand new homepage for the site. It will be built around YOU the readers, so I want to hear any thoughts regarding what I have down so far.
The site itself isn’t made up of just one important area content anymore, there are several. With this blog, the stock forum, Jack’s blog, my Charts blog, the stock education area (which is also getting a complete overhaul), and any future additions in the works ONLY seeing this blog when you get to the site home is inefficient to say the least.
Current Homepage Vision
You come to stocktradingtogo.com, and right smack down the middle is one live streaming feed of content pulled from all blogs on the sight. Instead of just seeing 4 recent full posts from this blog, you will get to see 10 recent post titles with summaries from all blogs. This stream is updated live, so no more checking 3 different blog homepages, just check the site homepage to see what’s new. Also at the top of page will be the current featured post of the whole site. Instead of links from one blog, try one featured post from either a blog or the forum.
You will also find a box with the latest forum posts on the side, and an area that displays all of the sites blogs, authors, and subscription options for each. You as a STTG reader should be able to read JUST jack’s content, or JUST my education articles, etc. and subscribe to whatever it is specifically you want more of. A new trader doesn’t know what the hell hedging is, so why should they be forced to read a post discussing hedging YHOO with covered calls to get to my newest post EXPLAINING what hedging is. That doesn’t make sense.
And for new investors who believe it or not make up a BIG chunk of the readership here (though you guys don’t comment a lot), I see all 100+ stock education articles organized so you can find whatever educational content you want, when you want it. Instead of scrolling through 100+ articles on the current stock education page, I see something setup almost like Craig’s list. A box featured on the homepage will display say ten categories, and for example lets say you click on “investment strategies”, well you will be taken to page that displays all of the SUB sections for that category. So, you decide to click on “day trading” and boom, you are taken to a list of 10 EDUCATION articles all about day trading. A global search function will help this even more. Lastly, each education article will conclude with a simple message, “still need help, ask our staff aquestion!” which will feed them right into the free stock questions area of the forum.
Advertisers will not be left out either, and just as they are featured in the prime space of the right sidebar, this will remain. I sold out six 125 x 125 buttons in less than 48 hours here on the site and it is easy to say that they will continue to be popular down the road. Text links included as well.
Please Share Your Thoughts
This is the the current homepage vision, and I want to know what you think about it. What would you like to see on a brand new homepage of stocktradingtogo.com?
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Now the site looks great. I`m waiting to see the new vision.
I like the idea of one super feed, its very annoying to sign up for 4 different feeds
Blain, i’m always inspired by how you always think big. Great job on the success thus far and I have a feeling that it’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Do you have tags on your articles? That may be a good way to organize the education section. Your sectional approach sounds pretty similar, but if you look at sites like TraderMike, he’s got a Frequent Topics section that has more than the 10 sections you’re talking about. I just think if you limit yourself to 10 main topics, you might be pigeon-holing some articles unnecessarily. Flickr I think was the first site to really use the tags very well, but following that style is very “Web 2.0″ and seems to be a good way to highlight the content of articles on your website.
Good idea Bryan, I will look into this as well. I think you are speaking of category tagging within Wordpress?
One feature I will add as well to all of my education articles is adding directly related post links at the end of each one. The related posts plugin simply does not get the job done well enough.
I think the site looks good right now. I do think that the one super feed thing is probably one of the best things that you could do at this point.
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Good call Blainer! You already know what I think!
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wow there is a lot of stuff going on here.. can’t wait to see the final outcome