We emailed back and forth a bit this weekend regarding your blog. I thought I’d recap for you and your blog followers now that I’m on my computer instead of my phone.

By the way, I’ve started a blog myself incase you’re interested. More cathartic than anything, but a blog nonetheless: http://brandthoekenga.blogspot.com

I’m not sure whether it’s the norm for the designer/programmer of a site to respond to your thoughts. Regardless, I am, because I appreciate how thoughtful and positive your review is. It’s so easy to be mean and negative since blogging is so anonymous.

As we talked about regarding the SEO – this was a conscious decision based on the timeframe we were looking at to get this site up and running. I designed, programmed and launched this site in under a week. In my opinion, which is supported by his stats, the majority of the searches that lead people to Guy’s site are direct ‘Guy Fieri’ or Guy Chef, etc. So spending a huge amount of effort from the get go didn’t seem like a top priority. That said, we are working with a company to do the SEO as soon as the budget allows and in the meantime I’ll have a look at your suggestion to optimize Guy’s site myself.

Regarding the shopping cart – agreed. We’re almost done with the new cart. We’re waiting on a full line of new product (exciting) and will be launching the new cart with the new product.

As far as the navigation is concerned, you bring up very valid points. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about the web is that there’s always room for improvement. I’ll respond to your email today and hopeful your thoughts will be useful and your suggestions will be implemented.

Blog – again agreed. We’re getting Kleetus up and running and working on a logo for him. I think we’ve hit the logo thing perfectly, so the project of branding his blog will be added to the list. I’ll also look at hosting on his site.

Finally, I’m really glad you like the new site overall. I’m a designer by trade who has been forced to learn some basic programming in order to complete sites for clients in situations like this… where they need them done ASAP. Typically I would bring in a programmer. So the fact that you have some definite positives about the site overall is very good to hear! And any criticisms about the programming are to be expected.

Again, thanks for keeping your blog constructive and I look forward to your continued comments.

http://guyfieri.blogspot.com/2009/04/guy-fieri-launches-website-re-design.html