Subscriber: Paul Mackie	Website: Story Books Than Teach
URL: www.storybooksthatteach.com/

First Impressions

There was no doubt in my mind, when I first visited the site, as to what it was all about. The headline "Child Development" makes it quite clear. However, I was a bit distracted by the huge header with a Flash movie which kept presenting different messages.

Immediately below the Flash header and the headline was a panel with links to 22 different topics about child development - autism, parenting, special needs and so on. They all opened in a new browser window, and, had I been a casual visitor, I would have been very puzzled. Most of the web pages which opened had completely different website designs. More of this later - see "Content", below.

Scrolling down the very long page, I soon found what Paul is selling.. some innovative story books which help with a young child's development.

But I still wasn't clear exactly how different they were. I would have had to work hard to get to the real benefits of the book.

So, although my very first impressions were favourable, had I been a parent with a need for materials to help my young child, I probably wouldn't have gone much further on the site.

Readability

The text on the site is very readable, with much of it in a large and bold font.

Paul's writing style is quite relaxed, but not so casual as to seem unprofessional. In many places he makes good use of bullet points to present facts in a punchy, easy-to-read style.

Content

My first impression was that this really is a content-filled website, with a lot of information that people would want to read. In other words, it is not just a hard sell.

But when I started to look at some of the information pages which I mentioned in my "First Impressions", I began to feel a little uneasy. They were nearly all off-the-shelf content-filled websites, with a primary objective (it seemed to me) to generate AdSense advertising. There's nothing wrong with that - but they have little part in a website where the focus is (or should be) on selling the child development materials.

The various video pages were also a little disappointing. They were built with "Niche Video Site Builder" (which pulls in themed videos from YouTube), and Paul has used the default template for that software.

All of these rich content pages would have been much more effective had they used the same templates as the main website.

I had hopes that Paul's blog would provide useful information. Unfortunately, there are only two entries, dating back to December 2007.

I was, at first, impressed by the forum, which seemed to be a very lively place, with thousands of members and posts. But this is not a "real" forum. Nearly all of the posts are auto-populated from Yahoo Answers, using a rather clever script. Mind you, Paul is up front about this, and every post derived in this way has a clear statement to that effect.

Paul has two videos on his home page which reall are excellent. Here Paul comes over as a really genuine guy, with a clear passion for his subject. He also uses a very innovative technique which, at certain parts of the video, displays some different material at the side of the video - such a sign-up form.

But the home page is a bit of a mix up, with sales messages, factual information, testimonials and case studies all jumbled together.

Design

The overall website design has a definite amateur feel to it. In this particular market, that's not a bad idea! In a way, Paul is selling himself as much as the educational material. If you believe Paul as an experienced child development expert, you're also going to believe in the products he is selling.

The graphics on the site are not brilliant. The eBook cover designs are rather poor quality. It's not expensive to have them made professionally, and this would creatly improve the appearance of the products.

The huge flash banner at the top of the pages "steals" valuable space. The space "above the fold" - visible in the browser without scrolling down - is prime website territory. It is whn viewing this area that visitors decide to carry on reading the site - or whether they just leave. The flash banner is not a convincing reason for staying on the site.

Navigation

In the main, navigation is good. There's a left-hand menu with cascading options which works well. And the 20-odd information sites all open in a new window, so it's easy to return to the main site.

But there were some instances when a new window didn't open, and there was no way back to the site except by using the back button. One example is when you go to the order page at Lulu.com (which fulfill hard copy versions of the books). Once you start the ordering process there, it would be very hard to return to the main site.

Interaction

Paul has one mechanism for collecting email addresses, via a promise to send a free sample of the story books. Unfortunately, you have to watch about a minute of one of the videos before the sign-up form mysteriously appears next to the video. It's a neat bit of technology, but it probably results in many missed opportunities to get a visitor's contact details for subsequent follow-ups.

There is a "contact us" page, but this simply has an email address, not a contact form - which some visitors will prefer. Also, the email address given is a Gmail address, rather than one which has the website's domain name in it. The latter would look more professional.

Search Engine Optimisation

The metatags for "keywords" and "description" are correctly in place on the home page, and the TITLE tag has meaningful keywords in it. The theme of the site, as reflected in the headers, is, correctly, "child development".

This is a popular seacrh phrase; about 360,000 people a month search Google for this. Unfortunately, it's also a well-supplied keyword. A Google search for child development without the quote marks (") produces over 30 million pages. "child development" with the quotes turned up nearly 11 million pages.

This is aways a problem with popular keywords, and it's a question of finding the balance - keywords where there are a reasonable number of searches, but not over-supplied with web pages. It's not surprising, therefore, that I couldn't find Paul's site in the first 100 listings. And that's despite Google having apparently indexed over 1,500 of his pages (mainly because of spidering his YouTube populated video pages).

I found virtually no sites carrying a link to www.storybooksthatteach.com

Conclusions

In his request for a website review, Paul said that the prupose of his website was:

"Helping children be the best that they can be. Selling children's storybooks, clickbank affiliate program and adsense pages."

All these are admirable objectives - but there are too many objectives for one site. The danger is that, by trying to achieve too much on a site, you end up failing to do any of them well.

I think that Paul could well spin off a number of different websites to meet each objective:

• A website just selling his products
• A pure information website, with material written by Paul, himself
• A network of interlinked, rapidly generated sites, aimed at pulling in AdSense income (although this isn't as easy as it used to be).

I'll focus my attention on the sale website.

• The home page needs to be much shorter and punchier. Yes, start off by building confidence in the author's credibility, but move much more rapidly into the benefits of the products themselves.
     
• The sales website can still have some information. It currently has a couple of articles written by Paul, and I'm sure that he could write two or three others. Such articles would build on Paul's credibility as an expert in his field, and can only enhance the confidence which prospective customers have in his products.
     
• The sign-up form for the free sample needs to be much more visible, and, if possible, include a graphic of what people will receive when they part with their contact details.
     
• Graphics: a small amount of money should be invested in having eCovers professionally produced - and maybe a more conventional banner header as well (ditch the Flash movie at the top of the page!)
     
• Navigation needs to be more consistent. If it's not possible to have a link back to the site from some pages (e.g. Lulu.com's order page), then have those pages open in a new browser window.
     
• Either put all the testimonials on the home page (a single one, as there is at present, looks a little sad) or move them all off to their own page, with a prominent link to them on the home page.
     
• Some keyword research needs to be carried out to try to find relevant keywords where there is not as much competition as there is with "child development". Although this is central to the theme of the products, there is no point in majoring on this key phrase if it's not going to achieve anything.

Finally, I think that Paul's sales website could have a lot of potential. His knowledge of, and his enthusiasm for the subject really shine through his words, both written and spoken.

If my description of the sales page sounds like a traditional page selling to internet marketers then it's meant to be! It's not about internet marketing per se, but about applying sound marketing principles. And successful internet marketers know a lot about these principles.

It's also about psychology. And I guess that Paul Mackie knows a lot about psychology!

Site reviewed on 31st July 2008

Website Owner's Comments

After reading my review of his website, Paul said, amongst many things (!):

"Hi Ian

I agree with most of what you have said; here's my rational for what I have done with the site. My site has been online since early 2000 or so, and unfortunately I have not had a great deal of success with my storybooks. I added adsense to try and make some money from the site, I added video and a forum to try and drive traffic, but as you say "the site is confusing".

To be honest I am struggling with the marketing of my storybooks and the website in general.

In hindsight I think I may have overlooked the main reason for my website, "to help children develop"; and trying to kill too many birds with one stone.

I really appreciate your comments and will have to study them, to bring my site more in line with what you have said."

-- Paul Mackie