Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi everyone,

I just got my new website up and was wondering if you could take a look at it and let me know what you think.

Thanks,
Randy

www.rsmuthguitars.com

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Randy Muth
RS Muth Guitars Website
RS Muth Guitars Blog
Facebook Fan Page

Randy, that is by far one of the best sites I've ever seen, both as to look and content. Kudos! Very well done.

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Don Atwood
Arlington, VA

Great site Randy, easy to navigate and very pro!
Best, Evan

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http://www.NewYorkGuitarRepair.com

That is very nice.  Nice pictures, quick load, specifics covered, good design.  Maybe a page on the builder would be a good addition.  A little less subjectivity on the about page might appeal to me, but that is jus my opinion, and not a recommendation.  That page is a little long, but I know you are trying to give someone a feel for your philosophy of building.  I'm sure you have reviewed it over and over, and I have only scanned it.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

It is a great website. My only advice is to make it more concise. The
tendency of your wording tends to be verbose. You really want to get the
point across immediately, which is hard to do if you have a lot to say. So
I would suggest just combing thru your pages and trimming sentences as
much as possible. Other than that very minor issue, I think it is fantastic.
Your guitars are beautiful.

I also noticed a spelling error when you mentioned Lutz spruce as a
highbred - should be hybrid.

Best of luck,
Simon

Thanks for the kind words guys. I know that one page is a little long. I may try to shorten it, but I wanted the site to be informative, or a least present my take on things. I am planning on interspersing some building pics to break up the field of text a bit. I may also include a picture of myself to personalize it. I do prefer to use bookmarks instead of jumping from page to page, so I can keep my main index concise.

Simon, thanks for finding the typo.

Randy

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Randy Muth
RS Muth Guitars Website
RS Muth Guitars Blog
Facebook Fan Page

I would eliminate your payment and return policy from the site as these items can be discussed directly with the customer. "A non-refundable deposit equal to 25% of the quoted price is required to secure a position on the waiting list and to lock in this price." may scare potential customers away. You may say you require a down payment to hold the price and a spot on the waiting list but non-refundable well that another story.

In all, I like the design and flow of the site. Beautiful looking instruments!


   

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Michael Lloyd

“I was born to ignorance, yes, and lesser poverties ...
I was born to privilege that I did not see ... I didn’t know it, but my way was paved” – John Gorka

Just a thought, but that one page might divide up into multiple page links to a main "About" page.  My experience tells me that people don't seem to mind jumping to a new page, but if it takes too long to read a page, they lose interest.  A page you can read in a minute or so is pretty good.  Jump to new page, read for a minute or so.  Somehow, browsers like the break of jumping to a new page.  Jump breaks with short, informative text seems to be a good formula.

The other pages are very strong and informative.  It is a very sharp, professional looking site.  If you could just figure out a way to make breaks on that one page.

This is just my opinion, nothing else.  I'm sure someone in OLF is strong in page design.  Surely one of them will chime in.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Very well done. Lots of information and very professionally done.

Maybe a little more information about your experience as a luthier, number of builds, years building and such.

Great job !!!!

Your website is well done, very tasteful. As is your guitars.

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Jim Womack

"Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for. "
Will Rogers

Randy,
Very nice website.
You mention using a "V" head joint,but I couldn't seem to find a picture of it.
To me this is a feature that very few others have and I would try to highlight it.
Hope this helps.
Brad

Very nice site Randy.

I noticed a couple small housekeeping items. Some of the " ' "s on the site ended up as squares not apostrophes, and the length of the page breaks kind of weird. There is a black line running horizontal at the bottom of the page, and on several of the pages the content spans across this and ends up a little garbled as it goes over this "hump"

I suspect it is browser incompatability problems. You might check it out on other systems. I am using Windows XP and IE 6.0.29

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

That's a really good-looking site and it's nicely laid out. It's very easy to look at each page without feeling overwhelmed visually. I think the "About" page could use more pictures to illustrate each section of that page.

I feel like I say or at least think this when anyone asks for honest opinions on their new website. Hire a ruthless editor to refine your text for grammar, style and content. Grammar is not everyone's strong suit, but a professional website really ought to be free from grammatical errors. A second set of eyes is really helpful for this kind of stuff.

I used to work at a bicycle shop in high school and college. I remember the following conversation between my boss and a sales rep from a company that wanted us to sell their bicyles.

Sales rep: "Hi, I just wanted to see if you got our new brochure and had a chance to look it over yet.

Boss: "Yeah we looked it over. It looked very nice but it had so many grammar and spelling mistakes, I'd never show it to a customer."

Sales rep: "What, are you an English teacher or something?"

Boss: "No! That's the problem!"

(Now's the time to look through this post and throw grammar errors back in my face :) )

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Jonathan Kendall, Siloam Springs AR

Jon has a good point.  Editing your own stuff is nearly impossible.  One does not see his/her own errors very easily.  I am constantly editing resumes that I get from candidates, some of which are professionally done, and still have grammatical errors in them. Anytime you want impact, brevity is important.  That is why bullet points are often used in resumes.  The same might apply in your web page.  Make your key points without all of the supporting verbage, then you can follow-up with a brief paragraph to expand with your philosophy.  Then, someone browsing quickly will see the points, even if they don't read the rest.  Pictures to break up that page would help too.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Randy,

I really enjoyed your site. I would have to agree with most here that the
about page would be well served broken up with pictures and/or spread out
over a few pages.

Your work is top notch and serves as a good reminder to myself that I still
have a ways to go in this fine art!

Thanks for sharing and much success to you,
Chris

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Christopher C. Cordle
North Muskegon, MI

http://www.yardsaleunderwear.com
http://www.facebook.com/christopher.cordle

Very pro looking site, very well done
nice job
Love your gitters too!
Cheers
Charliewood

Once again I really appreciate the time you guys took in reviewing this site. I already corrected the typos that were pointed out.

I've done enough writing to know you can't edit your own work, especially without taking a long break from it. I did have several people proof read it before I presented it here, including a blind friend who uses speech software. It goes to show that you can't have too many editors. I'm sure something else will pop up.

Waddy, this whole page was meant to expand on my thoughts, the highlights (bullets) are on the "Models" page. My plan is to break it up with some pics (including a V-joint). I may also break it into more pages, not sure yet.

In terms of tone, I certainly wanted it to look professional, but not slick. My hope was that some of the verbage would be informative and help initiate a dialogue, as well as get potential buyers thinking about things they may or may not have thought about. I will see if I can may my wording more concise.

Again thanks for the constructive criticism, it is HIGHLY valued. Also, thanks to those that PM'd me.

Randy

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Randy Muth
RS Muth Guitars Website
RS Muth Guitars Blog
Facebook Fan Page

Randy,

I can’t add a whole lot here. You have already got great reviews, and very good advise!

I will say, there’s no way you can build a web site that will appeal to everyone. Having said that, I
thought you did a wonderful job of presenting yourself, your building philosophy, and your
guitars. The site is well designed, easy to navigate, and I like the colors. They are easy to look at,
and they go well with the color tones of your guitars.

Also, I feel you did well, in expressing the intended result from your building techniques.
Your descriptions were clear and concise. And, I rather enjoyed the “Musings” of the “About” section.
In those few short paragraphs, I got to know a little bit about you as a person, not just a guitar
builder. And, It’s comforting to know, for me anyway, that there are those, you in this case, that
place much importance on intuitiveness. Though, analysis and intuitiveness work hand and hand in
many instances, it is intuitiveness that gives rise for the need to analyze.

BTW, I’ve been accused of, over analyzing, so, you might want to take this with a grain of salt!

Anyway, best of luck to you!

Robert

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Everything has beauty, But, not everyone see's it!

I like it. I didn't take the time to read everything you have to say, but the colors, photos and the general layout seem coherent, balanced and easy to navigate.   

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

Hope I don't seem like I'm picking on you or anything. I usually appreciate honest criticism much more than praise, that's just the way my personality works.

I noticed a lot of the grammatical errors fixed, but there are still some not-too-hard-to-find errors. Commas in wrong places, "affect" where it should be "effect," etc... It'd be worth it to find someone ruthless that knows all the nitpicky rules and will bleed all over your text with a red pen. You might ask your friends and see if they know someone that has done professional proof-reading.

I'm not sure I'd list names and links to suppliers. It seems like that could cause problems when you upcharge for premium woods. I could see customers trying to squeeze you on your perceived profit margin. I'm certainly not a pro, so maybe others have done that without it being an issue.

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Jonathan Kendall, Siloam Springs AR

Jon,

I don't mind at all and in fact I appreciate it. Although, I have to admit, being human, I like both praise and criticism. I am going to try to find someone more professional to edit it.

I may be naive, but I don't mind being upfront about my profit margins. Customers are savvy these days and many probably already know about this site and all of the vendors listed. I think my profit margin on materials is more than fair.

Randy

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Randy Muth
RS Muth Guitars Website
RS Muth Guitars Blog
Facebook Fan Page