SEMS Design was asked to accomplish the task of revamping an equine fine art website for Janson Editions. The collection of equine fine art and equine licensing images needed to be displayed in a smoother fashion that would also allow the website to grow with the addition of more fine art and images. The process and tools used by SEMS Design can be used on any type of horse website, but we found these tools to be very useful for equine photographers and artists to show off their portfolio.

To start, here is the older template of the Janson Editions website:

And here is the template design we came up with for Janson Editions:

The first, and most important change that we implemented to the website was the ability for the template to grow with the amount of content, or images, that needed to be displayed on the page. The older template was only one large image that had restraints on how much content could go on a page and the use of images inside the template.

We also added a flash slideshow to the main page that would allow a portfolio like slideshow to run on the main page. Using flash allowed us to save some space as far as load time of the pictures that would be used.

Away from what can be seen to the visitor, there was a major need for search engine optimization. None of the pages had titles, keywords, descriptions, or any files on the server that would help the search engines to index the site better in the search engines. We also changed the file names and places them in different folders with names that would help in the search engine optimization process. For example, the old site would go to http://www.jansoneditions.com/gallery.html when someone wanted to see the Gallery. We put the gallery into a folder called “horse-fine-art-gallery”, which will help search engines pick up valuable keywords in the URL. This was done for all parts of the website that needed better placing in the search engines.

We also added the coding on all pages to monitor visitor tracking with Google Analytics. This will allow us to monitor all visitor activity and to find out what is working and what is not.

Next, we needed to give the Fine Art Gallery a better appearance from the old site. Here is how the gallery looked on the old site:

With this being the main page of the gallery on the old site, visitors had to actually go to each gallery print name to see the image. We wanted to make it easier for visitors to know what they wanted to see so they could decide if they wanted to learn more about the picture or not. So this is how we changed it:

Having a thumbnail of each print would allow visitors to see the image before having to investigate any further. We then went one step further and added a jquery lightbox. The lightbox allows visitors to hover over the thumbnail and see the full size print without having to change the page. This was implemented for ease of use for visitors to see what they wanted to see the easiest way possible.

We decided to use the same principle with the Licensing Images portion of the site. Here is how the old site displayed the categories of the Licensing Images:

With each collection of images there was a selection of multiple images to view. There also was a different set number of images in each collection. So to help visitors decide what collection to look at, we changed the appearance to this:

Using the thumbnail view with a link below that also showed how many images could be found in each collection, we felt this would allow visitors to have an idea of what they would find in each collection.

For each of use on the part of Janson Editions we added the ability for them handle all images in both the Licensing Images and Fine Art Gallery sections. Logging in to a browser based admin panel would allow Janson Editions to add/edit/delete albums, add/edit/delete images, and monitor the activity for each of the images. This helps them to decide what images will appear where and what images they want on the website and when.

With the use of jquery and some other newer technology, we were able to help improve their customer support as well. With the new contact form, someone can get any errors in their contact request without the page having to reload. We have found that if someone has an error in their form input and has to redo the form again to send it, they will not redo it. So with the contact form found on the Janson Editions website, all errors, and anything that is not ready for the form to be submitted, will appear on the same page so the error can be fixed without having to do the form all over again.

Most of the new technology being used on websites these days are helping in how the page is delivered to visitors and how more interactive the experience can be. At the same time, the site helps owners to interact with their visitors easier and the same for visitors with the site owner.

If you would like to see the new version of Janson Editions you can visit the site at http://www.jansoneditions.com

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Tags: equine web design, horse web design, horse web site redesign, horse web sites, horse website redesign, web site redesign —