Week 3 Analyzing a classmate's website

This week’s assignment involves visiting a classmate’s website and examining some of its features. I chose Shae Brown for this task. I will demonstrate how her main website reflects visual professionalism and consistency, but according to Anderson’s Technical Communication, the site could benefit from some fine-tuning to better meet the reader-centered criteria.

According to our textbook, effective websites must be designed with the reader as the central focus. This could be achieved by being clear about one's communication goals and purpose, using layouts that are received positively, which include navigational clarity. Visually unified design with readable text is also a major factor. Shae Brown’s website appears polished and professional, with consistent color themes and fonts. Like the rest of us, the website could use some adjustments.

Shae’s landing page seems to lack a description for the website. Once you are there, the three options on top are great. They allow me to focus on the section labeled “BPS 415”. Once I am there, it is difficult to tell which section goes with the week's assignment. I can figure it out, but Anderson’s recommendation is that readers should be able to reach their destination quickly and intuitively.

Using the table provided in class, I found that improvements could be made to clarity, navigational options, and perhaps the visible layout patterns. I believe she did a great job with the text as it is easy to read, the fonts are legible, with good contrast, and it appears to follow ethical guidelines.

While Shae Brown’s website reflects visual professionalism, it could use some revamping to make it more reader-centered per Anderson’s Technical Communication. As a reader, I know what the website is about, but I would have no idea if I was not a classmate. While the main menu is on every page, once there, it needs clearly labeled content. In full disclosure, I was adjusting my website as I was typing this up. She did a great job, but we can all use some additional reworking of our sites.