Rubric: Paragraph | Date: Mar 14
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Rubric: Standard | Date: Mar 10
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Rubric: Paragraph | Date: Feb 23
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Review Portfolio (you will be directed to a different page)

I really like how everything is organized when I first enter your site - which is very important especially for a directory. The layout is also very well made and works with your site genre. Your "key" section should be on the front page rather than in the "Get Listed etc." section, since your visitors can navigate your links even if they do not go to the "Get Listed" section (because if the visitor does not want to list their site but, instead, want to navigate it, they will more likely go straight to your links and not the "Get Listed" page). On your "examples form" section, you say, "Don't forget to delete the message after the form. And remember all of the things you should do when filling out the form." The last sentence, And remember all of the things you should do when filling out the form is a little vague and does not contribute any new information to the visitor, since you are explaining what the person should do when filling out the form. I suggest removing this sentence.

The site rankings section is a little out the way on your site and can not be easily found unless the visitor is specifically looking for it (since it is in the extras section, unlike other directories who put them up with the links). By moving the rankings to each link section, it makes it easier for the visitor to know which sites you personally recommend and will direct them where to go based on these rankings (thereby making your directory easier to use and very convenient). Also, your "Requests" link section is too large to navigate through since you have button, layout, graphic and review requests in this section. I suggest creating an individual section for reviews since, as your directory gets larger, more review sites will be added and an additional section for these review sites will make it easier to navigate. Review requests are also much different than graphic requests (buttons/layouts/banners etc.). This also applies to your "Premade" link section, since it has all of fonts, graphics and premade links here. Since there are many different sub-groups for "fonts" (such as font resources and font guides), making an additional section for this will make it easier for your visitors to navigate your site and find the site they are looking for. This is the same for graphics and premades - since graphics can also fall under icons, resources and anime (just to name a few) and premades can fall under templates, userlookups, petpages and multi-use.

Your directory is definitely on it's way to becoming one of the top directories with over 500 links and upcoming NT articles. The biggest problem would be the organization of links since you have many vague link sections that hold many different kinds of sites (e.g. under "Requests" section is reviews, layouts, buttons, etc). By adding additional sections to accommodate the growing link count, it will make your directory more user-friendly and easy to navigate. Good job and good luck with your site!

First Impression-
Jackie:
Upon entering your site, the first thing I notice is the beautiful, vibrant color scheme. The colors welcome the visitor and give your site that cheerful vibe. Your introduction is well laid out and gets straight to the point about what your site offers and what your goals are. Everything is also neatly organized and all your links are easily found, good job!

Rico:
Your site's introduction is very well-written, and offers all necessary information. However, its sequence is quite strange, and I would recommend you make some slight changes to it: Hello, and welcome to La Casa, a review site by Jenny. Opened on March 4, 2013, La Casa strives to offer unbiased, thoughtful, and in-depth reviews that encourage improvement and help increase professionalism, accessibility, and quality of content. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, feel free to neomail Jenny. Thank you for visiting! Changes made:

• Reordered introduction
• Fixed minor punctuation errors
• Removed established date

In addition to minor errors in your introduction, you have a visitor counter on your first page. While there is nothing wrong with having a visitor counter, its placement on the home page of your site is confusing and seems slightly conceited, as if you are bragging about the number of people that have visited your site. Moving your counter to the sitely section, the center of information about your site, will make much more sense and help to create a more cohesive feeling in your site.

Layout-
Jackie:
Looking closer at your site, I've noticed that a little of the yellow neopets bar is noticeable (the top right part of your layout). This can easily be fixed with the removal code from Double Standard (do not use the body margin-top code because this will shift everything upward and your coding will no longer be aligned with the layout image).

The one aspect of your layout that was a little confusing was the "Menu" title in your navigation. Since the "Menu" title is grouped with your other navigation links, it makes the visitor assume that this is a link too, when in fact, it is not. Perhaps asking Turnip if she could put the "Menu" title outside of the box that holds the other navigation links so they do not get mixed up.

Between each "page" of your site, you should add breaks, {br} {br}, so that when you navigate your site, you won't see the top of each section afterwards (here is an image to show you what I mean).

Rico:
La Casa's current layout is both visually appealing and convenient to visitors. The imagery in the layout is well-textured and beautifully cropped, giving off a homey and comforting feel. This layout is also very practical, with an ample content area that reduces unnecessary scrolling and navigation that is in a convenient and noticeable place.

However, there are very serious issues regarding the organization of your pages, most notably the Rubrics section. For example, please take a look at the page for the "Ani" rubric. You'll notice that the rubric, the most important part of the page, has been crammed into a very small box. This is highly problematic, as it is very difficult to read your rubrics. If a requester cannot read your rubrics, they are unable to request a review and will not reap the benefits of your knowledge. I suggest that you make the box's height much larger or you remove the box altogether.

Also, I have noticed that you made the decision to remove the scroll bars from your rubrics' boxes. This is highly inconvenient, and I strongly suggest you fix them as soon as possible. I had trouble scrolling through your rubrics, and I had no control over how much I scrolled, so I couldn't tell whether or not I was missing parts of your rubrics. This is extremely detrimental to your site, and it is vital that this is fixed immediately.

Spelling & Grammar-
In your "Request" section, you say, I will only review on-site sites. I will not review sites with stolen content.
The proper term would be "I will only review on-neo sites." rather than "on-site sites."

For one of your rubrics (the In-Depth - "Ani" rubric), you say (in the Links and Textareas section), Do you text areas contain the right information?
You should be your.

Content & Quality-
Jackie:
One big thing that I noticed about the way you organized your content is that you put a lot of your content into div boxes that do not show the scrolling. This makes it more difficult for the visitor to navigate through these sections since they don't have an idea of how much is inside the div box and can make scrolling difficult. You should also increase the size of these scroll boxes (since they are so small and the amount of content they hold is so large), possibly by 20px.

For your rubrics, you have names that go with each type of criteria, but why? It isn't really explained through a theme or any kind of description as to why there are names related to each rubric. Though this is a creative aspect to your site, it needs to be fully explained in order to allow this concept to be used to it's full potential. Incorporating it into a theme, adding it to your FAQ, or even putting a description at the top of the "Rubrics" page would be helpful to the visitor.

Going through your rubrics, you have quite a variety that is bound to help any site. The sections where you tell the visitor which sites are "good for" vs. which sites the rubric is "available to" is really helpful and allows the requester to explore their options as to what review is best for them. The section where you advertise sites that also have similar rubrics is also helpful, especially if your review requests are closed but the visitor want to request a review. But there is one section of your rubric (in your in-depth reviews) that did not really seem to contribute to any constructive criticism that could be given to a site-owner which was History and Activity. Though activeness is always crucial to a successful site, the "history" of the site is not. The amount of times a site has been on a hiatus in the past does not really affect the site now and cannot be used to improve a site for the future. I suggest removing this section and adding a "Sitely/Updates" section instead.

For each "page" of criteria, the back sign is aligned to the right, and, even though I know you've done this for visual appeal, aligning this link to the center of the page rather than left or right is more convenient to the visitor. This is because it is much easier to notice than on the sides of your page.

Your "Coming Soon" section is a nice addition to your site, but in your "Request" section, it seems a little out of place since they are not available yet and, therefore, may not interest the visitor who wants to look at rubrics that are available and may overlook this section. Perhaps putting it in a "Coming Soon" page in the Extras section.

In Stardust's review, you say, The number of banners for each category is low, but the low number of categories is even more concerning. Perhaps suggesting some categories that can be added to the site (such as hiatus banners). You also mention that the placement of text on the graphics was a "con" to the site, but you did not provide any sort of example where this is seen. By giving the reviewee some kind of example to go by, they will understand your suggestions much better and are able to take more away from the review. Overall you're reviews are quite informative and fair, just make sure you are providing advice to it's fullest!

Rico:
REVIEW OF NOVA

• In the "Premade Icons" section of the review, you stated that some of their icons "lack an obvious focal point or are not centered correctly." Please remember that there is no one correct way to make an icon high quality, and the focal point of an icon does not have to be centered. For example, you picked out the icon below and had this to say about it: It is unclear whether the focal point is the wall or the man. My guess would be the man, and if that's the case, the image should be shifted to the right, and cropped to show more of the man's face." While I can understand the belief that a focal point has to be centered, I do not agree with it. In this icon's case, the focal point's placement to the right of the graphic greatly enhances the icon's meaning and sets it apart from the hundreds of icons that have focal points centered at all times. As it is, it looks as though the man is looking at and analyzing some sort of map. If the man were to be shifted so he was centered, we would not know what his hand was doing and the icon would not be as effective.
• I found it strange that you lumped Text Illegibility into the Button Animations category. The text of a button is the most important part, as a button is created for the sole purpose of advertising a site. An issue as big as this should have its own section in the review, and should not be an after thought tacked onto an unrelated section.
• You did a great job of explaining your points and offering suggestions as to how the site owner can better their site. Your suggestions as a whole were very helpful and fair, and you adequately pointed out all of the major issues with the site. Good job!

Sitely & Links-
Jackie:
You have a good amount of link back buttons. When hovering the link back buttons there's a name (?), but I'm not sure why. You should clarify what these names are for, in the FAQ, incorporate it in a theme (but no theme seems to be present) or putting a description about this in your introduction. Some link back buttons that weren't very visually appealing were:

The first button's animation is too fast and makes it difficult to read the text without the distraction of the animation. There needs to be more time in between the "fill of letters" vs. "no filled letters" so the viewer is able to look at the button and see text clearly (so they can read the name better). The second button's text is too small and doesn't utilize the space given. Using a larger font would have made the button look more full as opposed to empty (since the text is in the corner so it makes it look squished).

You already have a sister site, affiliates, listers and a counter. I didn't find any dead links. Good job!

Rico:
Your sitely section is very well organized and all necessary information is present. Well done.I did find your link back buttons quite strange, though. It seems as though you are trying to have a button for each of your rubrics. While this is not necessarily a bad thing, I found it to be quite excessive. Also, I personally believe that you should not have a certain button for each rubric type, as it seems unfair to the requester. For example, if I had a pink color scheme at my site and I requested a Luke review, would I be forced to use the button associated with that rubric, or would I have the choice to use the button designated for the Nelly review?

Extras-
You've got quite a few extras that is included in your site! First, I'll be looking at your FAQ; you have a lot of helpful answers to those who may want to request a review. But one answer didn't fully answer a question: Why can't I be on multiple waiting lists for reviews? You answer this question by explaining when you will reject a review request if people are on another review site's waiting list. You don't answer the why part of this, which is what the question is asking. You may want to make a separate question for the when you will reject a request and another question for why (or you could just reword this question).

Looking at "History of La Casa", I find it really interesting how your site is going through "stages" (open beta, public, etc.). Scrolling down, the link that reads, "La Casa 1.0: Open Beta {2/2/13-2/24/13}" looks a lot like a regular header and, personally, I did not even know it was a link until I hovered over it. Perhaps, instead of using a header, just style your regular font (the code is below)
<font color="COLORHERE" size="SIZEHERE">TEXTHERE</font>
If you don't like the code I provided you, you can still check out other tutorials like Forevermore.

Your staff, archived reviews, recommended sites and awards and recognitions are all looking very good (so far since they are looking a little bare; but I know you'll fill them up overtime!).

Comments:
Jackie Overall, I think your a very fair reviewer. Just a few content fix-ups (like the overflow of your div boxes being visible rather than hidden and the explanation of why your reviews are "named") and you'll be on your way! Good luck with your site!
Rico Overall, your site is off to a very good start. You already have a wonderful grasp of how to offer unbiased opinions and support them with detailed explanation. Although there are some serious issues regarding coding (especially in the Rubric divs), I can honestly say that I would recommend your site to those looking for a fair and in-depth review. Despite your site's age, you seem to be very well versed in the site community, and you know what makes a site high quality.

Your layout is really nice - the image and the colors go very well with the theme of your site. One thing is your lack of a background for the content box as well as the height of the content box as shown below:

The color change of the image of your layout makes an odd transition behind your text and text on this "orange" part of the layout can be difficult to read (especially your links). Adding a white background (or even a white background with an adjusted opacity) will allow for the text to be more legible. Also, you can see that there's space at the top of the content box that can still be used for scrolling. Perhaps adding 5px - 10px to the height of the content div box.

Taking a look at your rubrics, I notice that for the In-depth: Redwood criteria, you have a section for "Overall Appeal" that is worth 20 marks, yet the description of what you're looking for is very vague. Especially for something that is worth so much, you should explain further of what you're looking for; such as a webbie, portal or extra activities. Your rubrics look very good otherwise, the variety that you offer is well organized and the "members input" for the In-depth review is very well thought out and enables the guild to get the most out of your review.

Looking through your review section, I wondered why you only have links to the guild's webbie and not the actual guild. Perhaps adding a link to the guild as to allow visitors to navigate through your site easily and look at the sites you have reviewed.

For ~Panda Fun~ 's review, you point out some very good aspects that need to be fixed. For the "Layout" section of the review, you suggest things that need to be fixed but you don't offer any sort of further help (so that the reviewee knows how to fix these things or where to start). For example, in the review, you say, CSS used in the layout could be amped up to incorporated similar hues and textures to give the layout a completed look. What can be amped up for the layout to be given a "completed look"? Nicer headers or color scheme? If these are the cases you may want to point the reviewee to sites such as Bedazzled (for headers) or Kleur (a color palette). This is similar to a lot of your other reviews as well, such as the layout section for Neo.Cave (where you say the background needs to be changed but don't offer any other color choices).

Looking through your review for Loups Nocturne, you deducted one mark off the "First Impressions" but did not specify why you took the mark off. The first impression section is very short and did not explain as to what you thought needed improvement (since you did take off a mark), you need to find reason to deduct a mark and then explain to the reviewee why you took off a mark as to allow them to get the most out of the review.

Finally, your listers div box in the sitely section is very small and therefore, very cramped, especially since you use buttons instead of text links. Perhaps make the div box 15-20px taller in height.

Overall, your reviews are very thoughtful and detailed, though you need to further explain your reviews where you "point" your reviewee in the right direction of specifically where they can improve and how they can do it. Good job and good luck with your site!

First Impression-
Upon entering your site, your layout really brings out your theme of "soaring" very well, the cloud background and the title on the layout execute your theme great.

Looking at your introduction, you explain narrate the story in a very concise manner. There is a grammatical error in your introduction that I will explain in the Spelling & Grammar section of this review. I notice that you mention that you have 10 rubrics that you offer at your site, but you really do offer 17 rubrics. You may want to change this in your introduction as this can be very misleading. In your final part of your introduction, you say, Enjoy your stay in the clouds, because it will only last a little while. Before you know it, you'll be soaring. The sentencing in fairly confusing here because you imply that you cannot "stay in the clouds" for too long, yet in the next sentence you say that you'll be soaring. In order to "soar" you must be in the clouds yet you imply that you cannot stay in the clouds for too long. Perhaps rewording this to Enjoy your stay in the clouds and continue to soar.

Finally, you have an icon beside your introduction that has cloud images. Yes, your site has the "cloud/soaring" theme, but constantly adding cloud images around your site can take away from the effect that you want from the image of the layout (it won't have that bold feel that you want). Perhaps removing this icon and using one of the ones below (linked to creators):

Layout-
I will be looking at the color scheme of your site, how well the images/colors go together, the size of your layout as well as overall neatness and accessibility to all main sections of your site.

Spelling & Grammar-
In your introduction, you say, Here at Soar, your review at will be fair and unbiased, and will provide a screenshot of suggested improvements for your site.
There is no need for the word at in between "review" and "will".

Content & Quality-
I will be looking at quality as well as quantity of your site content. I will also be looking at overall organization and neatness of your content. Any extra content will not be reviewed here, but reviewed in the extra section below.

Sitely & Links-
I will be looking at amount of affiliates, listers (if you do have a section for listers) and site updates. I will also be looking for any dead links around the site.

Extras-
I will be looking for any extra features that you may incorporate through the site as well as any unique twists that may be in the site content (more in-depth than the content section). If you don't have any extra sections, don't fret! This section will be taken out.

Comments: Overall comments and suggestions will go here.