Please review my matching site in terms of the usability

[gpyong]

Hi, Please review my matching site in terms of the usability and perhaps the matching idea

site: www.matchimedia.com

The Matchimedia Project is a directory of matchable information and resources. It auto match-up information and resources by searching & comparing all the data in our database.

Generally, it collects information grouped by categories such as People, Lost and Found, Supply and Demand and Waste Exchange from users all over the world.

Matchimedia analysis and match the information base on criteria. The post owner will get notified by email whenever there is a new match-up.

Technologies used :

-Ajaxs
-GEOIP (grab long lat data base on user IP and provided Countries)
-Google Map API (integrate with GEOIP long lat db)
-Matching Algorithm (unique match algorithm for each categories)
-Social Networking (embed social networking features)


Thanks for your time!

[stbalaji2u]

The idea is fantastic i dont know whether your site is the first of its kind. I have to say the landing home page is fascinating with the Map that automatically moves around locations and that is definitely a catch for the users. I'm quite sure that your site with right marketing will turn to be the most visited site and that day is not so far
Honestly i don't have much to criticize it may be because my seduction on your site idea, but still it don't have any serious issues.
The Left side category Ajax menu navigation is cool,
Below the links to post new listing, save criteria, suggest category is also good, but i personally feel you need to replace the Anchor text to Vibrant catching images because moving from the home page those side bolded text looks pretty much same as ads.
Its just a suggestion to improve the look otherwise all are good.

Keep up the good work my best wishes for the success.

[gpyong]

Hi stbalaji2u, thanks for your constructive review, the idea is consider new so far as I haven't see any similar idea.

[stbalaji2u]

Fine keep it up.

[ThinkLikeaUser]

Some thoughts.

If this site is aimed at non-techies they will panic - the language will seem geeky to them, and put them off because of their perceived lack of ability - just the phrase "free matching algorithm" will have them quaking in their boots. - try and make it a bit less jargony if you're interested in attracting that audience.

Tech point - The javascript fell over on this page: http://www.matchimedia.com/search/Pe...d-Relationship and all my nav broke. Also from an accessibility point of view, using scripting like this is an accessibility issue - plus when the script breaks, so does your nav. I would consider a different implementation here for those reasons.

I searched for "jobs" with the "UK" radio button selected. None came up. It just said search results.

It leaves a user thinking:

- was the search broken - It didn't even say 0 results?

- did I type in the wrong term? If so, what's the right term, careers? Employment? There were no tips or synonym matches.... to help me

Or where there simply no matches? It said there were 17 matches for "job matching", so I am not sure why there was nothing.

That could do with tightening up - it's going to cause confusion.

Also I ws getting a javascript error

--------------------------------------------

Webpage error details

User Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 5.1; Trident/4.0; SU 3.23; DS_gamingharbor; GTB6; Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1) ; desktopsmiley_1_3_5621884013866662_5_62; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; WinNT-PAI 12.08.2009)
Timestamp: Wed, 7 Oct 2009 13:03:35 UTC


Message: Expected '}'
Line: 1
Char: 5158
Code: 0
URI: http://www.matchimedia.com/fmenu/fastFind.js


Message: Expected '}'
Line: 1
Char: 5158
Code: 0
URI: http://www.matchimedia.com/fmenu/fastFind.js


------------------------------------------------------

I saw the members online section. I wasn't sure what that did - until I realised you have to register to appear - that might put people off, they might want to do private, unmonitored searches and not realised that unregistered means the searches are private.

On the search people page, it's asking stuff like sexual orientation. I think if you're going to do romantic/adult matching you should keep that separate from stuff like jobs - I think that confuses the site purpose, and some people are going to be put off by adult stuff appearing (for example they use the site at work for other purposes).

Hope this helps.

[stylight]

Just few comments:

- I had to read the home page three time before I understood what this site is about.
- The site refused to register me because of "Invalid City". Only after I changed replace the name of my town by the name of big city I was able to register
- Avatar uploading is not very friendly

Cheers,
Sty