My design site is looking for a good kick in the pants.

I'm trying to get on my feet as a freelance web designer, but I really need my site to be torn up and down to shreads by my peers before I'll feel comfortable showing it to potential clients.

I want to submit it to search directories sometime soon. But I want it to be looked at in a favorable light.

So I beg you, tear it up! Let me know what could be improved

I'm not aiming for flashy stuff. I want the site to extremely simple and straight foward. But still kind of edgy.

My site:
http://www.dustyreagan.com/

My biggest concern is that it looks too similar to http://www.realworldstyle.com. It was his site that inspired my design. But I don't want it to be so similar that my site gets a negative light because of it.

It's simple and elegent - I like it And although you were inspired by another site - that is normal - people always see sites that they like and want to create something similar

quite good I would say..I personally prefer more gfx-based designs, but since it was your aim to keep the page straight I guess you met your aim

But just a thing to spend a thought on: when wanting to be a freelance webdesigner, would people then not take your page for a first estimation about your skills and wether you would be able to do that design that your potential customers want? You know professionalist do appreciate simple, elegant design, but your potential customers do know jack about webdesign, loading time and so on, so they would first rather have a look on wether the page of the webdesign company does "imply" that the webdesigner has skills, and for non-professionalists, that equals mostly wether the whole design itselfs looks eye-catching, so to say gfx-based.

I´m a freelance webdesigner myself, and at least that is the experience that I had. E.g. in my most recent work did I want to do an elegant design for an estate agency, and that is what I came up with at the end, cause of the will of the customer: http://immoexpert.at <- rather much gfx-based

I see what you mean mithril - maybe you could add a few graphics to your site to show off your skills

The customer is always right. Let me explain what I mean by this, because it is often used in many different ways.. An important rule about sales is this : "Everybody wants to be right" and the easiest, or at least common, way of doing this is by making the other person wrong. In fact, the desire to be right is so high, and the behaviour of making other people wrong is so common that, most people stand on the defensive. As soon as they feel that somebody is making them wrong.. they put up a barrier and shoot the other person down (at least in their own minds). Even more so, with this desire high and behaviour common.. whenever you make somebody feel right (by acknowledging them in a sincere manner) then they are on your side instead of against you. Very few sales will be made by making the other person feel that they are wrong.. which is what you have just done with this paragraph.. particularly that first sentence.

You can have this as your personal goal.. it's a good goal to have.. but don't tell your potential clients this.. educate them, but don't tell them that this is what you are doing.. you have just told your potential clients that they don't know something.. they are making poor choices, and you know better. And your even using jargon to do so. web standards methadology, what is this guy going on about?!

instead.. maybe something like 'We will work with you to provide the fast attractive site that you want, in a manner that is easy to use and highly compatible Internet Explorer, Netscape, and any other other browser on any computer.' or something like that. Instead of telling me that I am wrong and you know better.. tell me what the benefits are of going with you.

Customers don't buy features.. they buy benefits. And if they are going to somebody else for web design, they don't want an education.

oh.. and on the FAQ page.. you're missing the # in the links.

That makes a lot of sense c444l. I'll be thinking of how to reword it. Thanks for pointing out the faq too!

mithril and red hot sheep: Yeah, I see your point. I think I may try adding some sort of graphic element that's out of the way.

Thanks for the input!

One other concern of mine: I was considering maybe including articles that I've written and maybe other type of tips and utilities used for web design on the site. All of them written or created by me. The only issue though, is that they would probably attract other web designers and not clients. But on the same token more content might help the site. Any opinions on this? I guess alternatively I could make a completely different site for peer level type work.

I appreciate all of the help! More critiques are extremely welcomed!

I updated the paragraph you mentioned c444l. Opinions?

IMHO, the new paragraph will attract more clients, and repell less.

of course, my opinion is not the only one.

I agree with C444l on this good overview of the human ego

I think the site is too plain, with a fairly simple structure. While this is not nessercerily bad, It isn't showing off your website creating skills, and gives me the feeling that you downloaded the design from a cheap site.

Show off a bit more while staying professional as this will show potential customers that you can do more than use 2 plain colors, a few divs and one image. If you are unwilling to change your site, then make a few example pages of your work.

At the moment I would be put off by your website, as just about every other person who knows a scrap of html could reproduce it. Stand out from the crowd...

i have to agree with CJX
anybody that can use html could create something similar in no time at all

its not that its a bad site design its more that it isnt doing you any justice at all
if i wanted a website designed id go for someone that made their site stand out from the others so that i know i would be getting someone who could make my site stand out - if that makes sense?

Ive just though of some examples:

Everyone has a pale background; experiment with darker colors
Everyone has a banner at the top, and a menu on the left; try the banner on the left and the menu along the top! (of course, the banner will be next to, not below the menu).
Everyone uses those same bullet points; why not create your own???

Hey, thanks everyone for the critiques!

I've pondered a bit about the site and I think I'm going to redesign it. It'll probably be a month or two before v.2 but I'll definitely post it back up here for some more reviews.

You guys have been extremely helpful!