The first idea would be to get rid of the advertising. Do you know that the advertising shows when the page first loads but doesn't reload when I navigate?

Generally this site looks like it was made using microsoft FrontPage 98. The background image is unpleasant to the eye, the content doesn't magnify when I increase the browser magnification, not many people care about how many visitors you have had, 'Welcome Guest' is generally considered to be a bit of a cheesey greeting and the constant flashing of text and the animation of the logo is distracting - Sorry to be all negative so far, but I'd rather be honest with you.

As a prospective customer I would be put off by your contact number being a mobile, more so if you don't include a business address. I would be completely put off as a prospective customer if I were to read the section on how to become a technician, there is no way I would entrust my personal computer to someone if the selection criteria is 'As long as you are computer literate you can become a Micro Repair Technician'. This gives the impression of cowboyism at it's worst. Worse still 'Cleaning and servicing procedure which has been developed for MicroRepair which will allow you to optimise, valet and remove virus/malware from any laptop or PC.' shows that you don't know your own tools (how can you if they were developed for you insted of by you?) and you don't know what you are doing, how can you if they were developed for you insted of by you?

Moreover is the ethical side of it, good advice to pc owners would be to get a good virus scanner rather than sending their pc to you for periodic scans and I could dust my heat sink with a hoover and a paint brush. I appreciate that not all pc owners would know that but an ethical company would not misadvise a customer on virus protection and security (very immoral) and most people could find out how to clean their pc after some simple Google searching on the matter. Unless you are offering this service for less than the cost of a virus scanner it is a bit of a rip-off.

As a prospective technician there is no way that I would pay you £199 to join without a garuntee of a return. If I pay you that and your site fails I would have given you money for nothing. I would be further put off as a prospective technician because if I did know what I was doing I would be aware of the comments above and I wouldn't want to be associated with this.

Do you realise that I cold get all of this done at PC world for £25 without having to mail my pc off or have a stranger come to my house and they would recomend a good virus scanner during the process?

I don't want to come across as just being vindictive about your site and service, I think that I am being objective but I want you to hear the objections that I have so that you can use the information constructively. Also, as you stand you look like you have the potential to give a bad name to a good service.

Good luck with it.
John
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www.beta2b.com

Thanks for taking the time to write such a long report, you have some valid and great points but i disagree with one - £25 quid gets you nothing at Pc world.

Also a basic virus scanner is crap the viruses are two steps a head some of them even disable the best known scanners.
Micro Repair has already fixed hundreds of Pc and laptops in we are just looking to expand. £199 is nothing as we dont charge any on going fees we make money from advertising.

Why don't you join us and charge your customers £25 and if the website fails i will give you your money back.

LONDON - PC World is one of the worst places to go if you ever need your computer fixed, according to a new report by consumer watchdog Which?

People deserve better

Experts for Computing Which? magazine conducted a survey to analyze the expertise of several computer repair companies including PC World. They introduced minor faults in several PCs and took them to 20 repair shops, seven of which belonged to PC World.

The remaining 13 shops were independent entities. At one store, the staff missed the fault entirely and told the people that it would take £350 to repair the machine. They were also advised to buy a new computer rather than repair the existing one. In the remaining six PC World stores, the staff refused to even look at the PC because it did not have a "boxed copy of Windows or a recovery disk."

Other retailers also had problems with some choosing to re-install Windows instead of finding the glitch meaning that customers had to shell out extra for a new Windows copy as well as lose data without any backup. But researchers said that independent repair shops carried out better service than PC World and at a lower cost.

"Consumers rely on PC repair shops to solve a problem and to do so at a fair price. It is shocking that simple problems such as a loose cable can be misdiagnosed, and stores are getting away with charging for their mistakes," said Abigail Waraker, Editor of Computing Which? magazine. "PC World is the only big chain that repairs PCs it didn't sell, making it the first port of call for many PC owners. We think they should overhaul their training- they could learn a lot from independent retailers."

PC World communications chief Hamish Thompson said that the company had fixed many PC problems for customers in the last year, "We're constantly improving the quality of our services and we're grateful to Which? for their feedback on 14 visits," he added.

Computing Which? has advised PC owners to follow these tips to avoid being hoodwinked:
1- Ask friends and family to recommend a repair shop
2- Always check the charges to look at the PC- whether it's an hourly rate or a flat fee for certain repairs
3- Get a quote beforehand for labour and parts
4- Make it clear to the shop that they must ask your permission of the cost of the work will go over a certain price
5- Ask the shop to call you before replacing any software or hardware- you may need to check if you risk losing data

Now you sound like a professional who knows what he is on about. That level of objection handling would be a massive sales plus for your site. To answer some of your points:

I agree. A basic virus scanner is crap. Many free ones let the virus in so that the software can learn how to deal with them so that the paid for version of the scanner can do it's job. However I did say a good virus scanner. I use Eset and have had no problems for 3 years. More than that, when my friends get viruses I put their hard drive into my pc and it solves the problem every time. More than that, the 12 companies local to me that I work with have never had a virus problem since I installed Eset on their systems and there have been many attacks. I still say that if you are going to offer a professional service you should tell your customers to protect themselves, not come to you after they have been infected.

I won't be joining you or anyone else to do hardware, I got out of that side a while back because software is much more renumerative and doesn't involve moving much (I am very lazy), but if you go under you won't be giving anyone their money back. If I were still into hardware though I would consider doing it for a commission.

PC World - The branch in Sealand does charge £25 for a service and they do a satisfactory job. It would be foolish to assume that an entire chain is no good based on the behaviours of individuals within it. I accept readily that there are branches of PC World and many other companies who should be avoided by everyone at all costs, but this applies to every trade. Organisations like Which and Watchdog often rely on sensationalism to get viewers and readers. If you applied everything that they say to everything that they report on we would never leave the house.

I think that the most important part of my previous post that I didn't get across is that the PC repair industry (like all others) is beset with many cowboys and your web site makes you look like one of them. If you can offer your customers reassurance of fair trade, quality of work and maximum security then you will be on to a good business plan. As it is your web site is just frightening to anyone reading the 'Become a technician' part and just looks like a billboard with an ipad competition on the customer side. You obviously know what the problems are in the industry and what your prospective customers fear the most, so use your abilities to entice them and offer a code of ethics.

I do genuinely wish you all of the best with this.
John
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www.beta2b.com

Hello Martin,

Don't take any of this as harsh, more advice on to better your services.

When going on your website I was confused as to where the buttons were to view your services etc but there doesn't seem to be any which is odd, you have a PC and Laptop Servicing button but this isn't obviously a button nor is it clear what it's linking to.

You have space at the top of the website for some unknown reason, and about 1000px of white notthingness at the bottom of the website which is very odd.

The logo is probably the best part of your identidy, shame it's lacking a decnet website to go with it.

The content needs a lot of work, for example - 'Don't wait till your computer breaks get it Micro Repaired today.' What does this even mean? If ones computer isn't broken then why would it need to get repaired?

As for the bashing of PC World, I work for KnowHow, PCWorld's new support division and I can say that what you here in the press etc is a very small minority, where we are we fix over 4000 laptops per week and less than 1% of these have issues when they return to the customer.

Work on the site and the content to look 1/2 professional.