Tori’s website, Palette Reviews, shares his reviews and recommendations on different East Asian comics (manga and manhwa), from selling your life span for cash to being reincarnated and having to change their fate. All these stories are unique and not often seen in Western storytelling. His in-depth analysis of the story, characters, and art styles helps us understand his honest opinions on each manga/manhwa.
Tori has chosen a distinctive topic; he can reach a niche audience through his website.
I’ll just give you a brief review of your whole website design (cause you’ve probably gotten a lot of feedback on it already). It’s nicely designed; I like the pastel colours matching your website’s name. Just a tiny critique: I noticed that your homepage has your latest post, but on the right, it also shows the same latest post. You should try to put some posts you love the most, so the audience will be more inclined to read that one instead of looking through the review section. The homepage is the first impression, so by having an engaging post, audiences will want to explore more of your page.
Consistent content can secure an intended audience. Since your website solely reviews manga/manga, people within the manga readers and “otaku” (anime fans) community will have a great read through your recommendations. One standout post I would like to mention is your post, “Series I’ve Read This Week #1.” It has a quick review of multiple books and a rating at the end. There isn’t always time for many to read a whole post; you want brief information. With this style, you can see what a hit was and what was not. Additionally, I appreciate how you added links to where you can buy the books or read them for free. It’s a nice touch, so your audience doesn’t struggle to find where to read the book.
For this peer review, we are assessing its marketability. The first thing I noticed about the website was its name, “Palette Review.” Just reading the name alone, my first instinct was that the website reviewed different palettes of colours. In Hollingsworth’s article, he discusses the importance of SEO and optimizing a piece of content to a specific keyword. If later on, you want to market yourself and invest in your website, your website’s title may cause some confusion. My first few searches when searching “palette review” on Google are eyeshadow makeup pallets. For audiences looking up “manga recommendation” or something similar, this might deter them from entering, thinking it is something else. It may lower your SEO results.
Although the name “Palette” has a special meaning for you, you could consider adjusting it to instantly convey to the audience that this is a manga review, not a colour or makeup review.
Tori’s website has the potential to market and promote manga/manhwa artists’ new stories. Artists often have a hard time finding recognition for their work. As a part of your website, providing a voice and more publicity to their work makes your website more marketable. Building up more clients and building your social standing.
Overall, Tori’s website looks great. There are a couple of improvements, but nothing major. It’s been two weeks, so I hope your website is going well. Wishing you lots of success on your final website!!!