Internal Review· Apr 28 – Apr 29

Review notes from Tony

Raw feedback captured verbatim from Tony's review session. Nothing here has been adopted as direction — it's input the team is weighing. Quotes are presented as said, organized by the topic the reviewer used.

General notes

"Headline and sub-head fonts: We need this as an element because it creates cost-effective visual impact."

— Tony
"Instead of being locked into a light or dark palette, the site should support both light and dark modes."

— Tony
"The presentation style is nice (side-by-side), but we need to nail the desktop version. Our target audience will likely use this site on a laptop. So let's ensure we use available space and avoid making it overly responsive."

— Tony
"Remove tables from the home page; their density causes people to ignore them. Similarly, the ticker is very cool but not suitable for this one."

— Tony
"Language: Is there a cool way to make this multi-lingual (e.g. with AI? We charge extra, but English/Spanish/Japanese seems smart.)"

— Tony
"Video: Is there a way to incorporate this into the website? A seamlessly integrated video module would be key, and presenting case studies as videos would be amazing. It would also create another discovery mechanism for Taiho Ventures. We don't need such a module or even a look & feel for the concepts, but ensuring easy integration from a design perspective probably requires some thought now."

— Tony

Sections Tony called out

Hero

Full-bleed video hero
- ""Sexy" immersive visual feature — a full bleed video as featured in #2 or #5 would be ideal. I think it captures the client's attention right away." — Tony
12 Cinematic Performance CVC hero

"area scenery would be striking and attention getting" — Tony

07 Cinematic Dark Syndicate hero

"background video is more standard, but still engaging" — Tony

Case study

Strong case study summary section
- "Strong case study summary section." — Tony
12 Cinematic Performance CVC case-study

"capsule style is compact and concise" — Tony

10 Maximalist Magazine CVC case-study

"magazine style article structure draws you into the case study" — Tony

Partners

Partners section that supports stakeholder recognition
- "Section that highlights partners, allowing for stakeholder recognition." — Tony
10 Maximalist Magazine CVC partners

"standard, but clean design draws attention to headshots which is most important element, given the small community and layout allows you to see the bulk of partners at a glance" — Tony

05 Warm Editorial Bio team

"the editorial style of the photos is engaging; layout sort of works with it, though a mosaic might optimize this a bit better" — Tony

Quote

Quotes that distill case studies
- "QUOTES: I think these distill their case studies very well. We should find room for this content in our demo." — Tony
06 Monograph Ventures quote

"this quote tightly distills their role within the syndicate" — Tony

12 Cinematic Performance CVC case-study

"ties takeaway tightly to case study in a sticky way" — Tony

Scannable content

Scannable, layered takeaways
- "SCANNABLE CONTENT: Allows you to deliver "the why" quickly. Here the format makes you think how organized/strategic they are." — Tony
02 Sepia Paper Editorial takeaways

"the layout is SO strong in efficiently providing a layered view of takeaways" — Tony

Intake form

Intake form (information architecture)
- "INTAKE FORM — enabling quick communication of requirements when collecting feedback." — Tony
12 Cinematic Performance CVC intake

"this form is terribly designed from a UX and visual appeal perspective, but the information architecture is solid — it efficiently asks all the right questions up front from a potential start-up that Taiho Ventures is looking for" — Tony

Global focus

Equally-weighted global locations
- "GLOBAL FOCUS — One primary consideration for choosing us is the reach and breadth Taiho brings as a partner. We should lean into that in the prototype." — Tony
02 Sepia Paper Editorial locations

"showing each location as equally important stresses their presence in separate communities" — Tony

Menus

Strong menus (no winning example yet)
- "Strong menus, to encourage our small target audience to come back to easily pull the materials they need / directly go to the content they are looking for." — Tony
- "I don't think any of these were particularly strong and I don't have any great examples. The best I could come up with: Nike — the multi-menu listing often found in the footer; might this work? Apple — solid, but I'm not sure if you can express the utilitarian practicality of these contextual menus. Stripe — I like it, but this may be my personal preference." — Tony

Avoid

Avoid the standard / WordPress look
- "Avoid the standard website style: #5 Poster Modern CVC is solid and fits well with Taiho brand standards. Except it leans toward a WordPress/cookie-cutter look. We need to avoid this." — Tony
09 Poster Modern CVC overall

"solid and fits well with Taiho brand standards. Except it leans toward a WordPress/cookie-cutter look" — Tony

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Review notes from Tony

Full-bleed video hero

Strong case study summary section

Partners section that supports stakeholder recognition

Quotes that distill case studies

Scannable, layered takeaways

Intake form (information architecture)

Equally-weighted global locations

Strong menus (no winning example yet)

Avoid the standard / WordPress look

Design Canvas