Bass Direct

[Woodinblack]

4 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

Punters aren't experts. But at the end of the day, they are the people you've got to please in terms of experience. So in this case, their opinions may count more (or at least as much as) the experts. Experts aren't the target buyers, the punters are.

 

 

People will always say what they don't like, but in reality, none of those will stop anyone from buying anything they were going to buy anyway, so where they should listen to peoples opinions, they have to bear in mind that these are just random peoples opinions when asked and unless there are real useabilty issues, they aren't that important.

Also they have to consider this is a bass guitar shop run by a very small company, not a eCommerce show room.

 

This is a standard modern site (a woocommerce one) - I am not sure I get the '2015 ecommerce site', like everything has to change every year?? It seems to do the job and everything works. I think they have done fine.

 

All sites have issues, but this seems to work a lot better than what they had, and makes it much clearer - obviously if you were used to the previous it might annoy as you want things to stay the same, but if you came from fresh to both sites, the old one would seem pretty poor.

[Reggaebass]

12 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

Search was quick for me, just over a second to find all used fenders.

Yeah same for me, no problem really 

[EBS_freak]

9 minutes ago, Woodinblack said:

 

People will always say what they don't like, but in reality, none of those will stop anyone from buying anything they were going to buy anyway, so where they should listen to peoples opinions, they have to bear in mind that these are just random peoples opinions when asked and unless there are real useabilty issues, they aren't that important.

 

 

This is not true if the product is not exclusive. People will buy the product - but not necessarily from BD.

 

Website responsiveness and minimal click through is a massive influencer. If you want to buy something and you can click to buy in three clicks (e.g. integrated checkout with ApplePay, Googlepay, PayPal without being nagged for details all the time - you are onto a winner. You only have to look at the speed at which you can do a quick checkout on Amazon to understand why this is a massive part of the UI and can influence the user to chose them as a store as opposed to anywhere else.  The "Buy Now" button in Amazon is a great example of this - why would the user want to go anywhere else when it is so easy and negates the traditional checkout experience. Appreciate, as good get more specialised and if the price becomes significantly different, this those attributes becomes a factor in accepting more laborious experiences).

 

As someone who has done a fair but of UI analysis for some government websites (which I know are mostly pap), responsiveness is a massive part of it. There's loads of money spent on active monitoring using real users as opposed to doing offline testing. You can see where people are bailing out and how they are attempting to use the system - because they may be exhibiting behaviours that were never accounted for at design time. Anyway, dont want to derail the thread will all that kinda talk.

 

Anyway... as a quick example of UI annoyance, it's annoying to me (and surely to others), that I cant navigate BD site and drill down into an item by clicking on the picture. In conjunction with the text, that would offer a larger click point and cater for both sets of people who want to navigate pictorially or via text link. I know BD have probably just bought this as a COTS e-commerce product, probably based on price (or maybe even being free) so it may not even be a configurable. Again, just a musing.

 

 

[Woodinblack]

ok, I hadn't noticed that you couldn't click the pictures, that is annoying, and is not something to do with the site, it is something in the setup. Woocommerce is just a free ecommerce platform, very configurable - it was one of the ones I looked at last time I had to update a site (which has yet to be updated due to fear of change).

I can see some issues with the site obviously, but somethings are less important. The weight colum for instance - wtf is the point of that? I know weight is important to bass players but I never heard anyone said 'I only play basses that are 4.1kg, not 100g more or less'.

 

I am aware that it is important to have the fast checkout, I wasn't comparing the site with amazon*, i was comparing it with the old site which I assume is a similar number of clicks - I don't remember it being slick before.

 

* I never compare anything with amazon, it isn't a site I ever use.

[Greg Edwards69]

12 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

Anyway... as a quick example of UI annoyance, it's annoying to me (and surely to others), that I cant navigate BD site and drill down into an item by clicking on the picture. In conjunction with the text, that would offer a larger click point and cater for both sets of people who want to navigate pictorially or via text link. I know BD have probably just bought this as a COTS e-commerce product, probably based on price (or maybe even being free) so it may not even be a configurable. Again, just a musing.

That was one of the first things I noticed too. Where there is no obvious button, my instinctive behaviour is to click the product image, not the descriptive caption underneath it.

 

I also found the search filters a little cumbersome. Most other similar websites don't require you to click 'apply' once choosing the appropriate filter, it should automatically apply.

 

Maybe we should feed these small, but impactful usability issues back to them to help make the new website better.

[tauzero]

2 hours ago, jonno1981 said:

I find it to harder to navigate around quickly on this new site. I actually used to value being able to see thumbnails at a glance on the old site to have a quick scan of new items, I don’t think that’s possible anymore.

 

On the home page there's "View latest Pre-owned" and "View latest New", which simply do a filter view for new or used with a sort by latest.

[tauzero]

23 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

The "Buy Now" button in Amazon is a great example of this - why would the user want to go anywhere else when it is so easy and negates the traditional checkout experience.

 

Because I then have to find and eradicate every twist and turn when they try and sign me up to Prime. In fact, Amazon is a good example of a mixed user experience - search function is so poor you only find things by accident, and when you do buy something, you have to find your way out of them automatically upselling you to Prime. Plus the bastards don't pay tax and [this rant continued p94].

[Supernaut]

Simple case in point is to compare directly to the competition. Bass Bros website has always been easy to use and up to date. 

[BigRedX]

54 minutes ago, tauzero said:

 

Because I then have to find and eradicate every twist and turn when they try and sign me up to Prime. In fact, Amazon is a good example of a mixed user experience - search function is so poor you only find things by accident, and when you do buy something, you have to find your way out of them automatically upselling you to Prime. Plus the bastards don't pay tax and [this rant continued p94].

 

Unless you only use Amazon very occasionally or manage to find products that ready have "free" delivery Prime should be a no-brainer.

 

I have to admit I was sceptical the first time it was pushed in my direction, but later went back and added up what my additional postage charges had been for the previous 12 months, and for me Prime more than pays for itself to the extent that all the other services that come with it are effectively free. Plus because it's used primarily for business purchases I can claim my Prime membership as a business expense.

Edited August 4, 2023 by BigRedX

[sammybee]

1 hour ago, Woodinblack said:

 

People will always say what they don't like, but in reality, none of those will stop anyone from buying anything they were going to buy anyway, so where they should listen to peoples opinions, they have to bear in mind that these are just random peoples opinions when asked and unless there are real useabilty issues, they aren't that important.

Also they have to consider this is a bass guitar shop run by a very small company, not a eCommerce show room.

 

This is a standard modern site (a woocommerce one) - I am not sure I get the '2015 ecommerce site', like everything has to change every year?? It seems to do the job and everything works. I think they have done fine.

 

All sites have issues, but this seems to work a lot better than what they had, and makes it much clearer - obviously if you were used to the previous it might annoy as you want things to stay the same, but if you came from fresh to both sites, the old one would seem pretty poor.

 

Ok. look at the competition - or similar businesses that have a web-presence... You say BassDirect is a small shop, but there are others that make a real effort to ensure their website/online presence is good.

 

Take for example Jordan Guitars https://jordanguitars.co.uk/ site is nice, clean and functional, a lot of thought has gone into the design etc.. I'm sure there are others

[Cato]

It's not perfect but it's a massive improvement on the previous site, which was borderline unusable.

 

 

 

 

[chris_b]

22 minutes ago, Supernaut said:

Simple case in point is to compare directly to the competition. Bass Bros website has always been easy to use and up to date. 

 

If you specify 5 string basses on the Bass Brothers site, annoyingly, it doesn't show you all of them.

 

I found the old BD site OK to use. It was easy to get around and find the info I was looking for.

 

As a person who can now only buy a bass if it is close to 8lbs or less, the weight option is very interesting to me. IMO they should add 2 more ranges options , 0kg to 2.9kg, and 3kg to 3.9kg.

 

Also as a terminally lazy person I would prefer lists of products to click on rather than having to type the name in the search bar every time.

[Greg Edwards69]

43 minutes ago, Supernaut said:

Simple case in point is to compare directly to the competition. Bass Bros website has always been easy to use and up to date. 

 

5 minutes ago, chris_b said:

If you specify 5 string basses on the Bass Brothers site, annoyingly, it doesn't show you all of them.

 

I found the old BD site OK to use. It was easy to get around and find the info I was looking for.

Funnily enough, I discovered the Bass Bros website for the first time this morning. I don't know if there's some throttling going on at work, but it's a painfully slow-loading website. Slow to the point of being unusable. 

Edited August 4, 2023 by Greg Edwards69

[pst62]

It looks like they're using the same page builders as Northwest Guitars.

[Kev]

I do think on occasion people can sometimes struggle to tell the difference between a slow server, a slow isp and a slow PC/Browser.  Both the new Bass Direct and Bassbros website are as fast as they possible could be for me, so either the server they're on is very variable or (more likely) its browsers and pcs slowing things down.

 

I oddly miss the old Bass Direct site.  I liked how one-click it was to quickly look at different sections/manufacturers.  And I think the search defaulting to show both in and out of stock items, with no way of knowing without clicking on the product, is not a good way of doing it.

[Chienmortbb]

On the bright side, look how many of us have looked over there since the relaunch.

[EBS_freak]

2 hours ago, Kev said:

I do think on occasion people can sometimes struggle to tell the difference between a slow server, a slow isp and a slow PC/Browser.  Both the new Bass Direct and Bassbros website are as fast as they possible could be for me, so either the server they're on is very variable or (more likely) its browsers and pcs slowing things down.

 

I oddly miss the old Bass Direct site.  I liked how one-click it was to quickly look at different sections/manufacturers.  And I think the search defaulting to show both in and out of stock items, with no way of knowing without clicking on the product, is not a good way of doing it.

Use a third party analyser to see how BD reports its responsiveness. Spoiler - there's a lot of bloatware in the BD site, although whoever built it is probably not even aware or maybe not savvy enough around such things. Its not been coded, it's been assembled using COTS products that have been shoehorned together.

Edited August 4, 2023 by EBS_freak

[EBS_freak]

3 hours ago, tauzero said:

Plus the bastards don't pay tax and [this rant continued p94].

When you figure out how much companies rely on the revenue generated via Amazon, they have the government over a barrel.

 

"We leave the UK and all the dependants go bust/lose business and pay no/less tax... or you let us carry on."

 

All the linked dependant tax revenue would be a catastrophic loss to the public coffers.

 

Couriers/packaging manufactures/folks selling through amazon/affiliate earners/digital media owners where the distribution is through Amazon/staff/warehousing costs etc.... the impact of Amazon pulling out of the UK would be MASSIVE.

 

(Doesn't make it right though)

Edited August 4, 2023 by EBS_freak

[tauzero]

2 hours ago, BigRedX said:

Unless you only use Amazon very occasionally or manage to find products that ready have "free" delivery Prime should be a no-brainer.

 

Prime would most definitely not pay for itself in my case. Some of us hate using Amazon for assorted reasons to do with tax avoidance and workers' rights.

[tauzero]

3 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

When you figure out how much companies rely on the revenue generated via Amazon, they have the government over a barrel.

 

"We leave the UK and all the dependants go bust/lose business and pay no/less tax... or you let us carry on."

 

All the linked dependant tax revenue would be a catastrophic loss to the public coffers.

 

Couriers/packaging manufactures/folks selling through amazon/affiliate earners/digital media owners where the distribution is through Amazon/staff/warehousing costs etc.... the impact of Amazon pulling out of the UK would be MASSIVE.

 

Why would Amazon pull out of the UK? Even if they paid their fair whack, it would still leave large sums for the bloated parasite Bezos.

[EBS_freak]

4 minutes ago, tauzero said:

 

Why would Amazon pull out of the UK? Even if they paid their fair whack, it would still leave large sums for the bloated parasite Bezos.

The don't - but the threat is enough to secure them what they want.

 

If there is the choice of paying out, or not paying out, which do you think Bezos would want to go with?

 

For a different take on the situ, why aren't you annoyed that Amazon are receiving tax credits? (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/aug/15/amazon-could-avoid-uk-tax-for-two-more-years-thanks-to-rishi-sunaks-tax-break)

[EBS_freak]

Anyway, not going to go into any more Amazon talk, I was simply referencing their UI, not their tax status and shouldn't be derailing the thread.

 

Plus, its verging on politics anyway. So, I'm self moderating and done on that particular aspect of the convo! (And @ped is watching)

[tauzero]

As I haven't bought anything from the new BD website, I'm not in a position to compare it with Am*z*n, except to say that it probably doesn't try to force you into buying Prime/strings/plectrums. There could be some pre-filtering done from drop-downs on the main menu. The filtering is comprehensive, which is good.

 

It's by no means perfect, but it's a far better look than the old website and at least as usable. I used to look at the used 5-string basses - that's handy, I can do exactly that now. It would be an improvement to be able to click on the pictures as well as the names to show the details. I also think that if you use the hierarchy display line to go back a level or two, all the filters should be shown with their current selections.

[EBS_freak]

40 minutes ago, tauzero said:

I also think that if you use the hierarchy display line to go back a level or two, all the filters should be shown with their current selections.

Agreed - I'm sure there's a popular website that we know of that does such a thing. Its name currently escapes me.

Edited August 4, 2023 by EBS_freak

[EBS_freak]

Another annoyance. I click on to a product (via the text, not via a pic)

 

Look at that big pic in the middle. Lets click on it (seems reasonable, but maybe not because it wouldn't allow me to click on the images in the listings... but hey)...

 

 

Woah! That's great that. I want to see more. Oh, the cursor keys dont seem to do anything... and there's no arrows on the pic to scroll. Oh you're kidding me...

 

Click out.... look at the pics underneath... and...

 

 

oh look! same picture but now I can scroll through the rest of the images. Why not give me the scroll option on the main (and first pic) that I clicked on. I don't want to back out of an action I have done to scroll through some pics.

 

PS, I know this isn't BDs fault, it just shows how devs don't understand how user experience/expectations (especially for consistency - do you want me to click on pictures or not?) are often at odds with the spec