Timewell — Sun, 19 Sep 2004 17:08:38 +0000

Sorry for dragging up an old thread - nice site by the way! Looks very, very good!

But - how did you get the "Proceed Directly to Checkout" feature? Did you make it yourself or was there a hack/mod that could be downloaded?

fusioncroc — Wed, 16 Jun 2004 14:57:53 +0000

I think you have made a e commerce site lokk good

Only my opinion

cangyray — Wed, 16 Jun 2004 11:43:41 +0000

First of all, your design is wonderful with only a one suggestion. I think the pink and green work very well. You have cooled down the feminimity of the pink with the green, but your shades work together. The only problem I saw (other than the problems that have been discussed earlier) is that the text at the bottom shouldn't be pink. You can't read it. Just use your green instead.
I wish you success! Please don't ever show this site again. I am a purse fanatic and I just went into DTs! Ha!

Megan — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 16:33:57 +0000

Abhi - normally I would agree with you. This is a sepecial case, that's all. I believe that in design there are always exceptions to the rules. So lets stop arguing.

Mark - I can't get into the site now but when I was there I did think the pricing was rather high. The selection and quality looked good though. I was trying to get a more detailed look at the products but to me it looked like a lot of that stuff I could make myself, especially with the bags and beaded jewelry. However, I like to make things myself if I can find the time. I also don't mind using lower quality materials if I can get the same look. A lot of people aren't cheap and crafty like me and would be happy to pay the price, especially if you point out the unique features of the products. When I look at fashion magazines I can never believe the prices people will pay for stuff, but quite obviously they will and this is the market you'll be targeting.

About the colours, that's a good idea. Go with something more sophisticated for the winter, and tap into whatever colours are showing up in current fashion.

Abhishek Reddy — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 16:06:27 +0000

Ok, you can count out "shopping cargo hold" , but I don't see why the others are inappropriate. Perhaps if you saw them in proper context you'd decide otherwise? They sound absurd now, but by relativist reasoning, such transgressions won't be absurd given the right circumstances. That's sort of my point... being selective with deeply ingrained universal symbols -- absolutes -- isn't a good idea.

Logos in the top-left is a flimsy standard. Take a fair sample of web pages and you'll find that it varies enough not to be considered "standard" at any length. Besides, the shopping cart concept is about a discrete symbolic phenomenon, which people treat differently to wider design conventions like layouts.

Ultimately, though, as I said, the worst this'll do is be mildly annoying to a portion (majority?) of the audience. Even in Nielsen's case study, he provides multiple reasons for the subject's failure. So playing with carts and bags is trivial if it doesn't mount up, like you say, Megan.

mark754 — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 16:01:06 +0000

Thanks, everyone, for your excellent comments. You have lots of great suggestions which I'll get working on. It's funny how many things you can miss when looking at a you own site!

Regarding the leveling off of images at the bottom of both columns - the problem is that the product images that appear in the "what's new" box vary in height, which throws off the alignment when certain images come up (randomly each time the page is loaded). I guess I could set the height of all images the same, but then certain images with a tall and thin aspect ratio (e.g. earrings) would look too small. Any suggestions on the best way to handle this?

Megan - the "girly girl" colors were suggested by my girlfriend and we'll probably stay with this basic color scheme for spring and summer, then switch it to a darker color scheme during fall and winter.

The international shipping, purchase without being a member and credit card issues will be sorted out shortly. Shipping will be cheaper, especially to Canada

To the ladies: could you please comment on the product selection and pricing, especially in comparison to other fashion sites that you've seen or may use yourselves? We currently have about 600 products in total. I'm targeting a figure of 1,000 before we start promoting the site. I think there's enough handbags and jewelry and we'll focus on getting more fashion and accessories onto the site. Do you agree? We'll also be offering coupons in magazines (e.g. 20% off).

Thanks again!

Megan — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 15:44:18 +0000

IMO, there are always cases where it is appropriate to deviate from a standard. This is one of them. And the use of "bag" is reasonable and understandable. The examples you gave (suitcase, pot, net etc.) are not. It's like putting a logo on the right side. Yes, logos are normally in the top-left corner. That is where users expect to see it. But in some cases there is nothing wrong with putting it in the top-right. It may make sense, it may be the appropriate choice. However, it would never be appropraite to put the logo in the lower-right or lower-left corner. That wouldn't make sense.

I also think that it is important to do these things in moderation. The "bag" is the only non-standard aspect of this interface. If all sorts of things were non-standard it would be confusing. In this case, there is only one non-standard element and its context makes its use obvious.

Abhishek Reddy — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 15:35:14 +0000

I think Nielsen's point is that the shopping cart has become a standard symbol for this function. Deviating from the standard could be risky. I suppose it's a little like the envelope symbol which is used for both mail and email. It doesn't have to be perfectly accurate in reality, just widely used.

I'd also say that the fact that a shopping cart system (including the unrealistic "checkout") exists in the context of a bag product isn't sufficient justification to meddle with a standard icon. It would be rather like using the silhouette of mountains on a speed-bump road sign simply because there's a good view of a mountain range from that point in the road.

That is, if one were to adopt any contextually related container in place of the cart, one might end up with all sorts of absurd things like "shopping suitcase", "shopping pot", "shopping net", "shopping cargo hold", etc etc.

Megan — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 14:57:39 +0000

I disagree with that. On another site it may be the case, but in this case it makes perfect sense. Shopping carts are tacky and associated with cheap department stores and grocery stores. This is a classy womens' clothing and accessory shop. In the real world, I certainly wouldn't walk around a shop like that with a cart!** The use of "bag" here adds a touch of class and whimsy to the site.

If there were other confusing navigational items here I could see why this would be confusing, but since everything is so clearly layed out it's not a problem. The context clears up any confusion. The real problem lies behind that point when you try to place an actual order.

** Of course, I wouldn't walk around with a bag either, but bag is more appropriate than cart.

Little sidenote

Abhishek Reddy — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 14:23:19 +0000

Megan wrote: I'm going to do some test shopping here. I love the "shopping bag" concept (instead of "cart"). Great idea!

That comment caught my eye. Jakob Nielsen mentions in his critique of a bookseller's shopping system this:

Quote: The current Wordsworth design places additional barriers to having anybody buy because they employ several non-standard design elements:
1. They call their shopping cart a "bag" instead of a "cart". A few users will stop right here.

... which coincidentally (I hope) is precisely the situation here, not accounting for sales of any sort. I also notice "shopping bag" links to "shopping_cart.php". Depending on the potential scale of such inconsistencies across the site, it could get mildly confusing (don't underestimate the seriousness of little annoyances!).

Just a note.