Collections & Revised Item Pages Launch
Per my recent post we’ve been working on enhancing our hand-picked lists (AKA ‘HPL’) feature. The new “Collection” edition HPLs launched tonight.
Collections are “souped up” HPLs that are focused on a set style or purchase occasion. The goal of Collections is to help shoppers discover items tailored to their personal style and get them to discover merchants they might not have otherwise found. At a high-level, we are creating a serendipitous experience that drives buyers toward exciting discoveries while browsing on Bonanza. However, this is just the start.
Time and time again, our user tests have shown us how important it is for each item to have multiple good quality photos. Our Collections page is built around this feedback -- with your large, crisp pictures as the focus. Toward the bottom of the Collection pages you’ll find comments and a panel that prompts users to nominate or vote on new items for inclusion in the Collection. Collections, unlike standard HPLs, can receive nominations from anyone in the community. It’s up to the Collection curator to make the final call on what’s in and what’s out, but the community gets a voice by suggesting and voting on nominees.
We have also simplified and revised the item detail pages along with this update. The new design incorporates several improvements we have gleaned from our user research: we elevated the placement of your related items to be “above the fold,” rather than sequestered at the bottom of the page. We have increased the size of the main product image and the discoverability of the thumbnails. On some item pages you’ll find a related Collection at the bottom. Why are Collections on the detail page? As a whole, these are the most viewed pages on the site, so it gives us the best opportunity to introduce shoppers to items that are relevant to them and thus reduce site abandonment.
Our goals with the item detail page are three-fold. We want shoppers to either buy the item at hand (first priority), check out other items from the same booth (second priority), or find related items in a Collection (third priority.) The priorities are reflected in the new design. The product images are much stronger to drive sales of the item being viewed. The exposure to other items from the merchant’s booth is now above the fold and not relegated to the bottom of the page. And collection merchandising (the lowest priority) is appended after all the item details, at the bottom of the page. Our new designs received positive feedback in user feedback sessions for reducing clutter and grouping together like-minded information more effectively.
We understand that Collection merchandising on item pages may cause concern for some merchants. Why would it be in your interests to have other sellers’ items on your item page? The simple answer is “reciprocity.” Just as other sellers’ items are potentially on your page, your items are potentially on other sellers’ pages. And as we start personalizing the site experience what’s more valuable than absolute ownership of what shows on the bottom of item pages is getting your items in front of the right people; regardless of whose page they started at. Relevance matters most when it comes to driving conversion rates and sales, and Collections will be an invaluable tool for us to drive relevance.
Not convinced? That’s ok! Collections on your item pages aren’t mandatory. You can opt out of Collection participation in your booth advanced settings area. Just select “no” in the area that says “Participate in Collections.” Do note, however, that removing Collections from your detail pages means your items will not be eligible to be featured in Collections (this ensures fairness to those who do choose to participate…which we hope will be most everyone!)
For those that prefer to read their announcements in FAQ-style format, let’s run this back:
What’s the difference between a Collection and a hand-picked list (HPL)? Think of Collections as a “promoted HPL.” Just like HPLs get selected for promotion on the homepage, a handful of HPLs will be selected for promotion as Collections.
How do I get my HPLs promoted as a Collection? Make a great HPL, taking care to gear it around a set category, style (retro, trendy, vintage, etc), or occasion (night on the town, etc). Check the box when creating your list that you’d like to have it considered for a Collection. We’ll ask you a couple of questions about your list inspiration and background on the items you've selected; knowing the point of view of the curator is important of buyers. We’ll also ask the community for feedback on whether your HPL should be considered for promotion to a Collection. You can see a sample of the voting in the red box of the screenshot below.
Can I add items to other peoples’ Collections? You can nominate items from the bottom of item detail pages (as shown below), but it’s up to the Collection curator to make the final call.
Additionally, community members can vote to help the Collection curator know whether they think the item belongs! Look for voting at the bottom of Collection pages by the comments.
What’s changing with the hand-picked list creation process? Not much. We added one field so the list creator can ask a question of the community. Our hope is that this kick starts an interesting conversation that is engaging for merchants and prospective buyers.
I don’t want Collections on my item pages. Can I remove them? Yes. Just update the setting in your advanced booth settings area. Note that if you choose not to participate in Collections on your item detail pages, that your items are not eligible to be added to Collections by users. Why not? It’s only fair to those who choose to share traffic from their item pages.
What’s next for Collections? More user feedback sessions and testing, some tweaking no doubt, and promotion via new forthcoming emails and our social outlets. Look for an update on our new email marketing efforts soon.
Who is this HanaRyan character who seems to have created most of the collections so far? Hana is our merchandising intern whose full time job is to sift through our inventory of more than 3 million items and spot the items with great pictures and descriptions. And after weeks of building collections mostly by herself, you can be she is greatly looking forward to the help of the community in spotting the best of the best from within Bonanza!
What happened in the header? We made some aesthetic changes that we think give the site a little more personality. Nothing major. A nip here, a tuck there.
Are any fees changing at all with this? Nope! No new fees. No increase in fees. No changes at all. What if I opt out of collections? Will you increase my fees then? Nope. No new fees. No increase in fees. What if I sell a bunch more items as a result of being featured in collections? Then we will charge you our regular fees for the items you sell. And life will be good.
Thanks all. I suspect we didn’t cover all the questions so please fire away.
- Alex & Bill
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104 responses to Collections & Revised Item Pages Launch
I think I see. So it’s kinda like we the people vote on which hpl makes it to be featured. At least that’s how my brain sums it up. But I may have to re-read all that a few more times…LOL
The “aesthetic changes” look manly but I question the personality you were shooting for. Bachelor Pad?
I liked the old Bonanzle look better. (Why is my wink smiley covering my text if I have it on the same line as the text? Actually, it is cutting off text unless I remove the smiley.)
See, like this
Hey, the alignment of our posts here are off also.
Look at the end of each of the lines that I wrote above.
Ok, call me nutty. It looks fine now.
Yet another edit, I am not nutty. It is doing it intermittently.
Aha, it has something to do with the way this page is loading. Is it too heavy with those big graphics causing it to load slowly or something?
ummm, huh? But I admit, I didn’t read everything – yet.
Still: umm, huh?
A fair bit to take in I know. Reading the Q & A section toward the end might help. If not, let me know what specific questions you have and I’ll do my best to help out.
Possibly GrandmasPantry. We didn’t make any deliberate changes to blog commenting and all seems normal on my end. Let’s see if others express similar difficulties.
Time to head home for the night. Midnight at the office isn’t too bad I guess. I’ll be back for questions in the AM. Something tells me I’ll have a few. ; )
Collections Pages-Some Thoughts…Sounded like a great idea but…I just looked at several dozen collections by hanaryan, agent cardholder and a couple of others. They don’t seem very well thought out. The titles are mostly too cutesy clever or hipster and don’t seem to have much to do with a lot of the items listed in that particular collection. A lot of the pictures are kind of blah. I’m not very inspired to look at the items in the collections. I’m definitely NOT getting the impression that the collection creators are “People in the know”. It seems more like people who don’t have enough time to do the collections. Like they are just rushing through to get them posted.
At the bottom of an item page you are only given 5? choices of collections to nominate an item to? That doesn’t make any sense at all.
I mostly have Holiday ephemera listed for Christmas, Vale ntines and St Patricks Day and the collection featured on my item pages is “Dia de los Muertos”? I know there are many, many more relevant items to what I’m selling on Bonanaza. You couldn’t come up with a Christmas theme collection? That or Valentines would make a lot more sense.
If Bonanza is the “Number One Place to Sell Collectibles” why isn’t there a better focus on that type of thing? I think this feature needs a lot more organized thought put into it. I do like the new right side of the item pages though. Thanks for listening.
Yes, the page does appear “slow to load” the graphics. I like the way the system pulls out similar items from the booth, but sometimes those items are not so similar. The “collection” is not too distracting, but I, as a buyer, sometimes resent the thinking that you can “second guess” me, especially when the collection is not a really good match to the item shown.
Also, am I missing something or has the feedback count morphed into only a percentage?
Nonetheless, keep up the good work, Bonanza. You are my favorite venue.
PS As a special request, please make it easier to find the “vacation” function. Think, what would happen if you thought you were having a heart attack and you wanted to tie up loose ends before you called the ambulance. It should be really easy to find “vacation”.
One More Thought…I MUCH Prefer the original/traditional HPLs. Most are very eye catching and very cohesive. I really enjoy looking at those!
I’ve experienced this twice before, on eBay and eCRATER. Neither was profitable for my store. In both instances sales declined.
1. It took people away from my store/booth.
2. People might add items from the bottom links thinking they were still in my booth and getting combined shipping only to proceed to pay and find a huge shipping fee from 3-4 different sellers, panic at the cost and abandon the cart.
I have few sales on Bonanza and am not very actively involved here so I doubt I will see much difference in sales. It it increases them I will be sure to let you know.
Think the changes are great. Like the bigger pix.
Go collections!
It looks good
Reading and learning
BTW, the upgrade of the whole system looks just great! NEWER and more attractive
Very cool! Thank you!
I don’t think shoppers will think anything unusual of related items being present on the items pages, we see it everywhere these days. It will be interesting to see if affects the length of time on site, as found in Google Analytics.
I do wish that members could vote on the HPL’s as well as the Collections so that more of our members could see their own creativity on the front page. It bothers me a bit that same seller’s HPL’s are chosen to be on the landing page time after time.
I agree with Grandma And Johanna concerning this:
“If you don’t want the collections on your items you can opt out. It’s only fair though, if you aren’t interested in having other seller’s items in a collection on your page, then you lose the opportunity to have your items on another seller’s page.â€
If i’m a grand poobah paying member I should be allowed to be advertised in others booths WITH the option to opt the collections in my booth. That totally undercuts the purpose of paying extra. Your saying my membership is only as worthy as a nonpaying membership. I think you need to greatly reconsider this or we may have to have a meeting of members on a different venue to decide if we want to all opt out of memberships in protest. This type of blackmail is a two way street. Thus I strongly urge you to consider this.
Other than that I like your changes and thank you
a special note: I think you need to clean up the miss catorgorized items prior to making suggestions, Hannahs time would be best utilized by scouring through the billions of listed items and putting items in the categories they belong in. Toooooo many miscategorized items on Bonanza
Sounds like Collections will be a popularity contest. (Am I allowed to say that?)
Wrinkled dresses featured in a Collection is not too cool. :-(
I like the new look. However, when I am in one of my item listings, 9 out 10 times nothing shows up under “More items from SharsBoutique’s booth”. Every once in awhile, 1 will show up.
Now we are advertising in our items pages for each other with the collections list, that is if you make it to the collections list which some of us never do, so we advertise for others anyway.
Very user friendly – actually enjoying tremendously
I like the wishlist moved up closer to the top & the Twitter thing up top too.
Pages seem to be loading really fast for me, too – a definite PLUS.
Sorry, but the new Bonz header reminds me of that Contact paper which simulates wood. Sorry, sorry, sorry but I don’t like it.
I appreciate that the PTB here seem really interested in trying things to help sellers increase their sales and this new initiative is another move in trying to “put bums in the seats”.
My absolute certainty is that no amount of tinkering is going to help this place reach any kind of critical mass of buyers or sellers until you realize that the way to making this a viable alternative site for tens of thousands of sellers is to add AUCTIONS to the site.
Sellers who use the site love the ease of use, nice clean look, respect shown users by the management, great c/s and on and on, but you are totally missing the boat. Ebay has made it more clear (if that is even possible) in the last week that small sellers are not welcome.
If I sold new goods, I might be inclined to park a bunch of my inventory here and hope for the best. but my business is antiques and collectables. Fourteen years of selling on the net has shown me that auctions are the only way to be successful. Auction listings drive store/fixed price sales. They go hand in hand.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE……..give this serious consideration. I would love to move my business here, but no auctions makes it a no go.
heck no!!! keep it auction free other wise this would just another e-bay
I LOVE the Collections I got a surprise this morning when I logged on and had a message telling me my HPL Baby’s Breath had been made into a Collection Thanks Bonanza
_______________________________________________________________________________
JustGenny Specializing in Handmade Baby Booties and Hemp Jewelry Follow Me on Facebook , and Blogger
Do customers really shop here on Bonanza? It all looks great now but every booth needs to have customers. I agree with Shar. The system does not seem to work for our booth!
You’re looking for good photos, which is great. But in the clothing category, good photos are hard to come by because so many of them are automatically cropped. Yes, listers should be aware of the what happens to their photos and correct them—but they are not. It discourages buyers and makes Bonanza look amateurish (in a bad way). Is anyone working on changign this?
For those who don’t like the idea of a collection with items unrelated to their own showing up on their listing, look at it this way… since everything is unrelated your customer probably won’t click into it. If I’m looking at a book listing and see a collection of vintage clothing, I have no interest in that so I’m not going there.
Just a thought…
Hello Alex, I now have checked out the new look and features, I think I like what I see. But I want to wait and ponder a few days before I voice my final opinion. But you certainly get an A for effort.
I looked at a number of collections. Photos are AWFUL. Enlarging a bad photo just makes it all that much more of an eye sore (sad). Like Alice said, some of these changes are “curiouser and curiouser.” HPLs used to be Jewels on the home page, drawing buyers into the booths. That was seriously watered down when just a few HPL makers were selected to have multiple lists on the homepage. This “you have to be chosen as a favorite by other sellers/buyers” is a bad way to do business for all of the tens of thousands of people who will never have their items chosen and will thereby be buried in search. All you have to do is revert back to choosing AMAZING lists for the HP and every visit to Bonanza will get back to being a lovely visual experience. Bill and Mark used to make brilliant choices for the HP. Everyone understood the STANDARDS for HPLs getting selected. Those standards are seriously lacking in some of these photos and lists.
Have to agree with Barntiques859 on this one. One of the reasons we upgraded was to be able to opt out of Amazon listings. Now we have to compete with other sellers right here on Bonanza the way YOU want us to. You call it “sharing” and “opportunity”- I call it the first step to forced competition. I did not like Bonanza Bags because it segregated sellers. Now this. We work very hard on our site and our descriptions, photo optimizations etc. because we feel that quality pays off. Now someone who sells like products can just haphazardly list the items (and they do!)and appear on our pages? Don’t have a warm, fuzzy feeling about this-hope I am wrong. While I realize that currently buyers have the option to look at other listings to compare with ours at least have them need to do it. Don’t hand our competitors listings to them via our booth. I would think that they (the other sellers) would feel the same about having our listings on their pages. It has been such a pleasure to be involved with a selling site that cares about their members- cash influx + growth + new employees who are going to “fix” things = a slow road to eBay-like rules and lack of choices for sellers. I’ll watch for awhile and if my sales change for the better due to the decisions you are making for us I will post it loud and clear that I was wrong. Here’s hoping for mega sales for all of us!
When I went to log in today, the first things that caught my eye on the landing page were the subtle wood grain background and the font change on the main picks for shop, sell, my bonanza, and people. I very much like them both. They’ll both work very nicely for us because our items are mainly vintage, and these enhancements communicate a retro feel. It gives me the impression that Bonanza definitely embraces the vintage community, as well as the concept of keeping it fresh. Well done.
@audreygrace – you can type any list in you like and we’ll predict the name as you enter characters. Sort of how search works.
@lostlizard – thanks for the feedback. Collections do have larger photos than other pages so they could take longer to load than you are accustomed depending on your connection speed. I’ll look at the vacation option suggestion!
Glad you like the changes dollarjewelry and yourstrulyjessica.
The new changes can’t hurt me because I’ve had one sale since joining Bonanza last June. I thought some of it was my fault due to picture quality….but I’ve gone thru a number of sites the past couple of weeks and mine look good along with the others. I was planning on revamping my site, making major changes, I know what I need to do now, saves me precious time….thanks. Hopefully all this will benefit Greatnecks.
P.S. Benefit Greatnecks along with everyone else.
I like it! Thanks for continuing to improve our site!
@SharsBoutique – thanks for the feedback regarding items on the right side. I’ll take a look.
“don’t want Collections on my item pages. Can I remove them? Yes. Just update the setting in your advanced booth settings area.”
The link labeled “Participate in Collections: YesEDIT” leads to a YOU ARE LOST let the unicorn take you home page. (Ah, ALL the links on advanced booth settings page currently lead to that dead-end page.)
Thank you for offering the choice to keep or opt out of Collections. Choice is a wonderful thing.
closetandcurioshop - I can't see what's not working on your booth, but if you email supportbonanza.com I know they’ll get right on it! They’re a super helpful bunch.@SelectsFromSusan – great point on picture quality. We are indeed working on ways to get this improved. It is very important for consumers. Stay tuned. ; )
@avamba – Are you still experiencing this? We tested this last night and I did again just now and haven’t received any errors when adjusting advanced settings.
@pennipete – thanks. ; )
I don’t like it, will opt out and will cancel my subscription!
Overall, I like the changes to the listing page – an improvement. I like the heading on the right side above the photos of my other items – it clearly indicates these are my listings. However, I think the collections section at the bottom of my pages is confusing because there is no such heading above the items stating they are from other sellers, so buyers no doubt think these are my items. They could easily add them to their cart by mistake. By adding a message like “A collection of items offered by other sellers”, this could avoid that confusion.
@gearseller2 – thanks for the feedback.
You can opt out of having Collections shown on your item pages in a couple of clicks (any member can). Just go to your advanced settings and select ‘no’ where it says ‘Participate in Collections’ and update your booth. ; )
Any enhancement to drive sales is a great one.
1. It pays to write long descriptions because it pushes the collections way out of site
2. Agree that area of item details could be smaller, so that the customer still MIGHT read a description
3. If it comes down to those paying a membership will get to opt out of collections showing on their pages yet I have to still see theirs…this would be def grounds for making my own business changes. Working on opening booth #4 and w/ traffic still at an all time slow there’s no way possible I could pay memberships on 4 booths.
5. My BIGGEST concern is going to be the voting and manipulation by “community voting” we have seen in the past how this has been terribly abused by some (for those remembering the abuse of favorites)
@momspennies – we’ll be tuning the matching for connecting items to collections. Feedback like this helps a lot. Thanks for pointing this out.
one last thing..if we were to opt out of collections, that means I can’t see it my listings. How does that effect the buyer coming in unregistered? Will it be restricted from their view as well?
also much like getting a notification by email of the changes..much appreciated!
@barntiques: Our #1 goal with our subscribers is to ensure that they can customize the appearance of their listings and booths to the maximum reasonable extent. This is why they can remove the Amazon link or change their booth panels. For this particular feature, though, we thought it would be fairer to allow both members and non-members to opt out of it, since it is a non-trivial aspect of the item detail page.
That said, we think that showing buyers relevant items is in the best interests of all our sellers, so we want to be sure we incentivize participation. We think that all sellers who participate in collections will see increased traffic from relevant buyers, even if they lose some traffic from buyers who weren’t the right match for their particular item.
@sofyblu2 – if you opt out of Collections no one will see Collections on your item pages regardless of who they are or their registered or unregistered states.
No trickery. ; )
Can we no longer tag items?
I may be totally missing something here but what’s an HPL? I like the concept, however, not absolutely sure yet HOW to get into a collection. Have been in Florida selling at a shop and now ready for more updates. Thank you for your sponsorship!
@gladdenrun An HPL is an acronym for Hand Picked List. These are the lists you often see rotating on the homepage. If you have an item that you think should be in a Collection just nominate it by typing the collection name into the field at the bottom of your item detail page.
We’ll see about the Collections, but in the meantime…
We can edit directly from the item page now? Yeeeeeeesssssss! Thank you! That’s the one feature I really wanted!
my question .. do the photos at the bottom change? I have went to several of my listings and I get the same persons items in different listings, and how do they change, or do they change when viewing listings? How do I know that my items are showing in someone elses booth listings? I like the other changes, smaller font I have issues about, I went to the collections page and wow huge pics anyway will check out everything before I decide if I opt out or not, but like I said earlier in a forum sold a disney rated G movie and texas chainsaw massacre was at bottome along with CARRIE bleeding all over my page lol
@CritterCreekRanch – the photos within a Collection and the Collection overall can change as you go from item to item. It depends on the prevalence of matching items and categories. Thanks for the tip on the movie. We’re working today on a way to address this.
I’ve been viewing Collections, as well as going into other’s Booths to see what appears at the bottom (as mine is now On Vacation). Personally, I have no objection to other Seller’s items being shown in my Booth; but I do understand other’s may not feel the same way, and respect their reasons why. I thank you for the giving us the ability to choose to opt out, if one so desires.
I know as we proceed, there will be tweaking, revisions needing to be made in order for “Collections” to function optimally.
I miss the information tab or the one that had information about recent updates. It was in addition to the blog.
Hi there, I still think you need to get rid of (or make much smaller) the row of info below our booth logos. The little map and the Rush notification and local pickup are low priority to most folks selling online I think. Maybe your research tells you differently.
But getting as many of my items above the fold (on a small laptop size screen that many people use) on my booth homepage is important to me as a seller and it’s good for buyers too – more items on view will draw them in to scroll down and browse. You could decrease the size of the map row and still show the same info (if you are convinced it must be there) Or you could have things like Rushes notifications appear only if the booth is actually having a Rush in the near future.
I also think the chat/ “seller is online” notification does not need to take up valuable real estate at the top of the page. Most of the time I am not online so buyers won’t catch me. They can easily contact us sellers anytime with the “ask seller a question” button. I would suggest making it optional for us to have this chat row at the top of our pages or move it to the side bar – so that the focus is on the eye-candy of our items for sale, rather than a map showing (in my case) the location of Glendale, CA.
That’s my web-savvy 2 cents
Thanks for listening!
Carrie (fadaddict)
I agree with:
BARNTIQUES859 – Clean up the categories so that the items are in the right collections! I look at my vintage chalkware and other pieces from the 30s and 40s and the collection at the bottom of the page is Avon collectibles. I guess that at least won’t take a customer away from my page as anyone looking at 30s and 40s won’t want Avon!SelectsFromSusan – Fix the photo tool so that it doesn’t crop the photos. Let the seller take care of the crop so they can make the whole item fit in the available space! Too many of our new sellers, and probably some of the oldies too, don’t know they can fix the image!
NimbusBooks – Don’t use bad photos! A while back Mark was stressing to us that HPLs would only make HP if they were clean, crisp, well centered, uncropped photos. But looking at the collections I am seeing items that are too dark, poorly cropped, busy backgrounds, out of focus, just plain bad photos! What’s with that?
NimbusBooks – How are sellers to know what they are looking at when they see the collection. Maybe it should say somewhere that these are similar items from other sellers.
momspennies – collections often have nothing to do with the item page it is on. This is being repeated over and over. I already noted that my 30s & 40s items are showing a 60s-70s collection. My art deco jewelry is mostly 20s-30s and the collection showing at the bottom is Mad Women. I believe that is a 60s-70s era show.
Anyone else who commented that the details could be smaller so the buyer can see that there is also a description.
I don’t like how the thumbnails cover the bottom of the main image on the item page. On many of my items this cuts off detail of the item and not everyone is going to know that they can click to make the image larger! There is nothing to tell a first time shopper that these images are clickable!
fadAddict – there is too much stuff at the top of the page taking up valuable real estate! I too want my shoppers to see product, not chat, map (I doubt they even care where I live), my dog, my snow, whatever. And, since you made the text in the menu bar so small couldn’t that be made a little more narrow giving my items a better chance to show up at first glance? Just a thought.
And last, It just occurred to me that we are now limited to 4 photos instead of the 6 I have been using! I feel that with jewelry and vintage items detail is a must. If you can’t pick it up, feel it, turn it around and upside down as you can in a mall then you must be able to view it from every possible angle. Not only are we now limited to 4 photos but all of the listings where I had additional photos in the description now only have a large area of dead, white space! Whats with that?
Over all I do love the new look of the item pages. I think it has been classed up a lot. Just questioning why you cut down on the image space. I am going to have to check and make sure that they images you decided to keep are the ones I think are the most important! Lots of extra work for me now that I am in the process of doing taxes, trying to optimize my titles, and adding attributes! My plate just got a lot fuller!
Sorry for taking up so much space here but these issues are all very important to me!
And I just looked at the Full Page Editor and it still has 6 slots for images. Then I looked at the Quick Editor and there is no more HTML editing feature! I have always used both of these features. Is the HTML gone for good? Will all of my pictures come back some day?
Oh, and the base issue here, I like the idea of collections, just want to see ones that are relevant to the item being visited!
Most of the changes are fine but I really, really hate that the secondary pictures overlap the main photo. It might look OK in the Ichiro bobblehead listing but in my jewelry listings where the image is zoomed in to show detail those pictures really obscure the item. If I have to add whitespace in my image to accomodate those pictures then my main picture is actually getting smaller :/
Thanks sparkle for sharing the screen shot. That is exactly what I was talking about! We need that detail for our small items.
@froggieb – six images can still be uploaded per item and all are available from the zoom view. You can determine the order in which they are shown. The first listed shows as the item page default and the last listed is available in the zoom view. All the others show as thumbnails.
As for the HTML editor you can still use it in quick edit mode. Once you hit your second line or so of text in the description a link will appear to access the HTML editor.
Thanks for the feedback Sparklemotion. I’ll take a look at this with the team.
I do not like that you took away one of our 6 photos and now we only have 5. I don’t like the way the collections look. There is so much I don’t like about the new changes. Now we have to scroll to get to the beginning of the description, where it was right there for us before. I don’t think many people will continue to scroll to the bottom and see the tacky collection box there, so that might not be a problem.
On a positive note, I DO like the tweet and facebook buttons being at the top. I DO like being able to favorite or follow a seller from the item page now.
@Indizona – the image is still there in the zoom view. We just increased the size (and discover-ability) of them in thumbnail form.
Thanks, alex.
@alex, I checked several of my items where I know I had 6 pictures. I clicked to zoom and scrolled through them and there are only 5 pics now. So I went to edit item to see if the 6th one is still there. It is, but when I went back to the item and clicked on the photos, it IS MISSING. Not on just one listing either. I checked several.
I still thing there should be something to indicate for the shopper that the image will enlarge if you click on it. It isn’t just a given on any other site I have been on. How is a shopper to know to click?
Indizona is right! There are only 5 pics. On my booth page when you hover over the pic it shows 5 additional images for a total of 6 but in the listing itself there are only 5. Not only that but many of my items that had 6 pics now only have 3. I am missing LOTS of pictures. I have a lot of extra work to do now. I am really glad I only have 149 items. If I had thousands I would be furious!
@Indizona, froggieb – it looks like we might have a bug. I suspect the last image just isn’t being displayed – we didn’t delete it or anything. One our developers is looking into it.
Froggieb – can you provide me the URLs for products that appear to be missing multiple photos?
Alex, just checked and those were older listings before I started using the full screen editing with 6 images. So what’s up there is they are showing 3 items instead of 4, same issue as the 6 only showing 4. Same glitch.
But, what about the images I had in my descriptions? Many of the old listings where I used the old quick editor had extra photos in the description and now there is just white space.
And thanks for addressing all the issues brought up here so quickly, I for one appreciate it!
Wow, you guys sure have been busy! I checked about 15+ of my books, across different subject categories, and they all have the “Armed with Astrology” collection at the bottom. Unfortunately, I don’t particularly like that collection, so I won’t be participating at this time. I don’t think it matters much, though, since it seems books are pretty bottom shelf items here, anyway, IMHO.
Just as an aside, it’s quite fascinating watching Bill’s bonanzle baby growing up at such a phenomenal rate. Which is a good and necessary thing, in most respects, but with so many parents it’s now sort of hard to find that original bundle of joy. Sorry, just feeling a bit nostalgic today.
@froggieb – I’ll have the support team follow-up with you to see how we can help out.
I checked one of my listings which has more than one pic. The thumbnails are chopped off now. So I went into edit and used the crop/rotate tool to fix them, which we didn’t have to do before. After saving the edit, I see that it hass duplicated the pics and I have the original chopped off one showing along with the the new version. Had to go in and edit again (twice) to get back to the correct number of images.
I also like a lot of the new changes.
I just looked at a few of my listings and noticed a few things.
The main photo took a long time to load, especially if I had more photos, and the additional photos overlap. (IMac OS X 10.6.6 latest Firefox) There is a huge space under the photos. Maybe I’m not taking advantage of the maximum size. (What is it?)
The results of the similar items of mine & the collection were all over the place, some related and some had no relation. I would think that the relation would be primary based on the main category. For example if I looked at a postcard, the other items would be more postcards.
Several items didn’t show any collection.
Have you thought of having a store directory in which a seller could sign up for in different main categories? A book dealer could sign up under books but a general dealer could sign up in antiques, ephemera, postcards, pottery, etc. Might be too complicated but something to kick around.
I also love to be able to have subcategories. Ex.- scroll under books, and have fiction, non fiction, etc. drop down.
Would also like the categories cleaned up, new things out of antiques, etc.
My thought on auctions. I’d love them for items that I can’t find a price for, either because it’s one of a kind or out of my expertise.
Keep up the good work!
Crystal, the bottom got chopped off my thumbnails, too. I think you can see that in the screenshot I posted — especially the thumbnail in the middle. As for the duplicate pics that has been a persistent problem I’ve had with the site’s crop tool for a good long time now.
Thanks, Sparkle. I didn’t know that about the duplicating pics always being an issue.
I guess now we have to crop all pics instead of just the main one when we do a new a listing.
Hi Alex, I tried typing in many keywords such as Valentines, Holiday etc in the List nomination bar and absolutely nothing came up. Just a blank bar or “Collection Failed”. The Collections HPLs really need to be more specific as to categories.
Also, the Collections HPLs were pretty messy to begin with. And the user suggestions are just going to make them worse. Ex #1-Night Owl by hanaryan. Described as a “pop of cobalt blue with silver or black” and “enjoy going into costume as the witching hour approaches” which I guess means Fashion? And you get a purse, shoes, earrings and dresses in blue or black with some silver and a “Blue Glass Cobalt Head”?? User suggestions are for a purse-9 Yes Votes, a watch-5 Yes Votes, an Orange and Black Butterfly Pin-7 Yes Votes And a Charlie Sheen People Magazine-8 Yes Votes?? What?? These make no sense at all.
Exampla #2. Desert Drifts-Described as “fun of the Southwest” and “A little inspiration: Despite it’s apparent emptiness, the desert teems with life. This decor collection, similarly, promotes simplicity and if full of surprises. A neutral palette and edited forms separate white walls. Exposed wood, printed ceramics and tapestries bear different patterns but a similar handcrafted utility and sense of story.” It includes a “Handmade Crude CHINESE Tea Utensils Set”. A “Handmade Paper Towel Holder”? a “THAI Trays Set” and a “Recipe Box”. Under Suggestions there is a “GERMANY Pizza Cutter” with 4 Yes Votes. What do these things have to do with the Southwest??? And all suggestions for both collections have all Yes Votes and No “No” Votes.
Looks to me like these Collections are just going to be a Spammy Mess at the bottom of our listings.
Sorry to be so critical. As a Seller I’m dismayed by the random illogic of these collections which will just make my booth look junky so I will probably opt out. I would have been happy to show RELEVANT collections in my booth. As a Buyer I don’t want to see a lot of random junk which I will NOT be checking out.
I do reallly appreciate the effort to improve the site and a I really like the new look for the most part. I do agree with those above that there needs to be some indication that booth photos can be enlarged. And I think the overlapping thumbnails are just blocking info to the buyer.
Please keep fine tuning. I will be hoping for much better collections which I will be happy to feature in my booth.
Thanks!
I don’t want to offend the lady that did these collections but many of them leave something to be desired to say the least. They just don’t use best marketing and merchandising practices. And I still can’t get over the wrinkled dresses.
And there is not one collection in the books category. Oh, well. Not wishing to constantly promote astrology in all my listings (which is what booksellers seem to get) I’ve opted out. Nothing against astrology… except that I have at least one astrology book which was not in that collection. I would prefer that any shopper with an interest in astrology look at my astrology book first via my own cross-promotional link. If it’s not what they want, fine, but with the collection in their face, chances are they won’t get to my astrology book.
Is there any way to check if any of our items are included in a collection?
All I ever wanted at The Dark Side and then here was a small place to have a store, a virtual store with no electric bill and no crummy landlord. Not a place to sell other peoples stuff for them. I have to say that after reading for hours and looking at my own and others items that I don’t think it’s a good idea for any seller to have someone else’s stuff inside of their “store” which is what our little booths really are. They are our little piece of hopefully someday, the American Pie. I understand that rules about what can and can not be sold need to be in place and that people don’t get cheated. But that is all that the “Provider” needs to provide, The Provider being Bonanza. Nothing more. We just want to run our little stores and have them look the way we want them to. Less interference and more helpful things like a shipping calculator that really works and a sales tax calculator and collector that really works would be more in line with the needs of the “Store/Booth” owners here. Glitz is fine but not necessary either. We looked fine 2 renditions back!
WOW @johngermaine, very good points! Although I’m OK with the changes We REALLY DO “NEED” a properly functioning shipping calculator. We REALLY DO “NEED” a tax feature.
I can’t really think of anything more important, unless its an overhaul and cleanup of the antique and vintage listings. Too many NEW items in those categories! And that is (in my opinion) last after the calculators!
It’s……SOCIALISM
@sparklemotion – we adjusted the placement of the thumbnails to make sure they reside a bit lower. Have a look now.
http://www.bonanza.com/booths/sparklemotion/items/Orange_Sapphire_Star_Shape_Dangle_Earrings
I just checked my listings. About 10 of my 30 listings now show the thumbnails completely below the main pic and that looks great. The rest of the listings still show the thumbnails overlapping the main pic but I do think they are a bit lower than they were before. I appreciate the fix. It looks much better now. Hoping all my listings will eventually have the thumbnails completely below the main pic.
The extra pics look much better now. Thank you, Alex.
Not wild about the collections feature since hand picked lists were fine. Showing more stuff to buy seems a bad idea before people choose an item. Also the script font looks amazingly amateur and incongruent against the new grass texture for the header and footer.
I will admit that I am biased since my sales are predominately from google search.
I spoke too soon. As audreygrace said, all thumbnails are not yet fixed.
Will the message box glitch that started at the same time as these changes be fixed soon?
If I click on “send them a message” the pop-up message box is mostly off the bottom of the screen, with no way to drag or otherwise move it… the only control on the screen is the X to close it, and that doesn’t even work. There’s no way to use the box to send a message, and the only way to get rid of it once it has been opened is to navigate to a different page. If I try to type in the little sliver of box that is showing, the main web page behind the box scrolls, but the box does not move, or become usable. (The exact same thing happens no matter which browser I use, and I never had this problem before, so I have to assume it is a site error.)
Am I the only one having this problem? Or am I just the only one that needed to contact a buyer the same day the changes came out?
@ImagizeYourWorld, we are aware of the “send them a message” link not working properly and it is on our list to get fixed asap. In the meantime, if you click on the user name, you will be taken to their profile page where you can click on the “Contact” link and send them a message. If you have any questions you can contact us at support and we will help.
[email protected]
As a Green Bay Packers fan I am not one who doesn’t love the green !!
I think I might feel better about the collections feature if there were a category that fit home school books. :(
Please advise and thank you.
~Lanae
Hi Lanae!
Home school books would be a great collection! We don’t have any books collections yet and would love to include that if you were to create it!
Best, —hanaryan
Also: it’s great to hear that people are concerned about image quality! Clear, well-lit images with neutral backgrounds promote good business, and we’ll do our best to keep these photos at the forefront. Thanks, —hanaryan
Posed this question in the forum. Probably should have put it here….
Can anyone explain the definitions of some of the titles under selecting handpicked collections? Selection offered: Night Owl, Geometry Lesson, Desert Drifts. What does that mean? The only title that has any clarity is Western Romance. I can’t “see†how the lists are going to make sense if people can’t make sense of the titles.
Am I missing something? Thought about it all night :-). Need help putting the thought to rest :-)
YAY!! Thank you hanaryan, I don’t think I realized I could do that. Now that I know, I will get one ready for you very soon.
~Lanae
Really, Really, Really need a prominent link on the item page that takes the viewer/buyer TO THE BOOTH just like it was before so that it is clear that seller has more than the item plus 1 to 5 other items. Like it was “See all 207 of xxxx’s items” or See 465 items in xxxxx’s Booth or however it is worded so that it inlcudes the word “booth” and a count of the items. I have looked at some items where there are no representative “other” items at the right side and it is very hard to even see the blue link. And if there are 4 or 5 items showing, one gets the idea that that’s all there is, folks!
It just has to be …or else sellers will be severely shortchanged. The way it is now it does seem that the seller has only 1 or maybe 5 more items. And the link to the booth, besides stating it is to the booth and ALL of sellers XXX number of items, needs a colored box around or bar behind the link.
Also REALLY really really need a “Return To Item” arrow to click back to the item page from whence one came to view a full Collection.
I agree with Eclec, we need a better button to take the buyer to all items. Maybe instead of the "more items for, have “All items …”.
Also a button for booth & shipping policies.
Have been checking items in my booth and none of the collections have much to do with the item. When I shop I really hate the site to start telling me what else might like, sort of up there with Google saved searches. I’d much rather see more from the seller.
One of my items (Roseville Magnolia Vase) made it to a collection, “Love It At First Site”. I do not see that title on the list of collections.
Also, How long will our item stay on a collection?
Who are the curators?
Thank You
Yes, THIS really has to be put back in place again:
“See all 207 of xxxx’s items†or See 465 items in xxxxx’s Booth or however it is worded so that it inlcudes the word “booth†and a count of the items"
I’m in another seller’s booth… I’m always – ummm, eh? WHERE do I get to the booth. But only because I know it. How can buyers know that there is much more to be found?
also sorely missed is: Buy Now-Button
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