online shops – what do you, and don't you like?

Seen a few people on here over the years asking about what people like in a bike shop – features/products etc – now its my turn…

What do you, and don’t you like about online shops?

Not looking for opinions on the financial side of thigs, more about the functionality of them, search systems, ranges of products etc.

What would make you use a web-shop, and what would put you off using one?

Any particular features you would love to see in an online shop?

Thanks!

Insufficient product details and photos are the biggest put off for me.
Followed secondly by lack of stock level and inaccurate expected delivery times.

product detail is something i’ve been thinking about. obviously on the product page there is all the detail you would need (i would hope!), but on the search result page, how much would you want?

for eg cotswold have very little – a thumbnail, product name and price

personally i prefer a little more – for eg a sleeping bag – i’d like to know the temp rating before i bother clicking through to the product page – less clicks…

do ‘hover over’ info boxes appeal?

any more for any more?

or have i just done the smallest ever bit of market research 🙁

Main pet hate – not showing shipping costs until way too late in the checkout process. Ideally show them before I even click buy.

Second peeve – lack of info – don’t just give external dimensions, give internal ones as well if relevant (for hi-fi furniture for example), or show pictures of the rear of CD players, amps etc so I can see connections.

I like the way that Wiggle works. I like that it connects stuff well…by brand, activity and function.

I think tagging is the most powerful thing that can happen to ecommerce shops also rapid checkout for the speedy ones or loyalty for return customers.

Main pet hate – not showing shipping costs until way too late in the checkout process. Ideally show them before I even click buy.

+1 Gosh yeah, that too. We all know we have to pay at some stage…so just be bloody upfront about it.

its better stating free or a standard shipping cost like £1 for small items or £3 for large

Being sneaky by showing non VAT price and no shipping costs.

We keep trying to work out where else we can put the words FREE DELIVERY in order that folk actually see it. You would be amazed at the number of queries we get about it.

chewkw – Member
Being sneaky by showing non VAT price

Do you have an example of that?

I had being bombarded by news letters and adds saying 40% off and when you look at the item, the only items that are 40% off are like xxxxl frames or size 3.5 mens shoes etc

actually i’ll name and shame, CRC do this, either reduce the entire items size range or dont simple as that! you might even sell more as i’m tired of looking now.

druidh – Member

Do you have an example of that?

I cannot recall the actual websites now but they do have VAT price but not very obvious and I only know at the very end when confirming purchase.

Ah – an outfit that sells around the world and has to add on the relevant tax at checkout. I guess they could implement a cookie system so that you tell them what country you are in before you see any of the items and they then re-calculate accordingly.

dobo – Member
I had being bombarded by news letters and adds saying 40% off and when you look at the item, the only items that are 40% off are like xxxxl frames or size 3.5 mens shoes etc

actually i’ll name and shame, CRC do this, either reduce the entire items size range or dont simple as that! you might even sell more as i’m tired of looking now.But why should they discount the sizes which sell easily?

dont reduce the price of something unless you have it in stock!

cullen-bay – Member
dont reduce the price of something unless you have it in stock!

I don’t understand that one. Surely you’re happy to get it cheaper as long as it arrives by the time you want/need it?

thats better 😉

thanks, confirms a few of my own thoughts too.

what about payent options? a variety, i assume? do people pay with paypal much?

would you rather have a lot of items – as many as can be crammed into a shop, or a more narrow range of more specific stuff?

thing is, it goes up in price just before they get it in stock!

I only buy on the tinternet if my lbs has no stock / cant get it as quickly…. however I do make sure the prices i pay are not tooooo far out.

My theory is support my local lbs – i ride with him….

So, what do I hate …. not knowing postage costs, stock levels and exact details (weights, dimensions etc)

Hope this helps with what would seem a launch of a new site 😉

thanks – yep, postage price will be important, as will stock levels.

ciderinsport – yep, but more of an extension of a current site… 🙂

Don’t classify everywhere in Scotland beyond Edinburgh as the “Highlands” and tell me you need to charge an additional 250% of postage to deliver there.

I get a bit miffed when buying tee-shirts (bike related) online and getting weekly emails that point to the latest “blog” that contains puerile images of near-naked young ladies that have only just been introduced to a bike with obligatory cave man comments. The repartee is witty but I am sick of the 1970’s laddishness. Otherwise I would be spending more…

For me it’s as above – no hidden postage costs – and quick delivery.

Decent search engine is a must, too – Google Base integration would be probably be a good idea as well.

If you’re planning on allowing overseas customers showing the prices in other currencies is nice, though not essential.

no laddishness will accour, i assure you!

search engine is one of the things which will need a lot of researching – being in the process of building one for another aspect of the business, i know how time consuming and complex it is (and how necessary it is to get right…)

Yup – good internal (on site) search function, everything above – especially the P&P prices. Paypal integration is always welcome. I love ‘hover-over’ info boxes. This TV guide[/url] does it very well.

If I’ve searched for something, I hate to have 10 items per page, spread over 20 pages…. Why not just have two long pages? OK it’ll take longer to load (maybe more so if there are lots of images) but I’d rather wait an extra 10 seconds than have to locate the tiny ‘next’ arrow using by laptop’s mousepad. Think that’s it 🙂

What do you sell BTW?

I like online shops (not just bike related) that have lots of info and personal views on stuff (eg the bike chain does this for some items). Also lots of photos.

I like the Wiggle “ask a question” thing. Answers tend to be slow though.

Also customer reviews: it’s amazing what you learn (powerlinks come in pairs despite lots of folk ordering 2).

As for payment option: check out the CRC Credit card thread. I bet a lot more folk will be using paypal from now on (til they get hacked).

Payment: If you’re a small/new shop go with one of the main payment processors like WorldPay, make it clear from the start so users know your payment processing should be secure. Also an option not to register with the site is nice, if I get good service the first time I’ll probably return and register voluntarily.

Range: Doesn’t matter how big/small, as long as it’s not a random mix of items. E.g. If you’re going to sell chainring spacers then non-standard length chainring bolts would be nice too.

Postage details need to be 100% clear, I was googling around for some £10 item that I couldn’t find locally a while back (slick honey grease I think) and the P&P was the major cost but with the main stockists, it wasn’t just hidden away- you had to create an account and log in and go all the way through the shopping basket thing to the checkout before you could be told ZOMG £5 postage. And there’s at least one retailer who I forget just now that has “free postage” all over the site and forgets to say “for orders over £50”.

Bad information online is irritating… Whether it’s wrong info or just lacking. Bars with no widths being a top one. Tyres with no version details, is it a folding singleply highroller or a dualply wire bead? It’s a secret.

Oh and this isn’t just an online shop thing, but anyone that describes their product as “lightweight” but doesn’t tell you what it blimmin weighs… Aaargh I hate that.

druidh

“I don’t understand that one. Surely you’re happy to get it cheaper as long as it arrives by the time you want/need it?”

I’d like some assurance that it’ll ever arrive, Winstanleys being your best example of this, they have great prices for stuff that they can’t even guess when they’ll be able to restock. Nearly got stuck in the Hope Hoop Vortex they had going a while back myself.

again, thanks for the responses – they’ll all be taken into account!

Probably not true of any bike shops I can think of but some/more online stores are setting up the login box so it’s not part of the main page content. This means the log in and password don’t get auto remembered by the browser and it’s a pain in the a*se.

In fact, having to log in is annoying.

Not allowing the first order to be sent anywhere other than the billing address is frustrating, you can guarantee that means a trip out to the post office.

Websites where your username can’t just be your email address so you have to think up some weird username you never remember. Passwords that have to be some complicated alpha numeric with capitals. It’s a bike shop login in not your online bank. Just makes using the site such a pain as each time you have to go through the hasslel of requesting and changing yourl password.

Just integrate google to do the search as it then finds miss spellings, abbreviations.
Show me all the search findings on one long page, not loads of pages with 10 products on each.
Think about product categories better and allow the ability to get to a product from more than one way. Especially important for spares and odds and sods.

Two pet hates.

Sites which pop up “tell us what you think of the site” survey requests when you load the first page – I don’t know what I think, I’ve not had chance to see it yet, but right now I’m thinking of going elsewhere you bloody irritant.

Product views that give you a thumbnail and a crappy ‘magnify’ tool so you can see an inch square in perfect detail; I have a screen that’s half a mile across, just show me the damn image. Coupled to that, “zoom” functions that show you exactly the same image only with a bit more white space around it. If you don’t have a zoomed image, don’t give me the option to view it.

Prices should be better than this
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?ModelID=63653 😯

As above, crystal clear postage prices. I find sites that use incremental postage really annoying, i.e postage for a chain is £2, then you pop an extra item in and it jumps to a fiver. If you can’t manage a flat rate up to £20 spend and then free afterwards for example, how about categorising each product into A, B and C. A being £2.50 postage, B being £5, and C being contact for details. The most expensive item in the basket is the price payable.

I also like to know who the courier will be as some are close to me, others are a 40 minute drive. An option to stick with Royal Mail/Parcelforce is always welcome as its easy to collect.

I also like the support ticket style customer service used by Rutland Cycling, quick response times and insures emails don’t get missed or ignored.

I like Paypal, means I don’t have to find my wallet. I like big pics, I like pics that you can move between rather than having to open and close a pop up for every image. I like a proper description rather than copy and paste from the manufacturer. I like photos rather than stock images if the detail is important.

Live stock up dates – (like Wiggle) are ESSENTIAL.
If I order something that shows in stock on a site, I don’t want an email to say its out of stock and I have to wait 2 weeks!

to ability to search by product colour would be lovely for those about to pimp.

The worst experience I had was quite recently (I had to buy this ‘specialist’ product from this shop as I couldn’t find it elsewhere).

Anyway the detail page said that postage was between £2 and £5.95 dependant on the product ordered (why couldn’t they say what the postage was as it was the detail page anyway). So I ordered it and TWO DAYS later I received an email saying that the postage was £5.95 (no surprises there – charge the maximum they could) and the email said:
The shipping costs for this order have been calculated and work out to £5.95.

This brings the total price for your order before amendments, if any, to £33.20.

As you have chosen to pay by card & have agreed to the shipping charges, in accordance with our advised method of calculation, the order will now be dispatch at the earliest opportunity.

I just found it to be a really odd – surely they know how much each item costs to post so why not actually say – and I also found the tone of voice to be really aggressive.