In case anyone was wondering whether or not we were going to read the comments and take them seriously, we present to you Transmission filters:
Automatic Porsche 911's in 90232
Manual Ford Mustang's in 90278
In real estate, they have a saying: Location, price and build quality (square footage, etc), you can control any two of those variables, but not all three. (ok, so maybe that's not exactly how the saying goes, but you get the point). There is a similar triumvirate working in web applications between power, ease of use and development time (and this includes some beta testing). A comment on the previous entry noted that "ease of use and advanced capability are not mutually exclusive". We wholeheartedly agree, but we're still gathering data both on how to make our site easier to use and what advanced capabilities we should offer.
We've built an infrastructure that allows us to easily add filters to slice and dice listings in myriad ways, but we haven't quite worked out how to expose this functionality to advanced users without overwhelming everyone else with so many choices. We have the ability to create about 300 different filters ranging from type of convertible top (manual, automatic, automatic w/ rear glass, etc) to type of headliner (cloth, vinyl, leather, etc.) to curb weight, to whether the car is equipped with an oil pressure warning sensor even whether or not it has a picnic table (Nissan Quest and Chevy Equinox, for the curious).
But, how many people even care to filter based on headliner type? Or curb weight? Probably not very many. But, that's why we started this blog:
What categories do you want to see in a search filter?
Monday, March 19, 2007
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
20 comments:
you need a filter that allows people to look for convertibles
2 ideas for you:
The first is geared towards novice users and could be called "The Car Concierge" or something. Basically it would be a link that would walk the user through an interactive option selection. I was thinking one option group per page (i.e. one page is transmission type, another one body style, etc) with "next", "skip" "back" and "finish" buttons on the bottom. Each choice in an option group would be depicted with large graphical representation and text, and there would be a "cars matching selections" counter somewhere as well. I'd say also give it a fun interactive feel by creating a "car concierge" character who walks the user through the choices (basically just a different cartoon drawing of him/her on each page - like one page he/she is looking under the hood, another they're kicking the tires, etc).
The second idea is for your more advanced users and would be an expanding menu in the left margin of the screen. Basically put an "+advanced search" in the left margin that expands to the 5 - 7 most common additional crieria and 2 or so other parent menus (for example, the advanced options menu would expand to: Body Style drop down list, min year/max year drop down list, max mileage text field, max distance from zip text field, must have photo checkbox, mechanics menu, styling menu, and a show all button (show all would open in a new page and be a no frills collection of all fields they can search on)). The mechanics and styling menu would possibly contain additional sub menus along with first level items.
Anyway I guess my philosophy is you can't ever give the user too many choices so long as they control the rate at which they see the options, none are mandatory, and the search can be initiated at any time. Also it's important to let searches be modified so users don't have to re-select their criteria over and over.
Thanks for reading our comments (and for the automatic porsche filter).
-nick
nick.staff@comcast.net
How about adding a filter for trim level? Like GT, GT2, sport, ZX3, etc.
Your site use to rival autotrader.com but now you only allow searches in zip codes.. What a joke and big waist of time!!
Why did you change it? I have not figured out how to do it yet. I have bought cars on lany different sites. This one is cumbersome.
Your web site is very user friendly. Trying to pinpoint a certain price range and mileage range is next to impossible
Your previous site was much more user friendly. I could search by Make and Model in a specific zip code area and be looking for a car within seconds. Now I can not even look for a car without it downloading files of every make and model in that zip code. It takes forever to search that way. Why did you change it. Now I don't see hardly any cars in my search criteria.....I think you may have chased off some customers by the changes. You have me.
i run a see-all search for ballwin,mo (zip63011) and it tells me there are 9 acuras in its sidebar filter.
i do another search ,25 mile rad as before, specifying acuras from the outset. 47 listings come up. that means that 38 of 47 advertisers arent getting their moneys worth!
a similar search on autotrader.com comes up with 192 listings!
all this means you are seriously screwing up and need to straighten out pronto. assuming its not an intentional breaking for some machiavellian purpose...
I wanted to find a certain model. I entered my zip code and there were none nearby. The zip code is a limiting factor. There was no way for me to expand the distance to search. Maybe you have that feature in one spot, but it wasn't available on the page that said "No listings matching your criteria exist within 75 miles"
Now there is no way to locate the used vehicle that interests me on your site. If there are no results then on that no results page there needs to be a way to expand the radius for finding a certain model.
OMG, this is to ugly for me sorry specially the people>
add filters for sunroof, leather seats, cd changer, spoiler and trim model: e.g., Altima SL
[…] catch: Jesper Rønn-Jensen is disabling all spam filters for a day on December 15, to see how much time actually is wasted sorting out spam comments, and how Akismet […]
Speaking of spam comments, "Darvin" is a sock puppet of pissedconsumer.com. That site has spammed my blog multiple times, using similar boilerplate. The features are: (1) the opening "Hello, I find your blog very interesting." (Spammers love to make compliments that fit any blog.) (2) A link which names the company but actually links to pissedconsumer.com. (3) An innocuous-sounding or positive statement about the company. It's a cookie-cutter pattern.
It should go without saying that any "consumer protection" site that spams can't be trusted.
I like to ask if don't mind having a link exchange with my blog
http://usedautosale.blogspot.com
let me know your feedback and looking forward to it.
thanks
Quite interesting and informative. Thanks for sharing.
Autoseller Network
Excellent post. I’m actually surprised the use of blogs and wikis isn’t higher.
viagra vs cialis viagra and alternatives free sample prescription for viagra viagra suppliers uk viagra sales viagra equivalent viagra herb alternative viagra soft tabs ship free viagra sample viagra and cocaine viagra oral viagra generic viagra online uk buying viagra
Post a Comment