ThunderThighs wrote:We've given you what you want on the details page. If you prefer that page as your landing page for woot, just change your bookmark to /today for all the URLs (e.g. www.woot.com/today)

It's kinda the best of both worlds.

So, instead of one bookmark for Woot, I now need 7 bookmarks?

ThunderThighs wrote:Not true. We've heard the sentiment in this forum and others that some don't like Woot Plus. It would be wrong to say that all wooters hate Woot Plus though. There are wooters that seem to like it but perhaps don't post as much.

I think the new site design can meet the desires of those that want the old design and those that like the new design.

The home page should be seen as a portal. It shows all the deals that are available for that day.

If you click through, you go to the detail page which is more what we had with the previous design but without the extra stuff (e.g. ads) and with easier to access information. Photos that are easier to find. Tabs to help navigate the information instead of a page that endlessly scrolled.

So please don't think that we've deserted our loyal wooters with the new home page design. We've given you what you want on the details page. If you prefer that page as your landing page for woot, just change your bookmark to /today for all the URLs (e.g. www.woot.com/today)

It's kinda the best of both worlds.

//turns off Pollyanna mode

/today has the same busy-shopping-site feel as the rest of the new site design.

You can rationalize away all the negative feedback and blame us for just not seeing it the right way. I mean, if it helps you. Doesn't do much for us though.

pha9992001 wrote:like...
http://youtu.be/-vWKDMmtoDA

They didn't go far enough. They need to take the table and chairs out of the break room. That would have been more accurate.

cmcdannold wrote:So, instead of one bookmark for Woot, I now need 7 bookmarks?

^^^^^^^^^^^
THIS

If there was a preference setting on your account page that would automatically take you to the 'today' page whichever tab you clicked, that would be great. Having 7 bookmarks for woot is not a good answer.

I'll add some more feedback now that it's been a few weeks. I don't come to the site via a traditional web browser anymore. It used to be one of my first stops after I settled in at the office.

Now, I use the wootalizer and the iphone woot app. I doubt I'll be back unless I see something to buy on one of those apps. The new layout is annoying, and I'm not bookmarking 5+ /today pages when there should be flippin links to them already.

And for the love of all that is wooty, kill the woot plus! crap. It's annoying and really makes it feel like 1saleaday around here....


I miss the old site....

I left a post somewhere back in this now 20+ page message with my two cents. Sooo now I ask....will the website ever be changing back? I know by now that higher ups have seen the overall negative review of the change, am I wrong in assuming this would be a fairly accurate sample of your customer base?

This post is full of curses. I'm looking forward to seeing how it gets auto-redacted. They spend more time writing code to make make sure no one says "wo o ot a zon" than they do protecting what is left of their brand cache. I'm going to curse one more time: greedy Orcaing Jab-jab-jab-Jabberjaws are running this ship. There is no other explanation.

Just sent this again to their beta feedback team:

"The site sucks now, and you obviously don't care, yet you still have this dumbass feedback button. So, as an advertising and copywriting professional for decades, I'll say again: you are myopic beyond the scope of the word. People literally live and die for the kind of brand cache you just torched. Orcaing Jab-jab-jab-Jabberjaws. YOU are what's wrong with the world. You are being paid to create fail from success. Short term greed = long term STUPID. Say hi to hoopstick for us when you join them on the turd pile."

Kudos for continuously improving your site, but this wouldn't be constructive without some criticism:

1 - Keep it simple, stupid: I miss the simplicity of your old site. Each page had all the info you needed with one click. I don't want to click "I want one" in order to read about the features/specs/etc. Consider shopper insights terms like "shopability" and "navigation" and how you've completely pissed us off.

2 - Communicating change: I get it. You've got a new look, you're in beta. What I missed the memo on was the shirt supplier change. You've now got way too much messaging on each page to expect time-starved customers to click through every page of your site. READ: I CHECK SHIRT.WOOT EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. I don't always buy very often (I'm trying to streamline), but when I Woot!, I can't claim to be the Dos Equis guy. I bought a shirt a couple weeks back and when it arrived, I thought I was shipped the wrong size. After writing a friendly email to customer service, I get the following0 response:

>>>If the tag shows the Woot logo in baby/light blue, then the shirt you received is actually a Women's XL. Currently, we are making the transition to new Anvil shirts which you might've already read about here: http://shirt.woot.com/Forums/ViewPost.aspx?PostID=4856801.
The most noticeable changes in the shirts is actually in the women's sizing. There is some further information about this here: http://shirt.woot.com/Forums/ViewPost.aspx?PostID=4862827.
While we in process of making this change, not all the shirts that we offer have yet to make this transition. You can verify which shirt is being printed on which blank by checking out the sizing chart at the end of each shirt description in the 'Features' tab.<<<<

Well, great. That was a helpful, customer-centric reply. I certainly missed the forum post on that. If you'd posted that notice under the sizing chart section, I might have realized that. While I'm not part of your core purchasing group, I was an occasional purchaser and a frequent browser. Consider me put off for a while as I have an awesome t-shirt with an awesome design that has officially become a nightie.

I don't know who guys sold out to COUGH COUGH, but I think you've forgotten what made your brand so great -- fantastic deals presented on a site built on simplicity and ease of navigation. Big images, sparse - yet entertaining text.

equazcion wrote:

You can rationalize away all the negative feedback and blame us for just not seeing it the right way. I mean, if it helps you. Doesn't do much for us though.

Yeah. This.

Like I said before, this is like Apple adding a bunch of levers and switches and splash screens to the iPad/iPhone.

You've taken away what made Woot special in the first place. I'm not saying not to grow. Hell, add as many sites as you want, but keep each page SIMPLE.

used to be a pretty far out site....now it's kinda a drag man

I take it you guys just don't care about all the feedback? Looks to me a majority of the feedback on the forum discussion is negative, what is the point of providing a forum discussion on the subject and allowing beta feedback if you guys don't plan on acting on any of it? Today's write up sucked by the way (23 Jun). I don't know what is happening over there but I feel like the niche you guys used to cater to is going to be filled by someone else eventually. I used to enjoy your site very much, it is no longer one of the sites I look at first thing in the morning when I start up the computer, or justify staying up 15 more mins until midnight just to see what will be next. Maybe a former employee will fill the niche with a "Whoop!" (there it is!), I would gladly deprive myself of 15 mins of much needed rest to check it out if it was similar to the old Woot!

Man, I barely ever check woot since the new design. Ya know what, i don't miss it. The old page was addictive. It was perfect! I understand putting more items up for sale besides just one item per day but isn't that what all the other woots are for? U could have made a sister page with this layout to sell more than 1 item, but let us decide to go off the original page to the new one, don't just force change down our throats. Bottom line is, whoever's pet project this is needs to just give up their stubborn EGO and just accept defeat and switch the page back. It's not a good idea, design, layout, feel, look etc. there is nothing good about it that makes it better than the old site. HOW MANY TIMES DO WE HAVE TO SAY IT!!!! SWITCH IT THE F BACK!! We never even seen a woot off with this terrible design? Can this overly busy layout even had a sell out bar and lights? Anyway, i'm off to not look at woot again for another month. I used to check everyday. I like how woot assumes we will still come back and get used to it.. It's not working woot, tell that ceo he's fired, it's a tough pill to swallow but give up and accept the fact that you are a blatent loosing failure and to go crawl back into that boring cave of an office u minnow-o. I will give woot 1 more month to go back, then it's cancel my account time. I used to tell everyone about woot. I put crap vids up. But no more, i'm going to reverse promote e site. Later

wavebreaker wrote:I might as well throw my hat in on this...

I don't understand what your overall goals were in this redesign. The base foci of Woot were, from my perspective, the community feel and the gimmick (single deal per day, sometimes a bit of a quirk).

The community suffers greatly from the resign, wherein the complimentary post and quality post entries are largely obscured. The longer you get a customer to spend with the product, the better off you are. When you put such things behind a wall you're limiting contact and the ability for a potential customer to become a actual customer. I used to check out threads on a fairly common basis, read the writeup, etc.

Haven't bothered much since the change. It's amazing the difference that click wall makes.

As for the plus... I really think you would have avoided ALL complaints and issues by doing the redesign and then had a new "Woot PLUS" area up top. That way you add something beneficial (hey, more deals! Cool!) instead of detracting from the base design (... why are all the things I actually came here to see covered up in these stupid 'deals'?).

The design isn't bad, and in fact I like some of the feel(and I do think that its about time you did something with the older Shirt designs you own), but I really think it was created by people who did not understand the needs/desires of the customer base.

So did CowboyDann give up on Woot too?

Woot seems to have gone the way of JC Penney; take everything people came to expect about your brand (in JCP's case, it was coupons and deep discount sales) and throw it out the window. It's a great way to offend your core customers. Not surprisingly, JCP's same-store sales are down over 20% and their president is on the curb.

Here's an article about JC Penneys "epic rebranding fail" I think we'll see a similar article about Woot soon.

miken927 wrote:So did CowboyDann give up on Woot too?

Woot seems to have gone the way of JC Penney; take everything people came to expect about your brand (in JCP's case, it was coupons and deep discount sales) and throw it out the window. It's a great way to offend your core customers. Not surprisingly, JCP's same-store sales are down over 20% and their president is on the curb.

Here's an article about JC Penneys "epic rebranding fail" I think we'll see a similar article about Woot soon.

But,but,but.. I really liked the new, classier JCP site, and the merchandise was not overpriced. The flyers were classy compared with the kyrappy old ones which I am sure are coming back.

Having said that, I find myself going to the woot copycat priceplunge for the type of experience we used to have here.

Instead of being a "dedicated" site with subsites focused on said dedication (shirt.woot is shirts made by woot; etc.), this site has become just another a-day-a-deal catalog. It truly has led to my departure from using Woot as a retailer.

Also, the "community" aspect seems lost as a result of this catalog demeanor. While the "top posts" scroll at the bottom right, it really isn't uniform or inviting to join in the discussion as the previous setup was.

I am disappointed. I liked the "cleaner" woot better.

I like it!

ThunderThighs wrote:I'll let you in on a not very secret link you can bookmark:

www.woot.com/today

It works for all the sites. It will take you straight to the offer page if that's your fav.

Just don't come crying to us when you miss out on a great Plus deal.

But that only works for the main woot page. From there you have to type in home.woot.com/today for the home deal. Or have a separate bookmark for that and all the sub-sites. A simple solution would be to have the "today" page be the page that loads and have a new Plus page with all the Plus deals. If the home or the sport or the kids deal doesn't interest me, I don't go there and I miss out on the Plus deals on that page. That also means Woot misses out on potential sales. But I would go to a Plus page and look at all the Plus deals on that page. That EASY solution has three immediate benefits. It eliminates a bit of clicking to get to the humorous write-ups, an issue that has been mentioned a lot in this thread. It brings woot back to a "one item a day" concept, another oft-mentioned complaint. And it puts all the Plus deals that would normally be missed on one page for easy viewing.

ThunderThighs wrote:Not true. We've heard the sentiment in this forum and others that some don't like Woot Plus. It would be wrong to say that all wooters hate Woot Plus though. There are wooters that seem to like it but perhaps don't post as much.

I am a long time woot customer with 9 pages of "stuff you bought". I don't mind the woot plus deals. I do mind the implementation of the woot plus deals. The plus deals should all be on their own page, one page with all the plus deals. There are several benefits to this. You could move the /today page for each sub-site up a level. That would put the humorous description back where people, you know, the ones you want to spend money, want it to be. They would no longer have to click on the "continue reading" link. And you might even increase revenue. For example, home.woot has an expresso maker today. I am not interested in an expresso maker so I'm not going to visit home.woot today. There are 2 or 3 plus deals on the home.woot page that I will not see. The plus deals are not enough to make me want to visit 6-7 pages to see them all. But I would visit one plus.woot page and look at them all at once. And the overall woot site would slide back into being centered on the one item a day concept.

ThunderThighs wrote:I think the new site design can meet the desires of those that want the old design and those that like the new design.

The home page should be seen as a portal. It shows all the deals that are available for that day.

The home page is no more a portal than is the kids page. Or the sport page. I'm sure I'm not alone when I say that I don't want a portal. I want detail pages that are linked. I don't want to have to go from the woot portal page to the woot detail page to the home portal page to the home detail page to the home specs tab to the sports portal page to the home details page….and so on. Woot has needlessly complicated the one item a day concept.

ThunderThighs wrote:If you click through, you go to the detail page which is more what we had with the previous design but without the extra stuff (e.g. ads) and with easier to access information. Photos that are easier to find. Tabs to help navigate the information instead of a page that endlessly scrolled.

I liked the page that endlessly scrolled. I'm a proponent of having all the information in one place, not spread out under different tabs. When I check woot, actually, before woot got the corporate makeover, I checked woot on my phone. I looked at all the sites almost every night. 5-6 clicks and I had seen it all. That's because of the endless scrolling. Now I wait for the email and I might check the site when I get home from work at 6 in the morning. Maybe. If I remember there was something I wanted to look at. But I do remember to check out 1saleaday on my phone at work. The information on your site is not easier to access now.

ThunderThighs wrote:So please don't think that we've deserted our loyal wooters with the new home page design. We've given you what you want on the details page. If you prefer that page as your landing page for woot, just change your bookmark to /today for all the URLs (e.g. www.woot.com/today)

It's kinda the best of both worlds.

Except that it's not the best of both worlds. To use /today bookmarks means the links on the page become useless and you have to have multiple bookmarks. Here's an idea…why doesn't woot change the links on its page to go directly to the /today page? Because then people wouldn't see the plus deals? Move all of the plus deals to one page and link to it. A simple solution with multiple benefits.

ThunderThighs wrote:
It's kinda the best of both worlds.

With all due respect (& there is a lot!), it isn't even "kinda the best of both worlds." Those who are used to seeing the description of the product immediately will not be placated. Being blinded w/the YELLING of woot plus! items is annoying. I click on an item to see that item, not something else. It's very distracting... Oh, look! A bunny! And if I click on that bunny & find something that is of no interest to me, I'm not going back to the one I might have bought.

It's also a too much of a bother to bookmark another page. Why would I have to do that? NOT user-friendly. The woot plus items belong in a tab at the top of the site - like all the other multiple deals that I might have an interest in. Or not. The not (having an interest in) is becoming more & more prevelent.

I came back for a look-see. I still hate the changes.

Someone needs to explain to the egg-heads that even though sales haven't plunged yet, you're alienating your biggest fans that generate most of your discussion content.

As those users abandon woot, the forum discussions, tweets, facebook posts, and all of the other activity you used to see from the woot fans will dwindle...

... and then the sales will begin to lag. Only then the powers-that-be might begin to realize that they have crushed a once great brand that pioneered a niche in Internet commerce.

But by then it will be too late. Woot will end up like flickr and myspace and geocities and del.icio.us...

Different eggheads - same philosophy. Take something good and different and make it like everything else and ruin it.

ThunderThighs wrote:Not true. We've heard the sentiment in this forum and others that some don't like Woot Plus. It would be wrong to say that all wooters hate Woot Plus though. There are wooters that seem to like it but perhaps don't post as much.

Wow..."perhaps [they] don't post as much." Distortion fields at 100% Captain!!!!

I think the new site design can meet the desires of those that want the old design and those that like the new design.

Really? Because that's not what the 21 pages of posts I just read express.

The home page should be seen as a portal. It shows all the deals that are available for that day.

The home page should be viewed as Amazon's heavy-handed meddling. Matt Rutledge's departure was the writting on the wall.

So please don't think that we've deserted our loyal wooters with the new home page design.

Sez the man behind the curtain...

DoublEE wrote:Sez the man behind the curtain...

TT is a chick, just sayin.

I print a receipt on each item I order. To print a reciept I get 5 pages of text and not all of the information is there. I wish you would fix this so you only get purchace information. Not pictures of the latest deals. It is a waste of supplies. Thank you.

I miss the old purple website.

Yeah, the front page is too busy but I don't mind the challenge for a bargain. I love sport.woot, second only to home.woot. I like the $5 all you can ship option. Now, give us a really good Woot-off!

So, we get an email today about a new newsletter, so I decide to come here to see if anything has changed, and between all the posts on the 2 main threads - what - 16 pages on one and 21 on another - it doesn't look as if Jason's Fried Fish Feast has listened at all.

They may have "heard" us, but to actually listen seems to be beyond comprehension for these numb-nuts.

After further review..Woot Now Sucks. I've been waiting for "it" to "sink in" and my brain to change to accept the new portal. But alas, sanity has prevailed and I am un-assuaged.
It is sad, Woot used to be easy, simple, uncluttered and a good deal to boot. Hey, when was the last time a woot sold out? Sorry, I digress. Now, it's like a big grocery store holder of merchandise that is krapp tipped over on my browser and spewed it's contents forth without being a good deal.

No offense meant to thunderthighs, and any similarity to real or fictional posters or employees is purely coincidental, but the fat lady has sung...and she's no diva, even if the CEO keeps telling us she is.

ibthor wrote:I miss the old purple website.

It's interesting to go back and read the comments on the switch from the purple website to Woot 2.0 The comments were larely positive, with the negatives mostly dealing with color choices.

nuclearscan wrote:It seems like every instinct and sensibility that went into making woot has been abandoned. Woot's success has been as much about creating a culture as it was about the actual products. It is now indistinguishable from any other mass reseller out there. When you demote your main (description) to a thin slice at the top, and even worse hide it behind a 'read more' button, it tells the reader you believe most people find the info useless, so we'll hide it here for those that want it. I'm not a web designer, but that's the perception I get as a customer.

This. Now I have no motivation to visit Woot over any other online deal retailer. Only shirt.woot offers any uniqueness.

miken927 wrote:It's interesting to go back and read the comments on the switch from the purple website to Woot 2.0 The comments were larely positive, with the negatives mostly dealing with color choices.

I also find it interesting that 7.5 of the pages were all on launch day with a handful of posts coming in thru the end of august - whereas this debacle has been rolling on for over a month - with no change in opinion, and Jason's Fried Fish Feast clearly ignoring the customers that brought them their cash cow.

> Stopped showing "Welcome" lightbox for mobile devices and user agents that don't support cookies"

Could you please fix this all the way? I do not store cookies across sessions and seeing the "welcome" over and over is getting annoying. I don't know of any other website (including Amazon) that throws an annoying welcome screen up for all visitors it doesn't recognize.

Behold my friends - the first post-apocolyptic Woot-off is about to begin.

Or so I derived from the email they sent this morning, which ended..."Now, if you'll excuse us, we should go lie down. We feel like Woot is about to have an "off" day. Two "off" days, actually."

We shall see what we shall see and what in this brave new world the new and improved Jason's Fried Fish Feast-off has to offer.

Phasers set on stun.

olcubmaster wrote:Behold my friends - the first post-apocolyptic Woot-off is about to begin.

Or so I derived from the email they sent this morning, which ended..."Now, if you'll excuse us, we should go lie down. We feel like Woot is about to have an "off" day. Two "off" days, actually."

We shall see what we shall see and what in this brave new world the new and improved Jason's Fried Fish Feast-off has to offer.

Phasers set on stun.

Phasers set to zzzzzzzzzz

Jason's Fried Fish Feast no longer has the appeal it once did......"off" days or not.....

zzzzzzzzzzz is correct! woot offs used to be even better deals than the woots themselves, now they are just the same item at the same price that it was when it was a woot. They should rename woot offs to what they have actually become...woot turn me offs.

zoinks wrote:zzzzzzzzzzz is correct! woot offs used to be even better deals than the woots themselves, now they are just the same item at the same price that it was when it was a woot. They should rename woot offs to what they have actually become...woot turn me offs.

Can I nominate this as a "quality post".......stated perfectly.....

I like the new design, but I do not like that the price of t-shirts has raised from $10 to $12. However, it is very nice the $5 ship them all!

richmondhokie wrote:So, we get an email today about a new newsletter, so I decide to come here to see if anything has changed,

Hey there!
Saw your other thread, figured the reply would best go here.

The great thing about that feedback button is that it's really provided a lot of feedback in such a short time frame, which is awesome. We're still looking at all the suggestions and working out the best solutions that not only fit our needs here at woot, but all of customer's needs as well. It's challenging at times, and we know it's frustrating, but we want everyone to stay in the loop and will keep trying to be pretty transparent at what we're up to.

What I do recommend is staying tuned to the feedback thread especially as our developers chime in on changes. This probably won't be the last time you hear from them - or us on the community team, finding those comments and bringing them back to everyone. We're eager to bring attention to the changes we've made, many of which are direct results of feedback from the community!

We do hear from people who want us to just "bring it all back" but honestly, that's not going to happen. We're constantly wanting and needing to experiment in new areas and try new stuff out. There are things people will like, there are things people won't like - this happens every time a major change is made, and yeah, there were lots of changes all at once. I do know that a lot of eyes are watching though, we appreciate the feedback and hope it can stay constructive and civil.

It's a total mess on my phone (Samsung Galaxy Note - a big screen - using Dolphin browser). Can't see the price! Can't see the text of other items. Screenshots here (got an error when I tried to make the link live):

http://tinyurl.com/cjcx5vf

-- Barbara

inkycatz wrote:Hey there!
Saw your other thread, figured the reply would best go here.

The great thing about that feedback button is that it's really provided a lot of feedback in such a short time frame, which is awesome. We're still looking at all the suggestions and working out the best solutions that not only fit our needs here at woot, but all of customer's needs as well. It's challenging at times, and we know it's frustrating, but we want everyone to stay in the loop and will keep trying to be pretty transparent at what we're up to.

What I do recommend is staying tuned to the feedback thread especially as our developers chime in on changes. This probably won't be the last time you hear from them - or us on the community team, finding those comments and bringing them back to everyone. We're eager to bring attention to the changes we've made, many of which are direct results of feedback from the community!

We do hear from people who want us to just "bring it all back" but honestly, that's not going to happen. We're constantly wanting and needing to experiment in new areas and try new stuff out. There are things people will like, there are things people won't like - this happens every time a major change is made, and yeah, there were lots of changes all at once. I do know that a lot of eyes are watching though, we appreciate the feedback and hope it can stay constructive and civil.

Well - when the MASSES are saying they don't like it....maybe someone should listen......I can count on a few fingers the folks that do like it.....

Well I left my "beta feedback," so might as well post here as well...

Not loving the change. Too much stuff, too any steps to get to where you want to go to get the information you want to make a decision about what you might or might not buy! I agree with some of the other posters that the Plus items should be on their own page. Right now, they take up more space than the offering of the day. And, also in agreement with posters, put the tracking number back on the shipping emails. I see that a few of my fellow wine.wooters have posted, Charon98 in particular, with valid points--again, no one likes to have to do the horizontal scroll and the left edge of the page is falling off now.

As far as the comments about the Labrat program, there was an email this weekend about a Labrat gathering to sample and take note of future wine.woot! offerings. Too bad it is in California and I am in Minnesota. I still have the Golden Ticket I received with my one Labrat opportunity. It was supercool to be chosen, if only once. If all of the Labrat "gatherings" are going to be limited to California (due to proximity to the wineries?), that will certainly limit the opportunities for the rest of us.

I suppose I should have actually posted that on the wine.woot! site, but then again with all the cross posting these days... nuff said.