So I wanted to keep all the updates and changes within the same topic, but the changes we made today were quite substantial and putting it in the same topic would be too much to read so I decided to make another topic.
So here are the changes:
1. Quick Account and Community Access via Dropdown Menu after logging in:
We noticed that it takes a lot of clicks to navigate to your account to check your wish lists, orders, reviews and etc. So we made some change that once you are logged in, you have access to a drop down menu of both Account and Community for quick access.
2. Previously purchased product check mark:
This was requested by a few customers and we were finally able to push this update out. As you can see, once you're logged in, on products you have purchased before, there will be a small green check mark next to it to indicate as such. Whether it's on the product page or the category page.
3. Review System Overhaul:
New Review Features
-You can find reviews with comments.
-You can up / down vote the review and the votes are tied to the overall user vote count.
-New "Verified Buyer" display so it's easier to see.
-Subscribe to the review so you will get notified if there are any comments left on the review.
-@user commenting and notification system that's same as the Community. Previously, you won't get notified if you asked a question on a review and the reviewer responds. This way the communication is clear and simple.
Though one thing with this update is that all the older review comments could no longer be kept. We are sorry for this inconvenience but feel this is a necessary change and will work better going forward.
Review Voting Quality Check
We have heard complaints about how some reviews don't really help the product and turns away people from trying them. We have made a change so that if a Review hits -5 in its voting, it will be removed from the product's overall rating.
For example, if a product has 2 reviews, 1 @ 5 stars, and 1 @ 1 star, then the product's rating average is 2 reviews @ 3 stars. Few days later that 1 star review reaches -5 in votes. The 1 star review will then be removed from the overall product rating. So instead of the product displaying 2 reviews @3 stars, it will now display 1 review @ 5 stars. The -5 vote review will still remain visible for users to read with a message noting as such, but it won't count towards the overall product rating.
4. Community User Profile Update
Some users have mentioned that they would like to see certain user's other reviews because the user's review is very detailed and helpful. With this update you can see what other reviews the user has written that might convince you on a product that you didn't know existed before! (NOTE: I have noticed that we have some bugs within the Reviews Tab and have already notify the developers of these issues. Sorry we didn't catch this earlier but we will try to fix this ASAP. (EDIT: This has been fixed.)
Also under your own profile, you can control subscriptions and comments for community and reviews, or just use the Dropdown Community Menu.
BUT THAT'S NOT ALL!
There are more changes still to come that we're working on right now that we hope we can push out in the next few weeks.
Account vote total update based on the following actions:
-Posting a product review increases your vote count by 3.
-Posting a community topic increases your vote count by 2.
-Leaving a community/review comment increases your vote count by 1. (This has now been updated, most users will be able to see their updated account votes.)
Based on those rules, we will also be doing an achievement like system in that if you reached a certain threshold like 1000 total account votes, or 50 reviews/topics posted, or 100 comments left, your account will be marked as such and we will be giving out free gifts/rewards. This is still being thought through and worked on so stay tuned!
In the meanwhile, let us know what you think about these changes! If you encounter any issues, bugs, or have any suggestions, please let us know!
@**ToyDemon** Hello, just letting you know that the cart breaks around 10 or so items and can't display any more on Opera or Chrome (didn't check through my other browsers). Also minor nitpick but the thumbnail sizing isn't uniform so it looks odd on the wishlist when the table has different height levels. I can provide examples if you need. No worries though, from one webdev to another, the site is pretty good.
@digiornopizza thanks for letting us know. If you can definitely shoot us an email to our customer service with some screen shots and we will try our best to see if we can fix the issue for you. I tested on chrome on mobile and didn’t seem to have any issues. The products in the side cart is scrollable even if you can’t see other then all.
Please provide detail on pc/mobile/tablet and anything else that could be helpful. Really appreciate it!
@**ToyDemon** Sure, I sent over an email with screenshots and my browser+viewport to support@toydemon.com I hope that's the right one. Your contact form doesn't allow for file upload for screenshots so I just went ahead and did it by email. I'll try and check it out through my phone though.
@**ToyDemon** I also have had problems with the cart: 1) Even with scrolling, there is a limit to what shows. 2) Then if an item at the bottom of the list goes out of stock, the only way to order is to delete items at the top of the cart until the out of stock item can be seen, then deleted. Then add the previously deleted items back to the cart. If page load times are slow (which for me is always) this can take a long time. Once I missed a sale and just gave up on the order. 3) Sometimes trying to scroll through the cart simply causes the whole page to scroll, and not the cart.
What works best is a simple full screen cart without extraneous distractions that slow down the page. I have noticed over the past twenty years that website design frequently involves innovations for the sake of innovation that create problems with no benefit.
To summarize: IMHO, the side pop up cart is a complicated pain in the butt that is probably costing some sales. Even if there are people who like the side cart, it does not matter if it loses sales.
@digiornopizza Thanks for the pics. It seems on the phone you are able to scroll through the items but on desktop browsers it stops at 10 items. I will report that to the developers for them to fix the issue.
@Belmar We're sorry for the issues you're having. We made the side cart so it's easier for users to see what they have and can apply coupon and get to checkout without needing load anything extra and it tend to work fast and easy for the usual customers that needs to purchase a few items. We, however, do understand that this might not work best for some other use cases. What you're describing is simply a bug and shouldn't happen. I will go ahead a submit a ticket to our dev team and have them try to fix the issue as soon as possible.
In the meanwhile, if you need to access the cart, just enter toydemon.com/checkout/cart and you will be taken to the cart page and see all of your cart in the old plain view. Hope that helps.
The side cart issue with only being able to display 10 items has been fixed. Sorry for the inconvenience and thank you guys for letting us know! If you guys find anymore issues, feel free to leave a comment or shoot us an email.
@**ToyDemon** The dropdown menu is such a great QOL addition so thank you for implementing it. On an unrelated note, are there any plans for adding a "stay logged in" option? It's small but it'd be nice to not have to manually sign in so often.
@gboi229 Thank you for the response. I will check and see if we could do that. We just originally thought because of the content of the site, most users don't want to be logged in indefinitely.
@**ToyDemon** I'm visually impaired and it's difficult for me to see images in the community topic. It would be nice if I could click an image that is embedded in a community topic and it show a full-size image, similar to how it's done on product pages. Usually this wouldn't be a huge deal, but with the new weekly product polls it's become something that I have really noticed causing me problems. Thank you for reading.
@Jonarby i have asked my colleague posting the polls to at least post the original image. You can just right click and view image in new tab/window and you will see the original image size for the new polls.
@**ToyDemon** Massive changes, I love that you can now follow people to see future reviews and you can now downvote unhelpful reviews without actually removing them. Very happy to see the purchased checkmark implemented too.
Overall love all these features and I'm very happy they were implemented.
I am impressed with the amount of work amount of improvement all at once. Thanks!
I am not sure about giving people an incentive to downvote reviews. There are frequently too many down votes already. I see quite a few down votes for reviews which seem to me are good reviews or at least unobjectionable. Reviews should not be discouraged. I am much more likely to buy something with a review. I once bought an item with all negative reviews because what was actually written made me think it was something I might like.
What I didn't mention was, as long as it breaks the -5 threshold, it'll be counted again. For example the review is at -5, then someone upvoted it and it becomes -4, then it will be counted again next day.
In the end we leave it up to you guys to decide, and we still display the review so you can still read it yourself and make that judgement instead of just removing the review. As we try to be more user oriented, some of these things will happen.
Since we give reward points for reviews, we might have users that will review (whether truthful or not, copy/paste from else where) and we cannot verify that. However, I am also not saying that all the users that review a lot are all just spamming for the reward points, just pointing out many factors that comes with a review and why some users might up/down vote it.
Please at least give it some time to work itself out, if this doesn't work then we can take another look at what's a better approach.
@**ToyDemon** I jut heard to say that I love the new ‘Previously purchased” product checkmark feature! Personally, I find that super useful and appreciate the addition to the site. Thanks for always being awesome, and now for being even more awesome!
