Need female help!

[sparklyscotty]

Hi there. Guys - this is one to pass to your wife/ girlfirend/ mother/ sister/ aunt/ third-cousin-twice-removed etc. You could even print this post off and pass it to any women you know.
I have had a lot of feedback about my jewellery site and products and am in the middle of having it redesigned. What I really need is feedback from my potential customers...
specifically I am looking for people's reactions to the following while surfing my site:

- would you sign up for the newsletter? If no, why not?
- do the quality of the photos put you offf?
- would you recommend the site to a freind?
- would you visit again?
- Is the site easy to navigate?
- Are the galleries easy to view?
- does it look professional?
- would the offer of free shipping make a difference to your decision to purchase?

...plus any other feedback that you think of while on the site.

www.chimerique.co.uk

This would help me out SO much. If any women out there are willing to let me know their thoughts, I would be really grateful.

-Angel-

[Rob Holmes]

Angel have you thought of putting together an online survey that people could whip through?

Rob

[Whistle Ink]

good idea matrixx!

maybe you could offer an incentive such as a free product to a randonmly picked surfer. you could let them choose the prize.

im sure this would get all the women searching thriugh your store, and would also tell you whats 'hot'

[Rob Holmes]

maybe you could offer an incentive such as a free product to a randonmly picked surfer. you could let them choose the prize.

im sure this would get all the women searching thriugh your store, and would also tell you whats 'hot'

Adwords would get you visitors for this very easily for around 4p a visitor and you could get a good cross section of opinions

Rob

[Anyanka]

I'll PM you

[sparklyscotty]

Thanks. I already offer a prize to one newsletter susbcriber a month, but haven't advertised that on the site yet.
-Angel-

[nickkis]

I'm totally lost at the thread... don't women read business forums? Why do guys have to pass on the details?

Found that quite condescending to be totally honest.....

[Rob Holmes]

I think Angel just wants to maximise the responses.

Generally the more responses the better quality the survey.

Rob

[paulho]

I have kidnapped my partners log on to reply to your thread. I thought that you had some lovely jewellery on your site but had to click on the item before I could find the price. It may appeal to more people if you put the price on the item as i got a bit worried when I ended up with 100 pounds worth of items in my basket before I realised that clicking on the picture revealed the price.
The web site design was good, was it done from someone on this site?

Easy to navigate, well categorised. Overall I'd be pretty chuffed with the outcome (but, as a woman, you NEED prices against what your selling!! :lol: )

Hope this helps :wink:
Lisa

[coxadmin]

Hi Angel

My comments are meant to be constructive and are not meant to be harsh - sometimes people don't express things well when typing in a forum. If you want to discuss my comments, please don't hesitate to contact me.

I'm looking at your site in Firefox with my internet security software set up as I require it.

When I look at http://www.chimerique.co.uk/elements.htm I see lots of boxes, some of which just say "Add to bag" and some say "Coming Soon". Out of 59 items on the page I can only see 4 photos. In order to view the images I have to lower my settings on my ad blocking software.

There are no prices at all on that page, either.

These things don't encourage me to stay on the site. It may be that prospective clients are seeing the same thing. I won't buy from sites which require me to change my security settings - e.g. Tesco home shopping would not work and tech support told me to disable my firewall; they lost my internet business even though I shop there all the time.

At the bottom of that page is an enormous white space, which appears unnecessary.

I haven't looked at the other pages but I'd be interested to hear why only a few images are displayed until ad blocking security levels are lowered.

[sparklyscotty]

Hi guys - Nikkis... the post wasn't meant to be offensive, I was just trying to reach my target audience of women. I figured women would just read the post and respond, the note to the guys was just to let them know that I was primarily looking for female comments. Sorry if it came off wrong.
Paulho... please thank Lisa for her comments. That is exactly the kind of feedback that is very helpful.
Lynn - thanks for your comments - not at all harsh. :)

I designed the site myself, but I don't have any technical expertise, (hence white spaces, images not appearing etc). I have gone with a total site re-design, but so far the feedback seems to be that the existing site LOOKS good, it just needs to work better.
-Angel-

[Tiggy]

Hi Angel
First of all 'well done' with your site and good luck with your enterprise. I think the site is very pretty and attractive which is a good start!

Here are my comments re your questions:

would you sign up for the newsletter? If no, why not?

Personally speaking I would not because I feel like I have newsletters coming out of my ears and am really 'over' them! It's just me - I'm sure plenty of people love them!

- do the quality of the photos put you offf? -

I have to say this was my biggest sticking point. Your photos are fine but when I buy jewellery, either on line or in person I want to get so close to it and examine it in minute, practically microscopic detail. It just felt a little frustrating that even when the pics were enlarged they still weren't up close and personal enough! If you can get pics that seem so large and full of colour of life and look like they are about to burst out of the screen and spill all of their lusciousness into my real space at any second it would whet my appetite a thousand fold. Think like the old masters of the Still Life paintings. Very often you almost feel like you need to reach out your hand and stop a piece of that's just about to topple off the dish and roll at your feet.

would you recommend the site to a freind?

Yes

- would you visit again? -

Yes - I have added you to my favourites.

Is the site easy to navigate? -

Yes - the only thing was I couldn't see a home page button to get back to the first page and I think this is a must - sorry if I just missed it.

Are the galleries easy to view?

Yes

- does it look professional? -

I think it does but it needs a bit of pizzazz injecting into it some how - kind of sharpening up. It looks dreamy and romantic but that is probably exactly what you are aiming for rather than a big glittzy 'big company' look.

would the offer of free shipping make a difference to your decision to purchase?

Definitely!!!

Best wishes
Tiggy

[Tiggy]

...sorry i meant to say to catch a piece of FRUIT!!!!!

Tggy

[RSL]

I think your range is lovely, the tiems look well designed and quite classy. i feel the colouring of the site could compliment your range a bit more. I found the dark blue to be a bit off putting. I also didn't like the fact that the prices were not available until you clicked on the pictures, I like to be instantly aware of prices. Viewing the site on Firefox is also quite strange, the entire product range appears in each gallery, I prefer to be given a few screen shots per page, but thats just my preference.
What would the newsletter consist of exactly? Wht would be its USP? If it has an "edge" or is unique then I'd consider it.

Overall good product range though.

[Tiggy]

Hi Angel

If you go to www. anniesherman.com and click on one of her photos to enlarge you'll see what I mean. Also it doesn't seem to be a slowing the site down at all as pictures load quite quickly.

The pics make the jewellery seem much more accessible, tangible almost.
Tiggy

[LDW]

Hi, here's my feedback, hope it helps.

Firstly, I love what you do - great for special occassions. Personally I would promote it to men, to encourage them to bye something unique for their partners. Ordering on line will save them running around the shops on Christmas eve :lol:

I signed up
I will revisit and recommend
Free shipping wouldn't make a difference, as I'd pressume it was built in to the price and marked up.

Personally I dont like the font you use in the titles as I struggled to read it. Apart from that I like it.


Good luck with it.

Best regards


Liza
Hi there. Guys - this is one to pass to your wife/ girlfirend/ mother/ sister/ aunt/ third-cousin-twice-removed etc. You could even print this post off and pass it to any women you know.
I have had a lot of feedback about my jewellery site and products and am in the middle of having it redesigned. What I really need is feedback from my potential customers...
specifically I am looking for people's reactions to the following while surfing my site:

- would you sign up for the newsletter? If no, why not?
- do the quality of the photos put you offf?
- would you recommend the site to a freind?
- would you visit again?
- Is the site easy to navigate?
- Are the galleries easy to view?
- does it look professional?
- would the offer of free shipping make a difference to your decision to purchase?

...plus any other feedback that you think of while on the site.

www.chimerique.co.uk

This would help me out SO much. If any women out there are willing to let me know their thoughts, I would be really grateful.

-Angel-

[nickkis]

Personal opinion on the site

IMHO your selling this stuff downwards and not upwards. Look at the websites of Tiffany, Beaverbrooks, Ernest Jones. They use very clean fonts, white space, lifestyle type images.

The pieces are all quite funky, certainly stuff I would wear but when I look at the site, it makes me think of 60 year old grandmothers, that quaint pastelly flowery association. My IMMEDIATE response when I saw the site was that it would be jewellry that was for an age group above what I believe your target market would be (my guess is I'm in your target demographic, 18-35, female, informed internet purchaser with high disposable income)

I found navigation easy through the products however I had to go and look for delivery details. You have a great selling point with your free delivery, use it to your best advantage and put it next to your prices.

The tiaras are stunning, why arent they on the homepage navigation?

In the product gallery, I would personally remove the spaces for coming soon, theres no information about whats coming so you may as well add as you go. As it is now, its breaking up the flow of the page.

I dont personally sign up for mailing lists, I do however save things to favourites. I'm in the net industry, doing that is second nature but it might instead be nice to add a "Range updated frequently, click here to add to favourites and check back regularly" type button/link.

I would love to mock it all up in Photoshop in a different way to let you see how I would display what are lovely products, attention span on the net is short, you have to immediately associate your product with a users lifestyle, desires and demographic profile.

[sparklyscotty]

THank you all so much for your comments. It is so funny to do something and then realise that it is interpreted totally differently by visitors. I have a much better idea now of what to do and feel better about doing it knowing that I am working in the right direction. Will let you all know when a new and improved version is online. :) Thanks again. When the new site is up I will be offering a UKBF discount as a thanks to all the help I get here.
-Angel-

[LittleAcorn]

Hi Angel,

I think your products look great! Very well done if you make these by hand yourself, I know how fiddly it is to do intricate work like that.

As the others have mentioned, a real close up picture would be very useful, if I was deciding whether to purchase the item.

Have a look at how this company shows their jewlery in pictures: http://www.zellestyle.com/catalog/index.htm . Take the 1st product images for example. They show the necklace being on a real person. Then they show a clear shot against a white background, and they show a 3rd shot zoomed right in on the details.

3 shots like that of each of your creations would help show off your work much better to prospective customers.

Best of luck with everything.

Nicola

[sparklyscotty]

Hi folks. Updated my site a bit this weekend. Is it getting better??? Pro photography is being done this Thursday.
Yay or nay to the navy border?
-Angel-

[coxadmin]

Hi Angel

I love the blue border.

Unfortunately I'm still having the same problem I had before with the images - on http://www.chimerique.co.uk/elements.htm I can only see 4 images without adjusting my internet security settings.

Regards

[Julie]

Hi Angel

I think your site is really good. Very easy to navigate and look at the various pieces. I agree with Tiggy that the photos could be a bit sharper; they are good, but perhaps not good enough if that's all that people can see of the product. The over design is clean and non-intrusive, but I wonder if the text overwhelms the pictures in someplace, particularly the 'Add to bag' in the galleries. I particularly like the masthead of your company name -- it's a good choice of display font.

Having said all this, this is meant as positive criticism. The site is very good and I would buy from it...

Julie

[RSL]

Hey there,

The site does indeed look a whole lot better. Well done.

Good luck with your continual business development too!

[sparklyscotty]

Thanks guys. Your comments gave me the confidence to tell my 'webdesigner' who was creating a new site where to go, and I am now taking legal action to get a refund!
Thanks again.
UKBF members get 10% off! :)
-Angel-

[Jayne]

Hi,

Your products are beautiful.. May I say the photgraphs of the pieces, may have looked better if on a slightly darker background, or on models, the white doesn't do your pieces full justice. Lovely, lovely things on, especially if you are about to be married.

Best Wishes

Jayne