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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Oz
    Posts
    944

    Best online hardgoods purchase experience

    So we’re all shutdown in Australia and Covid pretty much ruined our ski season and this summer too as us Aussies most likely won’t be able to head North for turns. So I’m using this free time to re-jig our website.

    I’d be super interested to see the websites that mags think are the gold standard for purchasing ski gear, particularly hardgoods online.

    Things I’m most interested in are

    - packaging of bindings and other ancillary products (poles, skins, bag etc) that are recommended and suitably matched
    - display of product information, features and specifications
    - video content
    - anything else that struck you as making the experience great compared to other competing websites.

    Would love to hear thoughts!

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Apr 2006
    Location
    Wasatch
    Posts
    7,239
    I have been impressed with backcountry sorting and pictures. They did bad with the recent branding mess but their app is well designed


    Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums
    I need to go to Utah.
    Utah?
    Yeah, Utah. It's wedged in between Wyoming and Nevada. You've seen pictures of it, right?

    So after 15 years we finally made it to Utah.....


    Thanks BCSAR and POWMOW Ski Patrol for rescues

    8, 17, 13, 18, 16, 18, 20, 19, 16, 24, 32, 35

    2021/2022 (13/15)

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Location
    Not Brooklyn
    Posts
    8,318
    I want real ski weight and dimensions for different sizes, not the ones published by manufacturer s.

    Sent from my Pixel 3a using TGR Forums mobile app

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Aug 2018
    Posts
    228
    I like sites where you can sort the sale items by discount %.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    May 2015
    Location
    inw
    Posts
    1,282
    evo.com is my go to for ski lengths & weights but then i always check those against Blister's measurements.

    skiessentials is the only shop i know that regularly does their own video content (there may be many others). it's ok - seems like a lot of work for limited benefit. it's not like a video ski review with a few turns on a scraped off east cost blue run is going to influence my decision of what shop to pay for what is the exact same product regardless of where you buy it.

    more efficient might be using pro/official video stoke content embedded on the product page. professionally produced. no overhead. just some simple embed code.

    i think site design and UX has everything to do with intended market segment and loyalty-building strategy. UX at curated.com, for example, is very controlled - works great for some. i don't like it. but if you want to get newbies, that might be a great approach.

    i think if you want experienced skiers to stick around on your site then high-quality filtering is key - my pet peeve is when user pops out the filter to select a few brands and then for each check oncheck it calls the DB and reloads the f*cking page. terrible design. other sites allow user to check as many as wanted and click "apply" or smth similar. little shit like that matters.

    also, consider allowing users to store favorite products, brands for future alerts. one use case: if i want a pivot 15 w/115mm brakes but you're out i want to see a "alert me when back in stock" option and then it has to work (lots of sites have this feature but it is not efficiently tied to inventory). another use case: allow users to create a custom view of favorite stuff from across the site w/relevant alerts. i'm insane about vests, for example. if i'm shopping at your site how about giving me an alert by product category (vests) and brand? and then a user panel where all of this can be centrally managed. that would be a differentiator.

    just a few thoughts off the top of my head.
    Last edited by ntblanks; 09-23-2020 at 12:20 PM.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Oz
    Posts
    944
    Quote Originally Posted by ntblanks View Post
    evo.com is my go to for ski lengths & weights but then i always check those against Blister's measurements.

    skiessentials is the only shop i know that regularly does their own video content (there may be many others). it's ok - seems like a lot of work for limited benefit. it's not like a video ski review with a few turns on a scraped off east cost blue run is going to influence my decision of what shop to pay for what is the exact same product regardless of where you buy it.

    more efficient might be using pro/official video stoke content embedded on the product page. professionally produced. no overhead. just some simple embed code.

    i think site design and UX has everything to do with intended market segment and loyalty-building strategy. UX at curated.com, for example, is very controlled - works great for some. i don't like it. but if you want to get newbies, that might be a great approach.

    i think if you want experienced skiers to stick around on your site then high-quality filtering is key - my pet peeve is when user pops out the filter to select a few brands and then for each check oncheck it calls the DB and reloads the f*cking page. terrible design. other sites allow user to check as many as wanted and click "apply" or smth similar. little shit like that matters.

    also, consider allowing users to store favorite products, brands for future alerts. one use case: if i want a pivot 15 w/115mm brakes but you're out i want to see a "alert me when back in stock" option and then it has to work (lots of sites have this feature but it is not efficiently tied to inventory). another use case: allow users to create a custom view of favorite stuff from across the site w/relevant alerts. i'm insane about vests, for example. if i'm shopping at your site how about giving me an alert by product category (vests) and brand? and then a user panel where all of this can be centrally managed. that would be a differentiator.

    just a few thoughts off the top of my head.
    Great call re: filtering, that’s in progress right now, AJAX realtime filtering as you select options the page will re-order in realtime, width sliders etc, should be trick.

    We’ve got a working back in stock process, you get an email as soon as an item comes back, we try to turn it off for products that will never come back.

    Last thing is a little harder for us as we’re using existing software so most of the tweaks we make are largely cosmetic, we don’t have the scale to get super trick with our dev.

    Evo is definitely one we look at - we’re working on a similar thing to them with the graphics for the rocker profile and other ski specs etc. Should be live next week.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Oct 2003
    Location
    Banff
    Posts
    22,210
    Quote Originally Posted by Jongle View Post
    I like sites where you can sort the sale items by discount %.
    yes


  8. #8
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Location
    Aspen
    Posts
    3,058
    Quote Originally Posted by I've seen black diamonds! View Post
    I want real ski weight and dimensions for different sizes, not the ones published by manufacturer s.

    Sent from my Pixel 3a using TGR Forums mobile app
    Truth. It baffles me that small/medium shops paying the flat-brimmed bro-brah to twiddle his thumbs half the day to do a quick weight check of new seasons gear and get their site updated. Even the more prominent players in the online space can’t get this small thing in order...


    Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Location
    关你屁事
    Posts
    9,530
    You post “actual weight” someone weighs their new skis on their poorly calibrated pos scale, complains it differs by 10g, returns them, why wouldn’t someone want that business?

    -actually related product stuff, not just “bought together. So, skins would have the major listing, as well as accessories (wax, bag if no bag), replacement parts (tip loops, etc).

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    西 雅 圖
    Posts
    5,359
    Quote Originally Posted by alpinevibes View Post
    Truth. It baffles me that small/medium shops paying the flat-brimmed bro-brah to twiddle his thumbs half the day to do a quick weight check of new seasons gear and get their site updated. Even the more prominent players in the online space can’t get this small thing in order...
    Probably the best small player in the business in that respect is skimo.co, though they only deal in touring gear. Even at a relatively big player like evo, there is really only one person who weighs new gear and posts the results on their website, and that person is in a brick and mortar location rather than the warehouse so a lot of gear doesn't get looked at.

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Oz
    Posts
    944
    Quote Originally Posted by dunfree View Post
    -actually related product stuff, not just “bought together. So, skins would have the major listing, as well as accessories (wax, bag if no bag), replacement parts (tip loops, etc).
    Right now we pre-make packages, mainly due to some legacy software constraints: https://aussieskier.com/products/k2-...ountry-package

    But we’re rolling out ‘roll your own’ package functionality as a part of this upgrade, can add bags, skins, whatever, right now it’s just bindings but we need to make sure the tech works: https://aussieskier.com/products/black-crows-atris-skis

  12. #12
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    西 雅 圖
    Posts
    5,359
    Quote Originally Posted by alpinevibes View Post
    Truth. It baffles me that small/medium shops paying the flat-brimmed bro-brah to twiddle his thumbs half the day to do a quick weight check of new seasons gear and get their site updated. Even the more prominent players in the online space can’t get this small thing in order...
    Plus, most businesses are probably hesitant to let the flat-brimmed bro-brah make wholesale changes on their website.

    The worst example of online merchant are those who cheat, like demosport.com in San Rafael, who copy and paste most of their hard goods descriptions verbatim from evo.com and don't feel the need to hire any knowledgeable copywriters at all. I'd probably refrain from buying anything from them on principle.

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Nov 2006
    Location
    NCW
    Posts
    4,577
    Evo has great copy for sure.

    I’ll pretty much buy from any site with the right price, doubly so if that price is CAD eh?

    Not backcountry though, fuck bc.com.

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