Help Test ReviewBy.me

[accelerator]

Hi All

I started work on my new US reviews site, ReviewBy.me, last August, coding the review functionality myself (yes it did take a while, doing bits here and there!) Anyway, I now have the site up, and I'm asking for a bit of help with beta testing. Could those interested please try the following:

1) Go to the Site Map, and choose one of the products to write a review. If you don't know anything about any of the products, maybe just do some brief reading up and add a very short review.

2) Could you add one review as Guest, one after registering and logging in.

3) Tell me what you think!

Thanks

 

[orchardapple]

Personally I dont think the template, layout does anything to inspire anyone to actually write a review

Theres no mention of what we are actually to review? what products are you looking for reviews?

whats the USP of this site and why should we use this and not one of the many others about for phones?

Its only on the 'site map' page I find a few products to review, these should be graphically displayed on the home page, perhaps showing a few reviews, tech write up, maybe price comparision for each item in a similar layout to the actual review pages

On the Iphone page you have adverts for Blackberry's, i'd look at Iphone adverts myself

If this is a stock template or layout then some serious dev work required to actually represent the products you are looking for reviews on.

Sorry, I hope this helps, not knocking the work just appears to be in its very early stages of development to go live and for it to make a sucess of your work, dont think it does justice to your efforts in its current state.

 

[accelerator]

All good points, the site is in beta testing at the moment and I will certainly have products on the home page when the site is in its final state.

The ads are from AdSense so they are auto-generated.

I am going to use the site to add review functionality to all my other US sites. I will use a separate site based on the same functionality to add reviews to all my UK sites.

Were you able to test the "Add Review" functionality?

Thanks and rgds

 

[accelerator]

Can anyone else help me out with some quick user testing?

Thanks

 

[retired_member13]

I agree with Orchard 100%.

Don't really have a lot left to add, other than to say that the purpose of the site is not at all clear from a user perspective - in that the whole point of the site appears to be to write reviews, not to actually find out about products. Are you building this purely to get SERP listings and adsense clicks - or is there another purpose to it?

I think you're really going to struggle to get content unless there's a real reason why someone would bother writing a review in the first place. There's a glut of sites doing this sort of thing, and some of them have been around for a decade. What makes this one new?

 

[accelerator]

Yes, the purpose of the site will be to get SERP listings.

I realise the site needs more work in terms of explanation / usability.

At the moment though, could someone just test the "Add a Review" functionality. Please go to the page:

Apple iPhone 3G S Reviews

and try adding a review as Guest and then by registering.

In particular I would like people to test the registration process to check it is working for them.

Many thanks

 

[orchardapple]

Firstly you will need to sort out the button redirect, it directs to a page with only the 'guest' or 'logon' links, need to embed this in a complete page so it appears seemless.

Also i'd look for people to logon in or you are gonna get spammed to death even though you have a captcha on the review page.

I'd suggest that you need to address your need for such a site as others also mentioned.

Can you really compete with other more established review sites????

 

[accelerator]

Firstly you will need to sort out the button redirect, it directs to a page with only the 'guest' or 'logon' links, need to embed this in a complete page so it appears seemless.

Also i'd look for people to logon in or you are gonna get spammed to death even though you have a captcha on the review page.

I'd suggest that you need to address your need for such a site as others also mentioned.

Can you really compete with other more established review sites????

Thanks for the comments, my reponses as follows:

- I prefer a page with only the guest or login links, my gut feeling is this is better for success rate. If I have it in a complete page, people might miss the options.

- I am hoping I won't get spammed because of the captcha. The capture is provided by recaptcha, I am hoping this is ok against the spammers. Should I be more worried?

- The main benefit to me of this site is user generated content. I have previously coded review submission functionality in ASP.net on another of my sites and people did contribute. Now I'm rewriting it in PHP and making it easy to add to all my other sites.

- I am not expecting to compete against cnet reviews here, just provide a mechanism to obtain user generated content.

Rgds

 

[orchardapple]

- I prefer a page with only the guest or login links, my gut feeling is this is better for success rate. If I have it in a complete page, people might miss the options.

Question is who are you designing this site for? You or visitors?

As mentioned previously several have visited the site and have been immed turned off by the design, layout and look etc.

TBH the current site is completely out of the 80's. i'd be looking at some sites that perform the similar function to what you are trying to achieve, get some thoughts on layout, function, overall appeal.

- The main benefit to me of this site is user generated content. I have previously coded review submission functionality in ASP.net on another of my sites and people did contribute. Now I'm rewriting it in PHP and making it easy to add to all my other sites.

If it works in ASP then why move to PHP? if it aint broke dont fix it

- I am not expecting to compete against cnet reviews here, just provide a mechanism to obtain user generated content.

Question is why are you looking to obtain these reviews?
What are you looking to do with the data?
Are you looking to add these 'reviews' to other sites you run?

Keep posting and back and i'm sure we'll continue to help.

 

[accelerator]

Question is who are you designing this site for? You or visitors?

As mentioned previously several have visited the site and have been immed turned off by the design, layout and look etc.

I'm designing for the visitors and for ease of use. I agree that my site designs can look basic, but after reading conversion optimisation books I use simple designs with high contrast buttons. I'm hoping no user will miss the "Add Your Review" button. If I had more time I would test different designs with Google Test Tools but for now my best guess will have to do.

TBH the current site is completely out of the 80's. i'd be looking at some sites that perform the similar function to what you are trying to achieve, get some thoughts on layout, function, overall appeal.

Again, I agree the site design looks out of the 80's, but with my affiliate sites the main aim is to get them in through SEO, and get them out on an affiliate link. For instance, my mens shirts site has this simple design and it makes sales. I agree testing different formats would be beneficial (I probably should!), but at the moment I am focused on rolling out new sites.

If it works in ASP then why move to PHP? if it aint broke dont fix it

I find the help from the PHP community much better, and believe me, I need all the help I can get.

Question is why are you looking to obtain these reviews?
What are you looking to do with the data?
Are you looking to add these 'reviews' to other sites you run?

Mainly to obtain additional indexable text that I don't have to type out myself, the RSI is kicking in these days.

Yes, I hope to add the same review mechanism to many of my sites, e.g. Best Broadband, Cheap Mobile Phones and Free Mobile Phones.

If you have time it would be great if you could try registering on ReviewBy.me and tell me what you thought of the sign up process.

Rgds

 

[ddwebguru]

I am not a pro in this field but still my question is why I have to sitemap to see the reviews of products. You should make an overhaul change in the structure of your website and bring some nice changes in the design so that we have browse it easily. It is quite difficult to find things in your website.