Great Moments in Portable eCommerce: Yogee.com.au
By AndrewBoyd • Sep 15th, 2007 • Category: Australian OddIt’s no secret that I read RSS feeds via Opera Mini on my Nokia e61 phone. I’ve found some blogs that work really well in this platform, and some that don’t. The same goes for websites in general.
I’ve had a long term interest in shopping sites - I’ve even set up a couple for clients and friends through the years. The idea of everyone competing in a more-or-less equal market is changing things a lot, and it’s been fun to watch. I also have an interest as a customer - I spend a fair bit of money this way.
Apart from being a mad gadgetarian, I’m currently looking at laptop options. This means subscribing to feeds from a few different bargain spotting sites - my favourite is probably OzBargain. This morning I was lying in bed reading feeds and followed a link from OzBargain to Yogee because they have a “10% off” promotion at the moment. This is what I saw:
Wow 
Let’s see that again, in detail:
Apparently, my browser sucks. Sure, it is small, and not very powerful, but it does what I ask of it most of the time and I’m pretty happy with it. I’ve probably used it every day in the last four months since I started blogging regularly.
This must be one of those “snooty maitre’d”, “cranky old Chinese lady runs the cash register” or “soup nazi” things - being deliberately obnoxious as a differentiator. In a competitive market differentiation (aiming to be unique) is certainly one way to be remarkable.
Otherwise, one might be tempted to think that they’ve just plain made a mistake
Seriously though, I am sure that they are doing their best (most people do, left to their own devices). They possibly do need to think about the growing number of portable readers that they might be turning away. It might be hard to measure the number of transactions that they might be missing out on due to this issue, as there probably aren’t any now for this very reason.
While I am handing out advice, they could also consider doing something about removing unrepresented categories from their menus. A couple of open source shopping cart systems I’ve used myself (like osCommerce) do this straight out of the box.
What’s your favourite online store?
AndrewBoyd is a consultant by day and blogger by night. He loves good food, good wine, and discussing faceted classification schemes with friends.
Email this author | All posts by AndrewBoyd
Wow. I doubt it’s a differentiation attempt to stand out - it’s too much of a put-down to the user for that.
I think Yogee should act fast and fix what could make them remarkable for all the wrong reasons.
Hi Martin,
thank you for your comment. My guess is that it is not deliberate - no-one is that silly - but part of their off the shelf shoppingcart software.
Regardless, yes, I agree totally - they should fix it.
Best regards, Andrew
Andrew - true, I would then question the professionalism of the shopping cart software in question.
And you’re raising good questions that many website owners will soon have to work with - potential customers/readers accessing the internet via a mobile device, as the trend is clearly growing.
Now I must go and check out if my sites do them justice in mobile format.
Thanks Martin,
if you want the “mobile health check” Opera Mini test at any stage please let me know.
Best regards, Andrew
Cheers Andrew - when I’m ready I’ll take you up on that offer.
Though it’ll be a few weeks coming just yet.
Thanks Martin,
any time
Cheers, Andrew
[…] It’s no secret that I read RSS feeds via Opera Mini on my Nokia e61 phone. I’ve found some blogs that work really well in this platform, and some that don’t. The same goes for websites in general. … …more […]
Hey! Thanks for the link. I think a lot of webmasters (myself included) are not aware of a growing group of users who access their websites via mobile devices with limited resolution and scripting capability. I just tested my site using Opera Mini’s simulator and it looks god awful
As of the Javascript message on Yogee.com.au, it appears to be coming from osCommerce’s “AJAX Suggest” module when it tries to create an XMLHttpRequest object (which obviously does not exist on Opera Mini). I gathered most AJAX sites won’t work on mobile devices, but I agree they should provide fallback options instead of prompting “You suck” on end-user’s browser.
I’ll pass the suggestions to Yogee.com.au. Thanks!
Hi everyone,
I apology for that unprofessional message. I have fixed that message to be a proper alert message.
This is the problem where you just copy some open source code from the internet and use it on your own shopping cart without knowing that the initial owner of that script put some doggy alert message.
The original code is come from http://www.oscommerce.com/community/contributions,4144/category,all/search,ajax search
Anyone use this contribution will have the same problem I have.
Best Regards,
Chang
Thanks for discovered this problem. We will definitely look into support mobile platform.
Feedback is always good way of improving our service.
Regards,
Chang
Hi Scott,
thank you for your comment. OzBargain is a great site - and your RSS feed comes through really nicely on Opera Mini (and I was able to find it to subscribe) so no problems there at all
I must admit I haven’t implemented an osCommerce site for a couple of years now - it’s a pity that they took something that worked for everyone and turned it into something that didn’t. That’s progress for you
Thanks for letting the Yogee crew know.
Best regards, Andrew
Hi Chang,
thank you for your comment. I should have contacted you directly, but it was such an astonishing story that I couldn’t resist blogging about it. Good luck with the reworking, and please let me know if you want an opinion when it’s completed - I am nothing if not opinionated
Best regards, Andrew
Hi Andrew,
No worry, I’m getting a free link anyway.
I have fixed that alert message. Could you give it a go and let me know you not seeing any “S***” message anymore?
Regards,
Chang
Hi Chang,
thank you for your comment.
The new error message is very polite and well considered, thank you
Best regards, Andrew
[…] was a bit harsh in my criticism of Yogee.com.au. Chang from Yogee admin got in touch and told me that they were working on […]
Kudos for Yogee coming on board and dealing with it with some class, being open about it - many other companies would come out guns blazing and casue more havoc by getting pissy.
This is how you deal with PR issues in this day and age - engage with the community.
Good to see.
Hi Martin,
thank you for your comment.
Yes, it was the best possible response - responsive, accurate, timely, appropriate.
Thanks, Andrew