Looks like BPL has a simplified and cleaner home page.

Also looks like they have cleaned up the Tabs at the top of the screen.

What do you think and any suggestions that you would have to make it better?

What information would you like to see on the Home Page?

(Note: this is not a discussion about the underlying technology, but simply the lay out of the website and how it can be better/useful).

Pass Suggestions have been:

* Photo of the week....submissions by BPL Members & Non Members

* Question of the Week Column....questions submitted by BPL Members & Non Members

* Gear Profile of the Week...could be short profile on a new or existing product
(This could also be a vendor/manufacture sponsored ad)

* UL Tip of the Week....general tips for "newbie" to make easy changes to save weight


My belief is that the primary purpose of the Home Page is to welcome non members to BPL the world of Lightweight/UL backpacking and to provide them a reason/value to become paying members of BPL.

As such, information presented on the Home Page should be a bit of creative self marketing to quickly grab attention and hold it by providing easy and useful information that is clear and easy to access.

The information on the Home Page should be changed weekly to provide fresh & new information to encourage people to return back the BPL Home Page/Website. The more repeat visits, the more likely someone may be willing to sign up for a Membership.


I like the current setup with the constant rotating image related to the new articles. Movement like that catches the eye and gives the site a sense of action vs. being static.

So what are your ideas and thoughts?

-Tony

its not rocket science

1. find the clickthroughs for each element of the page

2. remove those with minimal clicks, emphasize those with most clicks ... you can also break it down by who clicks (by membership status, time on each page, followthrough clicks after the initial link, where did they come from, etc ...)

3. look at the most travelled/linked to pages on the site ... these may benefit from having a direct link so as to minimize the number of action a user needs to go through to access

4. test yr new setup against the old through a randomized trial to make sure you arent effing up

5. do a multivariate test if you really wanna have fun ..

all the guesswork and "intuition" can mean everything or nothing ... reality is in the data

Edited by bearbreeder on 10/10/2011 12:35:55 MDT.

I'm not one to give unsolicited advice, but the titles of the now two Gear Swap boards are pretty confusing. Consider for a moment that the majority of the users who are going to click on the "Gear Swap: Selling" board are actually going to be clicking on it with the intention of BUYING gear, and the people who post on the "Gear Swap: Buying" board may never find the gear they want to buy unless people who want to SELL their gear check that forum first, and that for both boards, BOTH buying and selling take place with equal frequency.

Just make the old one called the "Gear Swap," same as always, and add a note below it that says "WTB ads go in the new 'Gear Wanted' section." Then name that new board the "Gear Wanted," or "Want to Buy or Trade," or something like that.

Edited by artsandt on 10/10/2011 23:05:02 MDT.

Well, after stopping by to visit the site several times in the last week, I went looking around for this thread because I didn't care for what I saw on the Home page. Anyone looking for the first time may just move on with the lack of content on. When I show up on Tuesdays, there's always new articles to click on and now, well, there's nothing to click on except categories. There's nothing to draw one in. Me, I've been around here for more than five minutes and so didn't give up so easily. But many may do just that because hacking off all of the content that was on the front page has left all us impatient folks with nothing to grab our attention when we land on the site.

BTW - Some good comments above me were made. I just wanted you to know that the page is pretty - but - vacant. Not very exciting for those of us looking for a little more.

Now, I'll think about what could be added for better website navigation and try to get back and contribute.

I'd keep the gear swap in one sub-forum. The actual amount of 'wanted' threads being created seems pretty small and not-deserving of it's own forum. Also, there is synergy in having all of this stuff together, because someone intending to post a FS thread might see a WTB posting and end up just contacting that poster. I doubt very many gear sellers are actually going to regularly browse a 'gear wanted' forum just in case someone is looking for that piece of gear they are selling. It would be far easier for gear sellers to just post up a FS thread instead of perpetually monitoring a WTB forum.

Edited by dandydan on 10/13/2011 16:28:43 MDT.

Now that the WTB section is in it's own category, I really have to go out of the way to see if I can help a brother (or sister) out. I feel that the older approach permitted more transactions.

I'd like to suggest that the articles be sortable by date and author and not just by category. I assume the empty front page is temporary.

At the beginning I thought, "Why take the new articles links off the home page? The listing there might encourage non-members to sign up." However, I've now gotten used to the uncluttered look on the home page.

I would very much like to see a home page link to the most recent articles, though. It's hard to find them when they are sorted by topic and mixed in with the old ones. Or to sit and wait for the slide show to change.

Just put "most recent" or "current" or "newest" in the "articles" line, and link it to a page listing the newest articles.

Edited by hikinggranny on 10/13/2011 16:38:54 MDT.

Looks like the Gear Swap is back to one forum instead of two. Nice!

Also nice to see BPL working on the website.

Hello Tony/BPL,

I'm hoping because you started this thread that you see this post. I'd like to license a few of your photos for a National Geographic book about hiking. Please email me at mstein1000@aol.com. I promise this is legitimate.

Thanks!
Miriam
*************************
http://www.linkedin.com/in/MiriamStein

Miriam -

If you click on Tony's name to the left of his post, you will see his info page, with a link to "send a personal message" to him. He will see that much quicker than relying on this website.

Hope this helps.

Edited by dkramalc on 10/20/2011 14:24:52 MDT.