Need input from the crowd here...
 

Hi folks. We're in the process of updating both the Porsche and BMW home pages. I've decided to alter the BMW home page first, and use it as a sort of working, test bed for our new site look.

Please take a look at the new site format and let me know what you think:

http://www.pelicanparts.com/bmw/index.htm

The format for the home page is unsurprisingly familiar - it follows the format for DriveWerks, which we spent many hours developing and tweaking. In addition, it keeps a uniform look and feel across the DriveWerks/BMW/Porsche sites.

Thanks in advance for your opinion!

-Wayne

Very nice. The UI makes sense and is easy enough to get around.

Plus it actually displays perfectly fine in Mozilla/Firefox browsers.

Looks good!

Nice work, very graphic.

Wayne,

Good work, I like it. And it is nice to have a similar look and feel across the board!

Jakes

Looks good. The only comment would be that the the silver BMW's do not show well against the white background

Looks good, but won't scale down to an 800 X 600 screen without some horizontal scroll. Last stats I saw showed that most people were using 800 X 600, with 1024 X 768 gaining.
More substantial problems in Netscape. Not holding font faces, link problems... Netscape sucks.

Looks good.

I like it, make things a little easier to find stuff like your new radar detector.

Nice Wayne...
No hassle, easy to navigate, simple and pleasing.


Bob
73.5T

Don't know if it's my screen, but could you format it so one does not have to scroll left and right to read the entire screen?

Working off a laptop so I don't think that I can change the screen resolution to a greater resolution in order to place more info on the screen.

In terms of navigation, I don't like having to select a sub model / year. Preformance Products (just looking at the comp) has this set up and I hated using it. It seems to make it difficult to look for items that I'm wanting to upgrade that were never originally available for my car - ie 2.7 RS P&C, S Caliper stuff, etc

The division between -73 and then 74+ seems to work really well IMO

Regards,
Andrew M

I hate it when pages don't fit the screen. I even hate it when pics are too large in a post and you can't read a paragraph w/o scrolling back and forth. To me, that is the number goal of web page design, fit the page. Not that I know how to do that or anything.

Wayne, when you get done tweaking your site this time, would you get down to the garage and get that 914/6 project going? Or sell it to me. :D :eek:

Good look Wayne, looks and runs consistent with the Porsche side of the site.

Thumbs up!

I'm feeling it!!

i like it. maybe off topic, but i rely on the tech articles alot. is there a way to index it? i miss alot of stuff doing the scrolling method. maybe put all the topics on one page so we can link to each article? it will get increasingly more difficult when there are more articles.

thanks

cliff

KIS.
 

Keep It Simple, Looks Good!

Looks good

Am i in Amazon.com?????? I mean, its so generic that we could replace car parts pictures with cooking articles and no one would see the difference. I know you are a store (kindof) but couldnt you keep it more car (Porsche) oriented visually?

I can hear those image-free-fans yelling at me. But with the high speed modem we got and good compression parameters, one can do a visually interesting web site but not too heavy in the kb department.

I am a graphic designer and frankly quite depressed by all of those generic-looking web site. Arent we driving the most visually pleasing cars of the world????

This said, i wont boycott cause the site is invaluable and has no equivalent. And kudos for the work youre doing.

Only my opinion.

Although I haven't seen current stats, I really think that 1024x768 is the new "standard" for almost everyone. It's nearly impossible to get that to look right on 800x600 (DriveWerks works, but the BMW car images don't compress in the center).

Thanks!

-Wayne

YES! As part of our new search engine, the tech articles will be indexed. Unfortunately, I have to individually convert each of the old pages to the new format, so it's slow going. But in a few months, 100% of the pages on Pelican (incl all tech articles) should be indexed in the search engine.

We're kindof in a transition state right now with elements of old and new mixed together...

-Wayne

This has been the number one comment from my employees, who want to "jazz" things up quite a bit. I'm open to changes, but we also have to remember a few things. This is an eCommerce site with the main purpose of conversion (people coming to the site - getting them to buy things). I need to make it easy to find products, and easy to buy them. The tabs at the top are very simple, universal, and work quite well in my opinion. Saying that it looks like Amazon isn't necessarily a bad thing in my mind - I think that design element works very well across many sites, plus many, many, many people are used to it and know how it works (important). Due to the sharing of products and pages from DW (technical limitations), I think the tabs at the top are here to stay...

That said, we're going to be looking at ways to spice up the center section just a bit - suggestions are indeed welcome...

Thanks again!

-Wayne

I Like It, says mikey!

800x600 ? maybe in afrika they still have that as a majority

agree, 43% is lower than 1024x768

2004 Higher 1024x768 800x600 640x480 Lower
January 10% 47% 37% 1% 5%
2003
October 9% 45% 40% 2% 4%
July 8% 43% 44% 2% 5%
April 7% 41% 46% 2% 4%
January 6% 40% 47% 2% 5%
2002
October 6% 38% 49% 2% 5%

On the homepage you say the jack is made in Netherlands, then inside it says Denmark. Are you trying to mislead buyers who are country-shoppers?

Nice UI, easier to spot the highlights (the board) than the current PP site.

I understand the desire for a p-car/non-generic web site, but think you're headed in a fine direction!

Cheers!

C.

Hmm, at the risk of showing my ignorance, isn't Denmark in the Netherlands? Maybe I need to bone up on my geography...

-Wayne

That's bad... the countries are hard to confuse. However, sometimes the whole Dutch and Danes can be mixed up when not paying attention.

lol

yeah Wayne, and Nebraska is a city in SoCal

:D:D:D

The Amazon look/feel/essence is perfect for this site. I want to go to an e-commerce site, look up a product and BUY it. I don't want to be putzing around trying to figure out the UI and have to play games with the system.

In my opinion, forget all that snazzy stuff. Focus on the money, focus on keeping it easy for a buyer to look for a part and pay for it. This is one of the major reasons I keep buying from Amazon. Oh, and I only buy my Porsche stuff here (or locally at a brick n' mortar shop).