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ModYourCar.com.au - heaps more changes...


MYC267

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okay thats fair enough.. i like the idea of the search by make/model on the front page.. but the advanced search doesnt seem to have a make/model/engine relationship... ie you search through all engines rather than just the one for your car...

 

did you not want this? just a question.. not a dig..

 

It is like this because it allows people to search for engine specific products. A lot of people to engine conversions so they end up with a hybrid car. :)

Dan

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It is like this because it allows people to search for engine specific products. A lot of people to engine conversions so they end up with a hybrid car. :)

 

nah thats a cop out answer :D i run a car owners club and are heavily into the jap car scene... and i cant think of any reason to have all engines and models listed when trying to track down a part...

 

you just havent been able to implement the relationships have you.. be honest.... :P

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Adiwillow is partially right. The relationship you set up is not perfect, but I perform swaps and it would be nice to look up parts based on the engine...for example I want in one easy fashion to look up all the RB25 internals.

 

Listing by models is nice, but still involves too much flipping if you have a huge catalog. Ideally the best solution entails narrowing down by year, make, model, body style and trim/engine all at once and including or excluding all the universal parts. It works great for me, but its a real pain in the @ss to upload parts even though I'm using EP. Gets way too complicated that way.

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Adiwillow is partially right. The relationship you set up is not perfect, but I perform swaps and it would be nice to look up parts based on the engine...for example I want in one easy fashion to look up all the RB25 internals.

 

Listing by models is nice, but still involves too much flipping if you have a huge catalog. Ideally the best solution entails narrowing down by year, make, model, body style and trim/engine all at once and including or excluding all the universal parts. It works great for me, but its a real pain in the @ss to upload parts even though I'm using EP. Gets way too complicated that way.

 

while adding body trim and engines to the search might seem like the ultimate, I am sure the ROI is not there. There is way too much work getting all the relationships straight and at the end of the day there is no guarantee this would get you more sales. and isn't getting more sales why we do this? not the "coolness" factor?

 

you would be better off writing code that when a customer selects a year/make/model to present the results by category than the default way osc presents the results. this is the way I wrote the vehicle search engine for my store and it works great. if for example the customer selects a 2003 Chevy Tahoe, instead of dumping 300 products for that vehicle onto the screen, I present the customer with the two top levels of categories for those products (ex. performance->intakes). The customer can then select the category they are shopping for. Most vehicles for any given year only have a handfull of different engines and is not difficult for the customer to find exactly what they are looking for.

 

I'm all in favor of adding new features to a store but you should try and figure out if your will ever see a return on the investment of time you put into writing that code and the ongoing maintenance everytime you upload a manufacturers catalog.

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I wrote mine the way it is for a reason.... some parts have nohing to do with the type of car and are soley engine related. Engine internals for example...

 

I actually wrote it this way intentionally it wasnt because I can't do the relationships.... in fact the year/make/model/engine relationship is there the way I have implemented it you just dont really see how it works from looking at the site.

 

I can associate complete year/make/model and engine to a particular product or just the model or just the engine.

 

Agreed you have to look at ROI on these things but for an auto shop I think a decent car search is imperative.

 

AXM you right... with my implementaion people can search for RB25 parts and it will show them all the parts for the RB25 etc... or they can select R33 GTS-T Skyline and those parts and others will come up.

Dan

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Agreed you have to look at ROI on these things but for an auto shop I think a decent car search is imperative.

 

My ROI comment was not directed at you or searching by vehicle... it was directed at adding body trim and engine to the search....as you pointed out many parts do not have anything to do with the engine or trim. while some parts do, you can easily take of that by using vehicle qualifiers in your product description pages.

 

I totallly get the value of vehicle search which I wrote one for my store like you did for yours. it's a must in our industry. :thumbsup:

 

BTW, not to take away from your thread, you have one of the few automotive stores built on osc that I believe could give me a run for my money. You do a really great job in a very competitive market. Hope it's paying off for you!

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Yes, I fully understand the ROI concerns. Yes adding more time in your code and inputting of products may or may not increase your ROI. But for me this was only extra time to create the code and I did lose some hair over it but after all it worked and I love the results. Its a fixed cost now. It took me X numbers of hours to develop and test, so I don't know how I cannot justify the ROI.

 

When adding/updating parts it takes only a second or two more trouble, so yes I'd definately have to say its worth it. The most time I find spending myself inputting is for SEO purposes which I'm sure we'll all agree is beneficial.

 

I guess it mainly comes down to how many parts and brands you have in your catalog. For example, I've only put in AEM and AXXIS Ultimate brake pads so far and if you just select 98 Integra you'll see 8 products fit. But if you select 98 Integra GS-R, you'll see only only 4 products that fit since Integra Type-R parts don't fit. So if I have 12 brands of brake pads you'll either see 48 products (of which in this circumstance 24 fit and 24 don't); or you'll see only the 24 that do.

 

Plus imagine it from a phone order perspective. "Hey what intake systems do you have for the WRX STi?" In seconds with one single page I can read them all the products available that exactly fit as well as prices. I'm not having to flip and flip through pages of parts that may or may not fit.

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Yes it is... we are doing very well! Give you a run for your money? What site is yours? Where is it based?

 

We are based on Southern California...actually have a couple of customers in Australia that have done a few right hand conversions on some US trucks they imported.....

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Yes, I fully understand the ROI concerns. Yes adding more time in your code and inputting of products may or may not increase your ROI. But for me this was only extra time to create the code and I did lose some hair over it but after all it worked and I love the results. Its a fixed cost now. It took me X numbers of hours to develop and test, so I don't know how I cannot justify the ROI.

 

When adding/updating parts it takes only a second or two more trouble, so yes I'd definately have to say its worth it. The most time I find spending myself inputting is for SEO purposes which I'm sure we'll all agree is beneficial.

 

I guess it mainly comes down to how many parts and brands you have in your catalog. For example, I've only put in AEM and AXXIS Ultimate brake pads so far and if you just select 98 Integra you'll see 8 products fit. But if you select 98 Integra GS-R, you'll see only only 4 products that fit since Integra Type-R parts don't fit. So if I have 12 brands of brake pads you'll either see 48 products (of which in this circumstance 24 fit and 24 don't); or you'll see only the 24 that do.

 

Plus imagine it from a phone order perspective. "Hey what intake systems do you have for the WRX STi?" In seconds with one single page I can read them all the products available that exactly fit as well as prices. I'm not having to flip and flip through pages of parts that may or may not fit.

 

I hear you on that...many product lines have many vehicle qualifiers.... I guess I chose a less sexy way of dealing with it. Instead of building it into the vehicle search feature, I simply added a few fields to the products tables reserved for these qualifiers. when a customer views a product, I display these qualifiers along with the product.

 

in our business its absolutely necesarry to display this information. I guess how we go about it is a personal preference uh?

 

B)

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I've both cruised through your guy's sites (LilDevil and ModYourcar) and both are very good implementations of an OSC-based automotive site. And your guys' vehicle handling works great for both of you guys. :thumbsup:

 

Yes with the complexity of our products, we need to "dummy" proof our sites as much as possible. I'd rather have it take a couple minutes longer to add a part than to have a customer complaining that we didn't send them the right part because they made the wrong selection cause it was "too confusing".

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  • 2 weeks later...

I guess with my implementation is it works well, and its not a massive over head and it makes it easy for the customers. They can select there car and in an instant see all the parts specifically for their car. I get praise from our customers about the feature.

 

My customers dont find it confusing and they all seem to find what they need. It does make it hard with so may parts because you find that parts get "burried". This feature helps bring them out which is what I like.

Dan

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