Another weird question

[Alex Zandra]

Hey!

I feel like I always post the most random questions, BUT my BF and I were wondering if anyone else noticed this:
How come the aesthetic of the website of virtually every vape company either a) looks like it is straight out of the jersey shore or b) looks like it is from the ad section of Consumer Reports or something (lol). You know like the magazine commerce section?

There's a few companies we have recently noticed who have been cultivating a really nice visual image (such as the vaping Rabbit--a really good look, I think. And very tasty). But for the most part everything pretty much looks the same.

I am hoping that this is because these companies are putting more time into making their juice taste good and less time into their design, but part of me can't help being afraid that they put as much time into their juice as their design (very little).

Just a thought.

Our favs right now are vaping Rabbit and Ben Johnson's Awesome Sauce--which doesn't even have a website, just a FB page, so maybe I negated myself here a little bit or something. But seriously, who designs half these websites??? Function over form, I suppose?

 

[bman1977]

I don't know if I should laugh at your Jersey Shore comment or be highly offended. Oh wait your from Brooklyn, Never mind.

 

[Rocketpunk]

I like The Vapor Chef's and Velvet Cloud Vapors websites.

Sent from my KFOT using Tapatalk

 

[Sandron419]

I know what you mean with the jersey shore look. I swung by ruthless vapors site and the first thing I thought was man, these guys look like total douchebags. I'll still order from them probably. Backwoods brew's site is the perfect layout/design for e juice imo

 

[AndriaD]

Hey!

I feel like I always post the most random questions, BUT my BF and I were wondering if anyone else noticed this:
How come the aesthetic of the website of virtually every vape company either a) looks like it is straight out of the jersey shore or b) looks like it is from the ad section of Consumer Reports or something (lol). You know like the magazine commerce section?

There's a few companies we have recently noticed who have been cultivating a really nice visual image (such as the Vaping Rabbit--a really good look, I think. And very tasty). But for the most part everything pretty much looks the same.

I am hoping that this is because these companies are putting more time into making their juice taste good and less time into their design, but part of me can't help being afraid that they put as much time into their juice as their design (very little).

Just a thought.

Our favs right now are Vaping Rabbit and Ben Johnson's Awesome Sauce--which doesn't even have a website, just a FB page, so maybe I negated myself here a little bit or something. But seriously, who designs half these websites??? Function over form, I suppose?

A lot of the reason is because there are some standard "e-commerce" programs, and those standard programs have some standard templates, so unless the company has a dedicated web designer, they're all going to look somewhat similar.

Actually I prefer a bare-bones type of site, because it shows that they're probably not overcharging just so they can pay someone to design their website. Most "regular" people don't really know that much about "graphic design" in general, and certainly not about designing a visual web interface.

Andria

 

[Rickajho]

One of the best - and most boring - web sites is Cignot because the pages and getting at the product load fast. I hate bloated web sites with animated backgrounds, 8 social plug-ins, live chat pop ups, spinning dookickes and flash animations - all just because they can.

 

[AndriaD]

One of the best - and most boring - web sites is Cignot because the pages and getting at the product load fast. I hate bloated web sites with animated backgrounds, 8 social plug-ins, live chat pop ups, spinning dookickes and flash animations - all just because they can.

That's exactly what I mean. People who don't "do internet design" want lots of visual gimcracks, flashy things, etc, not realizing how that affects load times (and annoys their visitors) . One of the first things I had to learn, designing templates, is KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID! Keeping it simple is the hardest thing for some people; keeping it simple yet looking professional and polished, that takes practice.

Andria

 

[Rickajho]

That's exactly what I mean. People who don't "do internet design" want lots of visual gimcracks, flashy things, etc, not realizing how that affects load times (and annoys their visitors) . One of the first things I had to learn, designing templates, is KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID! Keeping it simple is the hardest thing for some people; keeping it simple yet looking professional and polished, that takes practice.

Andria

During the last holidays Mt. Baker decided to add an animated snowfall background to all their pages - that just buried the load times for the site. I got so frustrated with it that I just... gave up and cut my order short. It was so bad that I went out of my way to message them, that if this was the shape of things to come I wouldn't be buying much there any more.

 

[jjk1]

The facebook / instagram only venders are the ones that drive me nuts. If you can’t take a day or two and put up a website and provide information about who you are and what you sell – you are probably making juice in your kitchen sink between .... hits.

 

[AndriaD]

During the last holidays Mt. Baker decided to add an animated snowfall background to all their pages - that just buried the load times for the site. I got so frustrated with it that I just... gave up and cut my order short. It was so bad that I went out of my way to message them, that if this was the shape of things to come I wouldn't be buying much there any more.

I'm not a big fan of MyFreedomSmokes' new site design; it's pretty and all, but a lot less usable than their previous very simple design. I find AJAX loading of a long page's contents annoying in the extreme, because when you click to look at a product, then click "back" to go back to the overall page, you have to wait all over again for everything to load BEFORE the item you clicked on, in order to go forward to whatever's below it. With the old, simple style, everything loaded once, and after that, it's in the user's browser cache, so reloading when you click back is like *blink* and it's loaded.

I'm a FIRM believer in designing sites that *I* would enjoy using, and doing goofy things to the page loading is NOT enjoyable to the user -- I have a 25 m'bit connection, probably a lot faster than a lot of folks', and I still find this kind of crap super-annoying. (because even the fastest internet connection is limited to the speed of the server!)

Andria

 

[Buggainok]

I really don't care about the actual artistic appearance of a seller's website. I just want it to be easy to navigate and find what I want, and work efficiently and quickly. I like it when you can find out what the shipping cost will be without having to enter payment info, too.

 

[AndriaD]

I really don't care about the actual artistic appearance of a seller's website. I just want it to be easy to navigate and find what I want, and work efficiently and quickly. I like it when you can find out what the shipping cost will be without having to enter payment info, too.

I agree, and I think this probably applies to most folks looking to buy something online -- they're not there to appreciate the website's aesthetic appeal, they're there to do some business, and if the aesthetics actually interfere with that, it equals lost sales. Not many will stick around waiting for cutesy effects to load, when they just want to buy something and get it done.

I haven't said a lot about this, because I figure, since I design web interfaces, I'm probably more sensitive to poor design than most would be -- but not knowing WHY something is taking so long to load doesn't make it less annoying, in fact it probably makes it MORE annoying!

Andria

 

[Stosh]

I'm a FIRM believer in designing sites that *I* would enjoy using, and doing goofy things to the page loading is NOT enjoyable to the user -- I have a 25 m'bit connection, probably a lot faster than a lot of folks', and I still find this kind of crap super-annoying. (because even the fastest internet connection is limited to the speed of the server!)

Andria

Isn't that supposed to be kept a secret? .. Always thought so, because so few people are aware.

I'm drawn to the easy to use websites that also have the most detailed write-up about the product and the most pictures that show details and blow-up views. If they can't show the product they are selling or describe it, there are other vendors that can and do.

 

[AndriaD]

Isn't that supposed to be kept a secret? .. Always thought so, because so few people are aware.

I'm drawn to the easy to use websites that also have the most detailed write-up about the product and the most pictures that show details and blow-up views. If they can't show the product they are selling or describe it, there are other vendors that can and do.

I dunno if it's meant to be secret, or what -- I've changed hosts several times, because their database servers were so slow, which has a radical impact on page-loading speed, if the site is database-driven, and most are, nowadays. So apparently not even some HOSTS are aware of the problem.

Andria