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need to be able to search companies on each page
you have two boxes: one for searching topics and one for asking a question. but the topics search only searches for topics on the company you are already on. would be better if this topic search was below the company and the search at the top was for searching different companies
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The best point from everyone
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I want the box at the top to search the companies themselves. I am on the company page for PayPal and now want to go to the company page for T-Mobile. I shouldn't have to navigate to some other page to "swtich" companies. I should be able to type "T-Mobile" in a top search box to go directly to the T-Mobile page without first going to the "companies" page and then searching, blah blah.
I understand that you can't search for topics/posts/questions ACROSS multiple companies, and I don't see this as a problem. I don't care about that. The fact that I cannot quickly get from one company to another is a major design flaw, though.
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this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?We've talked about the scope of search several times internally, and while I can't remember if there was an official decision made, I can give you my opinion on the issue.
The goal for the search system was that it had to operate as if the user was typing the subject for an email to send to a company they needed support from. We overloaded the box, intercept what you were going to ask and give you some alternatives that might remove the need for you to post.
Traditional search doesn't work that way, and I'm not a very smart guy. I would have no hope building a working natural language search system like Powerset or similar. I can, however, cheat my way into making people think the search works. It does because of specific restrictions we put on the system.
One such restriction was the size of available documents in the index. By keeping the index small I was able to make the search feel right. We can achieve this by segregating the search system on companies lines.
That is the technical reason, but there is a design reason also. I remember one conversation in the past when the system didn't have the top right search box; The assertion made was that if we don't have a search box in the top right we will get endlessly inundated with people telling us we have to have a search box in the top right, that the system is useless without it. That's what the system got, a search box in the top right for the people who expect one to be there. It's not a decision I agree with, but I'm just a coder.
So, back on subject. We've established that the search is restricted to the company-level for technical reasons. There are some factors that make this decision less... damning.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Google is better at search than I will ever be. I don't even have the slightest desire to compete. What we do do is SEO; We've spent much effort optimizing our system for search engines, with the help of some good friends. Maybe I'll make a grease monkey script that replaces our search box with a "site:" search box from google.
99 out of a 100 times its easy to determine the company that makes a product. It's pretty easy in our system to find companies.
I can honestly say though, that in the 9 months we've been building this thing, I've used that top search box *zero* times, and have rarely wanted a global search. Who knows if that will hold true as the way I use the system changes. -
Inappropriate?I want the box at the top to search the companies themselves. I am on the company page for PayPal and now want to go to the company page for T-Mobile. I shouldn't have to navigate to some other page to "swtich" companies. I should be able to type "T-Mobile" in a top search box to go directly to the T-Mobile page without first going to the "companies" page and then searching, blah blah.
I understand that you can't search for topics/posts/questions ACROSS multiple companies, and I don't see this as a problem. I don't care about that. The fact that I cannot quickly get from one company to another is a major design flaw, though.
I’m disappointed
3 people think
this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?This is a great point, Nick. This is a system that has been and will continue to be designed iteratively. Particularly now, in this early stage, we're sure to get some things wrong and feedback like yours is really helpful to get things righted quickly. You can be sure we'll be discussing this point tomorrow.
I’m thankful for our constructive critics
2 people think
this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?nick,
Thanks for the input! I agree with you.
I do however question the frequency that people will be jumping around using search from company to company in the grand scheme of things. People will be building up the list of companies that they care about, and at that point, having the ability to search for companies on every page is nearly useless. That real estate can be better spent on something more frequently needed.
I'd like to hear more of your thoughts on the subject -
Inappropriate?It goes without saying that the feature that Scott refers to ("building up the list of companies that they care about") is not part of the current release. In short, we have some features coming that will change the nature of this conversation.
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Inappropriate?the easier you make it for users to quickly find and comment on their favorite and least favorite companies, the more usage you will have of the app which is why i recommended having company search right on every page. i see coming back to this on a regular basis and quickly searching for a company to see if the company has responded, even if they are already in my list. the more i think about this, there might be a better way.
Why not list on the left side navigation all the companies in my profile ordered by how i've ranked them in wesabe-like terms (fan, captive, etc). with this you give me navigation AND a reason to complete my profile with all the companies that define me (self-expression).
then mark next to those the # of new replies from the company, as well as replies from the satisfaction community so i can see where there was action on the companies i care about.
If i rant or give a helpful comment to a company, and other people in the community can "agree" (getsatisfaction.com=digg for ideas for companies) and the company responds on this site, that is very cool and a reason for me to come back on a regular basis to the site. What is happening right here on this post is awesome- a customer is giving feedback and bantering directly with a team. Consumers will do that all the time if they think someone will actually listen to them. If big companies like United Airlines start responding here and actually taking the advice that the crowd votes are good ideas or at least relevant, that will be great reasons to come back and see not only for my posts but for others posts. can the US Government be a "company" on getsatisfaction. i'm sure we all have some ideas for how they can improve!
another idea for helping navigation between companies: how about a facebook-like newsfeed on the home page when i login with relevant activity on the site: actions by my friends or responses by companies that i have in my profile. "Joe has an idea for United Airlines" "Bob is a fan of Starbucks" "Bill has a question for Target", etc. "37 people agree with Jenn's idea for McDonalds". Gives me a reason to upload my address list-which helps you get viral.
in fact this would be a killer facebook app. it is like the "Causes" app but not just for raising money-for giving feedback. (tagline: GetSatisfaction: Where everyone can be Ralph Nader!). Anonymous posts on feedback sites are always dangerous-it can morph into just a bunch of rants- having the facebook reputation may keep it more balanced.
another idea: how about allowing while i'm posting a message to put in email addresses of relevant people that i want to see this post. I know the first round capital guys and the OATV guys and it would be fun to be able to add their emails here and get them in on this conversation. another benefit of doing this on facebook since all of those guys are already in my friends list.
If this was a facebook app, i'd click on your profile and send you a message right now asking you how do you guys plan to make money and when you will be doing your next round. *8-)
Great stuff guys. -
Inappropriate?Great thoughts all!
First off I totally agree with the need to easily jump around the system and between companies. The search box in the upper right is a bit crippled at the moment because it got tossed in and then wasn't given the proper amount of love and attention. We've been talking about making it a multi-use search box. You should be able to search for just companies in the system OR just products & services, as well as just a general topic search based on key words. Perhaps a bit like flickr's multifaceted search.
Thanks for chiming in.
2 people think
this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?"Why not list on the left side navigation all the companies in my profile ordered by how i've ranked them in wesabe-like terms (fan, captive, etc). with this you give me navigation AND a reason to complete my profile with all the companies that define me (self-expression).
then mark next to those the # of new replies from the company, as well as replies from the satisfaction community so i can see where there was action on the companies i care about."
Great Stuff! I especially like seeing the company responses broken out. Let that number be a link to a view that gives them the companies activity in the site. Show the people that want company interaction where to get it.
"If i rant or give a helpful comment to a company, and other people in the community can "agree" (getsatisfaction.com=digg for ideas for companies) and the company responds on this site, that is very cool and a reason for me to come back on a regular basis to the site."
We've talked on here about this several times, and our team has unanimously agreed this type of feature is indeed needed in the system. In fact, Cam and I originally built the system this way. there's another discussion about this here: http://getsatisfaction.com/satisfacti...
"another idea: how about allowing while i'm posting a message to put in email addresses of relevant people that i want to see this post. I know the first round capital guys and the OATV guys and it would be fun to be able to add their emails here and get them in on this conversation. another benefit of doing this on facebook since all of those guys are already in my friends list."
This right shows a failing of our system. This feature exists.
However, we do realize that noticeability of that bar needs help.
"If this was a facebook app, i'd click on your profile and send you a message right now asking you how do you guys plan to make money and when you will be doing your next round"
Private messaging is on the way :)
I’m enjoying having smarter people than me around
1 person thinks
this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?I'll toss in some thoughts on the dashboard as well.
It will become your slice of Satisfaction, the place you go to see what's new with the companies, products & services and people you're interested in. There is a lot of usefulness to be had here, but we are thinking carefully about how to keep the management of it as light weight as possible. Here's my current line of thougtht: I use facebook, albeit begrudgingly. It's a great service, and it models a lot of what I need in my social network, but it's not flexible or flowing like my actual relationships. Some relationships last a lifetime and some for just a short time, both are valuable in their own ways. I don't demarcate relationships with a type; circumstance and behavior does that for me. It just happens.
I have these same kinds of relationships with my companies and goods. Here's a scenario: Living in SF, I see Timbuk2 everywhere, I start to fall in love, I get *involved, I buy a bag, I wear it around, I talk about it on Satisfaction. Sometime later I give my bag to my brother (why not, he got my car too!), then I go buy a Chrome bag, I wear it around, I talk about it on Satisfaction. I flow between products and brands like this all the time.
Hopefully Satisfaction keeps up with my activity for me, based on when I get involved. If I take the time to look up a company then I'm obviously interested, I make a comment (or follow a topic, or vote) and I'm obviously *involved. No need to add another step and make an explicit connection, which might someday need to be disconnected explicitly even though I'm no longer obviously involved. Satisfaction has thus far been built on a very flowing model, currency and relevancy keep what's in front of you interesting and engaging. The dashboard could be a collection bin, or it could be a nicely filtered view into the flow just for you.
I’m over facebook.
2 people think
this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?i popped into this topic this morning to catch up and find the discussion has already totally happened! fun. good stuff everybody.
the only thing i'll add is that finding ways to help people move between and get use out of multiple company spaces is a huge priority for us, because we see the value of satisfaction in the way it centers customer service around customers, instead of siloing it within companies. thus, making it easy for people to quickly move around between multiple company spaces (as well as surfacing information from multiple company spaces in contextual and relevant ways) is very very very very very important. so, yeah, we're gonna work on that, for sure.
I’m loving this discussion
2 people think
this is one of the best points
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Inappropriate?we're getting started next week on a new version of search for the top of the page, so before we implement we'll be sure to float a couple of examples to this topic in order to get everybody's feedback!
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Inappropriate?Additionally, the getsatisfaction.com home page should basically be just a big company search box (with a brief explanation about the purpose of the website and such for new users, of course). The homepage as it stands now is pretty much just a fluff page. In fact, it really annoys me that it is so useless.
The page should have a company search box so both customers and employees can find their company quickly. No need to have "get" and "give" buttons, just have search and then AFTER the user finds the company, then they can click on some "Are you an employee? Start giving satisfaction!" link on the company page.
When you are a registered user, the home page should show recent activity regarding your account. Your recent posts, recent replies to your posts, etc. should be visible on the home page, immediately under the most prominent element -- the company search.
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Inappropriate?We completely agree nick.
To be honest the homepage went up very quickly as a placeholder. We're currently working on redesigning it.
Thanks for your great feedback!
I’m also annoyed by its lack of use
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Inappropriate?And here's a recent conversation about this very thing....
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