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>>>>> Suggestions for next year's Black Friday site & forums? <<<<<


Brad

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We do this every year to give you guys a chance to let us know what you liked about this year's site, what you didn't like, and what you'd like to see changed or added for next year.

 

We take these suggestions very seriously, and many suggestions from last year were incorporated into this year's site (things such as the individual store subforums, allowing you to add notes for each item to your shopping lists, etc...) so let us know what you want to see next year for both the Black Friday site itself, and the forums here.

 

And if you'd rather PM me with your suggestions, that would be fine as well.

 

Thanks :)

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Maybe a few tweeks because Weds & Thurs it was hard to log on from the server being busy.

Yeah, we really had no way of knowing how traffic would be. Last year, Tuesday was the busiest day, so once we made it past Tuesday this year we thought we'd be OK, but we ended up adding two more servers as the week went on.

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It was a job well done. The only thing I had problems with was various links wouldn't work. Stuff that went through fastclicks or whatever it was ended up bringing me to a blank page. I ended up having to right click and copy the link and strip out the referer address so I could go straight to the link. I had several instances like that.
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Guest RealLivePrinces
Maybe having an official price match thread in each of the official stores forum? Since all stores have different policies.
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I like the regional idea...

 

Also, maybe to know when the on line sites will start working? Staples seemed to go off line for a bit, and I could not log into check out the deals at 12:01 EST.

 

Second on the price matching deals, this would be helpful

 

Maybe if there was a way to see each item compared, so you know if the same item is at several places, you know the price?

 

Maybe a link to cnet ratings or something on the different items? Hard to tell from "opinions" but sometimes a deal does not meal quality.

 

YOU guys are great! It would be cool if all the stores we promote would send out an early link for a coupon to the site...like $5 off or something...but post it earlier in the season!

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I really thought the option of having Ross's phone available was AWESOME!!!! I wish I had written it down cause my computer CRASHED on Thanksgiving and I wasn't able to see Walmart's 'secrets' (found out quickly that I didn't miss anything though)

 

maybe have a couple of the moderators available, but list specific days and times/zones

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Price matching deals would be great.

 

What about the ability to forward a forum page to a friend who is not a member? There were several threads that I wanted to share with others who are not members (maybe this functionality is already available & I just didn't find it).

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A comment on regional forums.....

 

I would like to see it structured Northwest, Southwest, Midwest, Southeast, Northeast, New England and Canada. Under each sub forum for a discription you can list the states.

 

I really liked the Gottadeal Hotline and it should start 2 weeks before BF.

 

I agree there should be a subforum for price matching. The price matching postings got out of hand this year and tempers got hot.

 

I liked the store forums and should be back next year.

 

I would like to see a sub forum for news stores. There has alot this year but I guess next year there would be alot more. This sub we can post the story and talk about it. Just an idea.

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I almost called the hotline when the shopping list was down so long. I went away on vacation on Tuesday, having long since configured my list, and took a portable printer so I could print. However, my internet connection was so slooooow that I was never able to. :(

 

Regional forums and review links would be terrific, as well as feature spreadsheets, especially for things like the LCD tvs.

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To save you all the effort of contiuing to suggest it, we are not going to have regional threads/subforums. It just ins't practical as people are spread out over large areas which would make such a thing useless without having hundreds of individual subforums/threads, and we are not going to do that to our admins and mods as it would require a lot of work to keep everything organized.

 

But keep the other suggestions coming :)

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It was a job well done. The only thing I had problems with was various links wouldn't work. Stuff that went through fastclicks or whatever it was ended up bringing me to a blank page. I ended up having to right click and copy the link and strip out the referer address so I could go straight to the link. I had several instances like that.

Have to agree with that....the links in a lot of cases refused to load for me, too. Had to do the exact same thing and strip out the referrer link to get the link to load the correct page.

 

Other than that, your site was excellent!!! Cannot thank all of you for all your great and tireless work during this season and year. Thank you!!

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something along the price comparison line:

 

sample:

 

XXXXXX Walmart $XX.XX

XXpicXX Circuit City $XX.XX

XXXofXX Best Buy $XX.XX

XXitemX Local Store $XX.XX

XXXXXX Target $XX.XX

 

You could just list the lowest <5 store prices of the popular items...or the bigger doorbusters. I dont know...

 

 

Maybe adding customer service numbers to the stores (but i guess we can get that on their websites)...but to have a mini info part on the store forum might be benefital (hyperlinks to #s, store locators, ads, etc....)

 

im still thinking...

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I think there should be an official "What time do you get in line/When should I get in line" thread for each of the Big Box Stores, or at least for Circuit City and Best Buy. I know as a BF Mod, I had to collapse or close countless threads about "When should I get in line". If there was an official thread, right from the get-go, it might help people know that that's where they should be posting...

 

Also, it would be slick if the shopping lists had a quantity column (with a default of "1", of course). Also, if the shopping list could provide a subtotal per store and overall of items selected that would be very cool (maybe even pre- and after-rebate). I know, I know, I'm asking a lot.... http://s23.photobucket.com/albums/b399/Marcster2005/Smileypad/Non-Smiling/run.gif

 

A lot of people seemed interested in the topic of Shopping Buddies (http://forums.gottadeal.com/showthread.php?t=48982), but in my mind, there has to be a better way to organize the seekers rather than make people sift through all the postings (nationwide). I know that a number of "dating software" scripts are out there (many scripts are free). Maybe one could be adapted for this purpose. People could list their GD username, where they are planning on shopping for BF, and whether they are interested in "a friend to hang out with inline" vs. "someone to shop at other stores for them and then exchange later". The software would be able to bring up the local GDers that meet the criteria.

 

I completely agree with Brad... impatient people would start posting the same question in each regional-forum. http://s23.photobucket.com/albums/b399/Marcster2005/Smileypad/Sad%20Upset/scream.gif

 

Not to mention that you'd have good, legitimate, informative posts "lost" in a region that you don't frequent. For instance, let's say there was sections for Northwest Wal-Marts, Southwest Wal-Marts, Midwest Wal-Marts, Southeast Wal-Marts, Northeast Wal-Marts, New England Wal-Marts and Canadian Wal-Marts. Most of the news is national, not regional... If you were interested in shopping at Wal-Mart for BF, you'd have to frequent ALL of the forums, because you'd never know what tidbits you might miss.

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