Marketplace Disastrous Consequences

[Codex Alpha]

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Freya Mokusei wrote:

This has been a good chat. Thanks for understanding my perspective.

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We agree on all your points, these are the points I wanted to make anyway - much like you, I don't have much experience explaining these things to people, especially if they are discouraged when things change and they have unexpected results.

And people wonder why I rail on things like listings having no demo button, repeated product images for each color and style of one product, repeated gacha images to reflect 30-item-sets, the overuse and abuse of keywords (probably unknowingly), etc that all contributes to the MP having cluttered searches.

If I think there is a better way of doing something, I'll suggest it. If someone is gaming the system, I'll point it out.

In the end, I just want everyone to find what they're looking for, and for the MP to work smoothly, but we all must take responsibility for how we use it, access it, and construct our own listings.

[Freya Mokusei]

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entity0x wrote:

And people wonder why I rail on things like listings having no demo button, repeated product images for each color and style of one product, repeated gacha images to reflect 30-item-sets, the overuse and abuse of keywords (probably unknowingly), etc that all contributes to the MP having cluttered searches.

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I like these examples, they're possible to implement without changing the underlying algorithm. And I agree, having the first 12 results cluttered with "X-Long-ProductName \ Creator \ Colour" with only the Colour element changing... is not very readable.

You folks all use Marketplace more than I do, I'd never want to stifle the opportunity to come up with ideas on how to improve Marketplace. As far as I'm concerned it's all possible. My input into this thread was to attempt to explain why it works as it currently works, to better understand why some ideas are more difficult than others. I'm glad you found it useful - it's definitely helped with any approach I take on this subject in future.

[ChinRey]

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entity0x wrote:

And people wonder why I rail on things like listings having no demo button, repeated product images for each color and style of one product, repeated gacha images to reflect 30-item-sets, the overuse and abuse of keywords (probably unknowingly), etc that all contributes to the MP having cluttered searches.

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I think that should be the conclusion here. For all our arguments, the real problem isn't what the search update does, it is what it doesn't do.

Demos listed under main product, versions grouped, expired limited quantity/volume listings automatically unlisted, even a slight improvement in the routines for enforcing the listing guidelines. Each of these changes would have given a much bigger improvement in search, would have been far less controversial and should (without knowing exactly how the MP software is built) be far easier to implement.

So sorry to say this, Commerce Team, but you failed. Whether you did the job wrong isn't really that important because you did the wrong job.

/me sighs

[Pamela Galli]

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ChinRey wrote:

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entity0x wrote:

And people wonder why I rail on things like listings having no demo button, repeated product images for each color and style of one product, repeated gacha images to reflect 30-item-sets, the overuse and abuse of keywords (probably unknowingly), etc that all contributes to the MP having cluttered searches.

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I think that should be the conclusion here. For all our arguments, the real problem isn't what the search update does, it is what it doesn't do.

Demos listed under main product, versions grouped, expired limited quantity/volume listings automatically unlisted, even a slight improvement in the routines for enforcing the listing guidelines. Each of these changes would have given a much bigger improvement in search, would have been far less controversial and should (without knowing exactly how the MP software is built) be far easier to implement.

So sorry to say this, Commerce Team, but you failed. Whether you did the job wrong isn't really that important because you did the wrong job.

/me sighs

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Bingo. We have pleaded, we have begged, we have spelled it all out, year after year. The search algorithm may be borked but that is not all there is to search. I have not looked at new search but it sounds like at least they have given more weight to product names than keywords, and I thought they had filtered out store and creator names from product search but sounds like they reintroduced those. Ugh.

[Trip Hastings]

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Pamela Galli wrote:

and I thought they had filtered out store and creator names from product search but sounds like they reintroduced those. Ugh.

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Is this a thing people complained about having in the search? I can't count the number of times I've looked up a user or store name on MP after trying to work out where what someone is wearing came from.

I guess everybody uses Marketplace differently.

[Pamela Galli]

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Trip Hastings wrote:

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Pamela Galli wrote:

and I thought they had filtered out store and creator names from product search but sounds like they reintroduced those. Ugh.

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Is this a thing people complained about having in the search? I can't count the number of times I've looked up a user or store name on MP after trying to work out where what someone is wearing came from.

I guess everybody uses Marketplace differently.

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There is a separate creator / store search. Including creator and store names in product search is monumentally stupid.

[Trip Hastings]

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Pamela Galli wrote:

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Trip Hastings wrote:

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Pamela Galli wrote:

and I thought they had filtered out store and creator names from product search but sounds like they reintroduced those. Ugh.

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Is this a thing people complained about having in the search? I can't count the number of times I've looked up a user or store name on MP after trying to work out where what someone is wearing came from.

I guess everybody uses Marketplace differently.

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There is a separate creator / store search. Including creator and store names in product search is monumentally stupid.

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Is there? *looks* Huh, there is; there's a tab for it. I've been using this for years and never noticed it/realized what it was. Has it always been there? I would almost swear that it was not.

Well, that IS handy. But it's only "stupid", monumentally or otherwise, if you know it's an option. I hope they continue to work on it to better integrate it into the search experience. Including exact matches (just the top ones if multiples) in the main search results could be a nice touch.

I still don't find it to be particularly harmful to the search results, since there are good use cases for including it as much as there are occasions where it muddles the listings. Perhaps a checkbox filter to enable/disable it?

[Pamela Galli]

Yes, always been there, I use it all the time.  It is right there with the other tabs, so not sure why it would be hard to see.

If you think there is a reason to include House of Shoes store in a product search of "house", then there must be a reason to search for products in creator/ store search, too. 

[Trip Hastings]

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Pamela Galli wrote:

Yes, always been there, I use it all the time.  It is right there with the other tabs, so not sure why it would be hard to see.

If you think there is a reason to include House of Shoes store in a product search of "house", then there must be a reason to search for products in creator/ store search, too. 

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Less "hard to see" and more "ease to not notice". I'm not sure how I missed it all this time, if it's truly always been there. I asked a friend about it and he told me he'd never seen it either until someone pointed it out to him a few weeks ago. But that's a very small sample size.

On your other point, yes, that's certainly a negative case. There are also positives. Hence my suggestion of a toggleable filter. There's plusses and minuses to almost any limitation or lack thereof. It's all about what gives the most useful results.

[Pamela Galli]

I consider the three search tabs all more "easy to notice" and "hard to miss" than otherwise.

So what is an example of it being more useful to find a creator or store in product search than creator and store search? 

[Trip Hastings]

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Pamela Galli wrote:

I consider the three search tabs all more "easy to notice" and "hard to miss" than otherwise.

So what is an example of it being more useful to find a creator or store in product search than creator and store search? 

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Ok, a generalized example:

You are interested in a new avatar created by a store. Let's call the maker "Floogle". You want to see what sort of Floogle avatars there are, and what sort of compatible third-party products exist. The avatars themselves may or may not be labeled as "Floogle". After all, that's the store name. The seller may not have thought it necessary. So it is overall simplest to just search for Floogle and see what comes up. You get both the original avatar product and associated compatible items created by a third party.

Again, a generalized example. Specifics may vary. Your view on how commonplace this might be may differ from mine.

[Perrie Juran]

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Trip Hastings wrote:

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Pamela Galli wrote:

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Trip Hastings wrote:

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Pamela Galli wrote:

and I thought they had filtered out store and creator names from product search but sounds like they reintroduced those. Ugh.

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Is this a thing people complained about having in the search? I can't count the number of times I've looked up a user or store name on MP after trying to work out where what someone is wearing came from.

I guess everybody uses Marketplace differently.

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There is a separate creator / store search. Including creator and store names in product search is monumentally stupid.

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Is there? *looks* Huh, there is; there's a tab for it. I've been using this for years and never noticed it/realized what it was. Has it always been there? I would almost swear that it was not.

Well, that IS handy. But it's only "stupid", monumentally or otherwise, if you know it's an option. I hope they continue to work on it to better integrate it into the search experience. Including exact matches (just the top ones if multiples) in the main search results could be a nice touch.

I still don't find it to be particularly harmful to the search results, since there are good use cases for including it as much as there are occasions where it muddles the listings. Perhaps a checkbox filter to enable/disable it?

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"I've been using this for years and never noticed it/realized what it was."

Not meaning to insult you by this but this highlights a big problem in and with SL:  People not paying attention.  I've been guilty of it at times also.  It can happen to the best of us.

People get in a hurry for self gratification (which kind of is the reason we are in SL ) and don't read the manual.  Or in some cases they are just too dumb do look.  Did they take five minutes to browse through the tabs in the Preferences menu to see what's in it?

Sure I know some things are complex and take time to learn such as scripting.  But the number of ultra basic questions we get asked in the Forum sometimes seems like overkill.  Did the people even notice there is a 'Knowledge Base' tab here and bother to look what's in it?  Time and time again we simply quote from the KB when answering peoples questions though many of us simply give them the link because our attitude is that it's not our job to read for them.  We get chastised as being 'unfriendly' here for that attitude but I don't see for one moment what is wrong with that.  

[Chic Aeon]

I wrote about this topic in another thread earlier in the week or maybe weekend saying that it hasn't affected me. In some ways that was completely true THEN as I did go to the marketplace and check one of my top sellers and it was still on page one.  

 

Today after three days of almost not there sales (honestly the worst day I can remember in YEARS) I went and that item was on about page five. The demo which usually shows up high in the rankings was absent.  I have a couple of theories on this.

 

The folks moving to the top of the listings could be doing a better job with search terms OR they could be manipulating by cleverness (hey, that's why they call them exploits ).

 

Potential customers were not searching for my items by type (surround, camera etc) but were perusing the Marketplace STORE by looking up the company or my avatar name. This would be likely if they liked items they saw in an event venue.

 

In the time before -- when things were still normal from my outlook -- there were venues going on (several actually) where folks could pick up a landmark with store name and then later come by or look on the marketplace.

 

Hence the change POSSIBLY as there are NO venues going on for me right now. It will be interesting to see if things pick up as this month's venues begin. That would be a pretty clear indicator on the effect of the search changes.

 

 

[Trip Hastings]

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Perrie Juran wrote:

"I've been using this for years and never noticed it/realized what it was."

Not meaning to insult you by this but this highlights a big problem in and with SL:  People not paying attention.  I've been guilty of it at times also.  It can happen to the best of us.

People get in a hurry for self gratification (which kind of is the reason we are in SL

) and don't read the manual.  Or in some cases they are just too dumb do look.  Did they take five minutes to browse through the tabs in the Preferences menu to see what's in it?

Sure I know some things are complex and take time to learn such as scripting.  But the number of ultra basic questions we get asked in the Forum sometimes seems like overkill.  Did the people even notice there is a 'Knowledge Base' tab here and bother to look what's in it?  Time and time again we simply quote from the KB when answering peoples questions though many of us simply give them the link because our attitude is that it's not our job to read for them.  We get chastised as being 'unfriendly' here for that attitude but I don't see for one moment what is wrong with that.  

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Was it there all this time? If so, hey, my bad. I never needed it, so I never looked for it. I don't find that to be an unreasonable, or uncommon response. It's just human nature. A little embarrassing, but not shameful. Especially when it comes to SL, where there is just SO MUCH to process.

The problem with a "RTFM!" attitude is that it fails to take into account the many different ways people process information, and their starting levels of familiarity with the systems involved. For instance, some may have no idea what a "Knowledge Base" is and never investigate it as part of their search. Or, they may look and decide they don't know how to ask the right question of it, or where the information might be sorted. They may be approaching things from an entirely different perspective than the framers of the help system, and looking in all the wrong places. Or just have the wrong idea about how things work in the first place. They might find the answer and not understand it. Or, and I am as guilty of this as any, they might just be impatient. That's human nature too. There's a LOT out there to process, after all. Not to say people, even ones asking for help, can't be jerks for no good reason. But hostility and impatience does breed the same.