Couple o' quick thoughts
First, I know that user feedback will eventually help fill this niche, but until then, it would be nice for the site to give it’s own subjective advice on which products to buy—a Carrot Project seal of approval or something. I know that some of the awards might not mean much or are duplicative, and, as a result, I know that just counting awards isn’t going to guarantee a crunchy product. However, I don’t have time to research all the individual awards myself. Some sort of recommendations by the site itself might make it more likely that users go with a crunchy product rather than being overwhelmed with crunchiness data points.
Second, it would be cool to see the site incorporate quality rankings, price information, and whatever else consumers might want to know before making a purchase. I know that’s not your main concern, but it would make the site much more useful to consumers if they could survey all the factors relevant to their purchasing decisions in one place. This too might make it more likely consumers would incorporate a crunchiness factor into their decision-making processes.
You’ve probably thought of these things already, but I thought I’d mention them. The site looks great. Keep it up y’all.
Comments
Jake
Dec. 4, 2008
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I like that first idea a lot Luke. And I’m thinking now of a bunch of ways of getting that info on the site and in the right places. I’m going to email the team now, collect their thoughts on it, and see if I can’t at least put a little page together with our opinions (as non-experts that have been thinking about this quite a bit over the past few years).
As for incorporating quality and price info, I think you are absolutely right that consumers would be more likely to “incorporate a crunchiness factor into their decision-making processes” if they could consider all factors in one place.
The plan at the moment is to focus on crunchiness, make our information easily available to the folks that compare price and quality, and try to convince them to bake us in with their opinions. It’s certainly not a set in stone plan, however, and exactly how we proceed down that road will have lots to do with what you guys want us to do and what we learn when we get serious about understanding the price and quality comparison engines out there and how they work and whether the people behind them are interested in crunchiness.
Thanks so much for the thoughts. Keep them coming as you have them.
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Luke Garrett
Dec. 5, 2008
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You’re welcome. As someone who finds himself trending libertarian and looking for market-based solutions to society’s pressing problems, I love what y’all are doing. I also love the word “crunchy” as shorthand for all the things you’re concerned about.
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Jake
Dec. 8, 2008
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It’ll be fun to see where crunchy goes. It’s silly, but I think the silliness is good.
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