My pet hate with websites/stores/dealers

[Hardtail1969]

Being in IT, and not unfamiliar with web designs etc, i find the amount of suppliers who have the annoying habit of keeping their product listing pages updated with those "sold out" markers.

To me, as a shopper, i don't want to see a list of products that you have "sold out" on.

I am there to buy, so show me what you have, not what you don't.

It saves me time, and I dont have to browse through 6 pages of was 699. now 399, or was 999. now sold out.

just one page of the items you do stock would be nice.

Think about it, if you went to pick n pay, how would you shop, if all the shelves were covered in "sold out" stickers...

 

[shaunnadan]

And such is the woe of online shopping.... It's not just the vape industry buddy, most online stores have a similar case

Just incase your wondering why don't they remove the item completely, it's due to the added admin.

99% of online stores use a payment gateway like vend or shopify. You create stock items and edit it with the items particulars. if setup correctly then online and instore sales will update across the site to reflect real stock values.

Once the stock is close to or sold out a vendor needs to just top up the quantities when a new shipment of stock arrives.

It would be a big headache for vendors to remove and recreate stock items each time especially if you have a smaller online vendor package and have a limited amount of available stock items (you buy vend space on your own store)

Personally I prefer it the current way. I get to see that a vendor does stock a particular item I'm interested in and can contact them to query when stock will be arriving.

 

[SAVapeGear]

SEO on items also help to get customers to your site.If you remove everything from your site you wont get hits on your site through google SEO.

 

[Papa_Lazarou]

Additionally, many of the sold out items will be back in stock in the near future so they want to let you know that they do sell the item in question. In my country, there are not a tremendous number of online options for vape gear. One of them gets the majority of my business precisely because they do list all the items they carry (whether in stock at the moment or not), but then they have a one click "get notified when back in stock" option.

Perhaps if the sites were coded to sort the content - in stock items first, out of stock but soon to be back items at the end - we'd both be satisfied

Saturday's coming, brother - you'll get your gear. Oh yes you will.

 

[Silver]

Would be cool if you could click - show me whats in stock only
Or show me all including those not in stock at the moment

 

[Papa_Lazarou]

SEO on items also help to get customers to your site.If you remove everything from your site you wont get hits on your site through google SEO.

Ah yes - the black art of SEO. Don't screw with the Jenga tower

 

[Hardtail1969]

Additionally, many of the sold out items will be back in stock in the near future so they want to let you know that they do sell the item in question. In my country, there are not a tremendous number of online options for vape gear. One of them gets the majority of my business precisely because they do list all the items they carry (whether in stock at the moment or not), but then they have a one click "get notified when back in stock" option.

Perhaps if the sites were coded to sort the content - in stock items first, out of stock but soon to be back items at the end - we'd both be satisfied

Saturday's coming, brother - you'll get your gear. Oh yes you will.

Damn right i will!!!

Sent from my D6503 using Tapatalk

 

[Hardtail1969]

Would be cool if you could click - show me whats in stock only
Or show me all including those not in stock at the moment

Exactly. A radio button, just click and one sees the stuff one wants...

Sent from my D6503 using Tapatalk

 

[shaunnadan]

Would be cool if you could click - show me whats in stock only
Or show me all including those not in stock at the moment

You could create a new filter (similar to sorting price low to high)

So when you click on batteries it can sort out by stock on hand first....

I have seen this on shopify

 

[Papa_Lazarou]

Exactly. A radio button, just click and one sees the stuff one wants...

Sent from my D6503 using Tapatalk

With preferences recorded in your profile for returning customers. It would be an additional enticement to register with the vendor. Customize your shopping experience.

 

[Duffie12]

A couple of times I've asked if or when a sold out item would be available again. If it wasn't listed as sold out I wouldn't know that the vendor could still get it for me. Nonetheless, it would help if sold out items only listed after in stock items so you can see everything they have before seeing the out of stock or coming soon items.

 

[Neal]

Fully agree with points raised, my personal hate is ordering something that is listed as in stock, only to find the item actually is not in stock.

 

[Waine]

In my opinion, from a business perspective, vendors who have numerous items listed as "Sold out" leave the items on stock to show potential buyers that the item moved fast, or was a good seller. This creates the impression in the buyers mind that the sold out item is a product high in demand and therefore increases their interest to consider buying it the next time the item is available for sale.

What I like about the @Sirvape website is that they update their site almost daily. If items are re stocked they take the "sold out" label off.

 

[Stosta]

I'm happy it being listed as "Sold Out", that way I know it is available from there in the future. One vendor who is not particularly active on this forum lists items as "Sold Out", and when I ask about an ETA and get told they won't be getting any more in, but the item is still up... That's irritating!

 

[Gizmo]

We keep products listed still showing sold out if they will be available again in the short future.. All our out of stock products have a "Notify me when in stock" button where you input your email and get informed immediatly on the arrival of the product again. So for us it has a purpose and keeps customers informed.

If a product is End of Life to us it will not show on our product list.

 

[Silver]

Have moved this thread to "Who has stock"

 

[Stosta]

We keep products listed still showing sold out if they will be available again in the short future.. All our out of stock products have a "Notify me when in stock" button where you input your email and get informed immediatly on the arrival of the product again. So for us it has a purpose and keeps customers informed.

If a product is End of Life to us it will not show on our product list.

And that's why we heart you!

 

[vaporize.co.za]

Awesome feedback .. thanks! I have added a Discontinued status for products that we are unlikely to get again .. Products that now show Out Of Stock we either have on back order or have already ordered from our suppliers and its coming soon. Hope this makes things a bit easier to shop on Vaporize.co.za

 

[Cespian]

There exists a site where all hardware is listed as "On-Sale"... I dont give a hoot because their prices are great, but if everything is on sale, nothing is on sale

 

[vaporize.co.za]

Awesome feedback .. thanks! I have added a Discontinued status for products that we are unlikely to get again .. Products that now show Out Of Stock we either have on back order or have already ordered from our suppliers and its coming soon. Hope this makes things a bit easier to shop on Vaporize.co.za

Also check out these two pages ..

http://vaporize.co.za/coming-soon/
http://vaporize.co.za/just-arrived/

Coming Soon This is the Backorders page.. Products that will be re-ordered in the near future or new products already on its way from our suppliers. Some of these products we might have stocked but they sold out and will be re-ordered, others will be new and first time we stock them. All of these products are available to you on Backorder.. (Please check with me first for ETA)

Just Arrived This page has all the New Stuff we got in the last few months and still have In stock ready to ship.

 

[Rob Fisher]

I don't mind the out of stock so much... the thing that gets me is if a website doesn't have a "What's new" button. No what's new or just arrived button and I'm out of there... I don't want to have to search all over the site looking to see what new...

 

[KB_314]

I've seen sort options where you can sort by stock - if that could be added in addition to the usual price/date options it would be good

Edit : but if vendors know they will never be re-ordering something, get it off the website!