ToysRUs on eBay.com - But it Looks Crap

This is quite an old article now. I have considered removing it and I have edited it slightly since. However I decided that it would be better to leave this and the other articles on the site, as with anything, experience is only learnt through fire, this was one of those times where I could have done better and approached the subject more tactfully.

I’m leaving it, as it shows I’m just a mere mortal, like us all.

Original Article

Was just catching up with the Google reader over a cuppa and spot an interesting post from AuctionBytes that ToysRUs have launched on to eBay.com, you can read the article here.

Superb, another massive name hits eBay. Now this is where I’m going to go off the rails a little and point out that wtf is this crap template?

Now for those who don’t know Fooition basically left a load of their customers in the brown when eBay changed its shops format (was it twice? pretty sure it was) so I have never been a raving fan of the company. Their designs have always been front page only, although their more decent versions have got a lot better. Even still this is a company that has been around enough and are fully in-bed with Channel Advisor.

But surely between the pair of them (CA & Froo) they could have come up with something that doesn’t look so, whats the best word[?], basic, primitive, crap?

Look here:
http://www.toysrus.co.uk/Toys-R-Us/Toys/Role-Play/Little-Tikes-Side-By-Side-Kitchen(0078942)

And here:
http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=4319472&ab=Tru_homepage_aspot:leftnav:Dollhouse

I really hope this is just a beta or mock up version, otherwise this will be another amateur set up.

You think You Could Do Better Matt?

Yep and I’ll tell you for free. Its easy get the designer to copy the corporate brand and port it to eBay, this is not hard and when done properly can be done superbly well. If it does not look very, very like http://www.toysrus.com/ or http://www.toysrus.co.uk/ then it needs work.

Drop menus can be done (there is a post on this in a few days on the first eBay store that has this), the flash elements are easy and get rid of that right bar, product product product.

Note

I do try to be an advocate for the majority of the time. Frootion have some great designs, like I said they have got better (recently), While not a huge fan of Channel Advisor (due to history pre-Marketworks buy out), it has its place and I do admire its PR machine. But come on, it admit it, the listing looks crap and if you were ToysRUs would you be happy with it? I know I would not be.

Rant over, coffee finished.

Update

I put together the following article called ToysRus – Putting My Photoshop Skills Where My Mouth Is – The New Listing Template which summarize suggested changes. The template works, but it frankly sucks.

In hindsight (that beautiful maiden) , I should have perhaps joined all posts regarding ToysRus into one mammoth article. However, you can read all of them in this search:
http://lastdropofink.co.uk/?s=toysrus