It's that time of year to clean up the website, maybe try to streamline things. I'm working on a new feature, but I don't know if it will enhance your shopping experience or just slow you down: adding thumbnail images of the covers of each book in the catalog. As of now, I have thumbnails posted for all books in the Missouri section. This is the largest page on the website and, if you are still using dial-up for internet access, it could take a while to load completely. To my way of thinking, it is helpful to have an image of the book's cover, and the thumbnails enhance the overall appearance of the page. But what do you think? Do you agree with me, or do you find waiting for an image-heavy page to load aggravating? Would it be better just to put a link to the image next to each entry in the catalog, or does that defeat the purpose of browsing? An analysis of my web statistics indicates that visitors are more likely to browse than search. I'll send a free Camp Pope Bookshop t-shirt (size large only, sorry) to the first 5 people who respond with constructive criticism.
Clark

I would wholeheartedly support this new feature, as I have often wanted to see images of the book covers. They can give you a hint of the quality of presentation if nothing else. I admit I am a browser more than a searcher and would find cover images helpful. Even though I am still in the dark ages with dialup, I am happy to wait in this instance. If many find this distracting perhaps you could leave a blank box there and interested people could right-click on it and scroll to "show picture". I am not sure if that is what you already propose or if you intended to have a link open a new window for the image. That may be preferable as you could make it full size.

BTW, I was sure hoping more people would write book reviews , especially as you are the only online bookseller I know of that actually generously "pays" for onsite reviews. I spread the word all over the place, and it still looks like only Bruce and I were takers.

Thanks for your thoughts. I tested the Missouri page (with 107 thumbnails) on a computer connected via a 56k dialup modem. The text came up within 20 seconds; all of the thumbnails loaded within 2 minutes, 10 seconds. It's a while to wait, but the only alternative would be to break the page up into sections, which to me wouldn't enhance browsing, but rather make it more aggravating. I think it will be ok.
Yes, it's too bad more people weren't willing to submit reviews. I would welcome more.
Enjoy the shirt.
Clark

I got similar results with my pitifully slow earthlink connection (28k) from my 56k modem. The text comes up at 30 seconds and the cover pictures are all loaded at 3 min. 10 secs. I think the key is to at least have the text come up relatively fast. If you're browsing from the top, the pictures will all be loaded by the time you reach them so that is less important, IMO. 20 seconds isn't bad. maybe you could provide a warning on the homepage to expect short delays when loading the catalog pages with dialup. I agree that further breaking up the catalog into smaller sections would create more aggravation than help. Thanks for looking to continually improve your website.

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Replying to:

Thanks for your thoughts. I tested the Missouri page (with 107 thumbnails) on a computer connected via a 56k dialup modem. The text came up within 20 seconds; all of the thumbnails loaded within 2 minutes, 10 seconds. It's a while to wait, but the only alternative would be to break the page up into sections, which to me wouldn't enhance browsing, but rather make it more aggravating. I think it will be ok.
Yes, it's too bad more people weren't willing to submit reviews. I would welcome more.
Enjoy the shirt.
Clark

I just visited the site for the first time since the thumnails were introduced. It looks fabulous - and loaded up for me in 15 seconds flat (on DSL). I think the added visual element is both useful and attractive, and even a somewhat longer wait would be well worth the chance to get a sense of the book through it's cover (lots of dynamic graphics on those dust jackets - why not show them off?) Like the man said, a good site gets better.