Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

We offer a web site where we post white papers to help Internet retailers with optimizing their product shipping, logistics and fulfillment.  This is a free public service type web site.  The first paper we posted has received a lot of praise so we feel the site has merit.  We are getting ready to add several new white papers over the next few months of our own.  But as of today, we have now opened it up for others to submit white papers on the same subject matter for posting on the site.  The web site is known as http://www.BusinessShipper.com.

 

This brings me to the reason for this post.  As we post new white papers to the site, do you think we should add a reader rating system of each white paper or do you feel it would discourage people from submitting them?

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Bert at Harvey Software, Inc.
Multi-Carrier Shipping Software and Supply Chain Solutions for Internet Retailers

Also a provider of free shipping information and resources at Harvey Software`s Parcel Shipping Blog along with free tracking solutions at TrackingPage.com...

Definitely, but make it a checkbox type of thing for 1-5 stars or something, and perhaps only 256 characters of text comment. Then use software to calculate the average rating for the article, based on how many comments have been made.

I think rating systems make the thing very "middle school" sometimes.

Do you control and moderate what is posted?

Rating systems help me see quickly which articles most people find interesting and useful, so I can browse them first. If I see the same interest, then I`ll be more likely to check out other articles, perhaps less popular. It`s important, though, to know how many people have rated an article. If only 2 people rated it, one for and one against, I`d read it since that`s not much of a sample. But if 40 people have rated an article so-so, then I`d likely read something else first.

Thanks for the input on this issue.    Sorry I am so slow getting back but I went to the Internet Retailer Web Design `08 Conference in Miami at the end of last week.  I will say I did receive some very interesting insight on several issues including ratings.  After going to this meeting, I feel they are a must for our site.  This meeting really opened my eyes up on several subjects concerning web sites and many of the tools we have ignored or we have improperly used.  It was one of the best meeting I had gone to in years.

 

Nikole, we do control and moderate all that will be posted to insure it is appropriate for the site.

 

Craig, your discussion of rating systems is one of the reasons we should be using a rating system - for speed and ease of use.  At the meeting last week they pointed out that one should do everything they can to make is easy for the user to find what they are looking for and rating systems are one of the things that can help.  They also pointed out that it was important to date and notate new listings so people can easily see that there has been inadequate time for the listings to be rated.  Otherwise people might blow past unrated new listings. 

 

Wow, one meeting and I got a little smarter.  Who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks…

 

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Bert at Harvey Software, Inc.
Multi-Carrier Shipping Software and Supply Chain Solutions for Internet Retailers

Also a provider of free shipping information and resources at Harvey Software`s Parcel Shipping Blog along with free tracking solutions at TrackingPage.com...

I think cats invented that expression.