_This article is by Guest Contributor Kate Trgovac._
Amazon pioneered the use of customer feedback and reviews to enhance their website. Readers can rate a book and write a review. Other readers can then offer feedback on that review. Great system and a more trusted set of content then just the editorial review from the publisher.
“eBags.com”:http://www.ebags.com/ takes customer reviews to the next level.
Whether you’re reviewing a laptop case, wallet, or travel poker game, you are asked a number of context setting questions prior to giving your review. Questions like “How often do you use this item” and “What do you usually use this item for”. For laptop bags, this is a particularly helpful set of questions. So I know that if an “Occupational Therapist” is reviewing a laptop bag that he uses “occasionally”, I may not have the same ultimate experience if I am a “Powerpoint Addict” who needs a bag that is in “constant use.”
And when these individual reviews are grouped together, they provide a rich, meta-data layer to the product. It would be great if eBags could take the next step and provide product-specific meta-data, say “Laptop Dimensions”. Then, provide a way for customers to search for laptop case reviews for a “17 inch laptop” that is used on a “Daily” basis for “Travel” by an “IT professional”. Now *that* would be some great context!
_Kate Trgovac is Manager, Web Evolution for Petro-Canada. Prior to joining Petro-Canada, Kate spent eight years developing user experience strategies for clients at several interactive agencies in Toronto. She writes about technology, branding, user-experience and other topics of note on her blog “mynameiskate.ca”:http://www.mynameiskate.ca/ ._