Show HN: Amazon Search on Steroids(jeviz.com)
jeviz.com
Show HN: Amazon Search on Steroids
http://www.jeviz.com/
16 comments
It is really hard to do with, even API requires department for extra features. What about dividing screen with iframes and search for several(at most 4) categories.
Would be swell if sellers' book descriptions could also be searched; I've found some gems that way: https://tinyapps.org/blog/nix/201112010700_amazon_wget.html
Never thought that, I will look into it. Thanks for the feedback.
I always thought it would be nice to sort by stars x reviewers or stars x log(reviews) -- something like that. Something that better balances rating and popularity. One of the most annoying things in amazon search by rating is scrolling through screens and screens of products with one user giving a product 5 stars.
Agreed, I find it amazing that this still hasn't been addressed. "Sort by Average Score" should definitely factor in the number of reviews. It's an easy fix from a technical perspective because you can also sort by number of reviews. Just combine the two!
Definitely good idea, currently I redirect to Amazon and it is not easy with even with Amazon Advertising API because when you request amazon only turns 10 products and for another 10 you need a new request. You need to request lots of pages to calculate it and Amazon has request limits.
Not exactly what you said but similar search result can be done in two steps by jeviz.com.
1-) Choose sort by Most Reviews, which is an sort option Amazon generally hides
2-) From Average Customer Review choose 4 stars and & up
this will sort all products that are 4 or above stars but in most reviews order.
1-) Choose sort by Most Reviews, which is an sort option Amazon generally hides
2-) From Average Customer Review choose 4 stars and & up
this will sort all products that are 4 or above stars but in most reviews order.
A few things:
- The interface is overwhelming. While I understand that you aim to surface power, I think you're not targeting a specific power well enough to cater to a user's needs. For example, if you aim to help a user find deals, you should develop an interface that targets that super power.
- Related to ^, I'm wondering why a user would ever need some of these features... like why would I want to search by hidden keywords?
- Re: branding. I feel like you haphazardly went for a 5-letter dot com, when you could have done something more memorable like amazonhunter.com
- The interface is overwhelming. While I understand that you aim to surface power, I think you're not targeting a specific power well enough to cater to a user's needs. For example, if you aim to help a user find deals, you should develop an interface that targets that super power.
- Related to ^, I'm wondering why a user would ever need some of these features... like why would I want to search by hidden keywords?
- Re: branding. I feel like you haphazardly went for a 5-letter dot com, when you could have done something more memorable like amazonhunter.com
Agreed. Just some random thoughts
- I'd add some indication of how long the tour is. Felt like I clicked for a while. Maybe I'm just impatient.
- Highlight the input that the tour popup is currently referencing in some way (eg add blue focus border)
- All of your inputs have explanatory text below them, and no labels. They also have no spacing to show what goes with what. You should add labels above the inputs, and put the explanatory text in a tooltip
- You have a breadcrumb kind of display on the top right side. Usually that's on the top left. I also expected it to be interactive since it is styled in blue, like a link
- Can you put the search results in an iframe or something, keeping the user on the same page? Opening a new tab was unexpected.
- I'd add some indication of how long the tour is. Felt like I clicked for a while. Maybe I'm just impatient.
- Highlight the input that the tour popup is currently referencing in some way (eg add blue focus border)
- All of your inputs have explanatory text below them, and no labels. They also have no spacing to show what goes with what. You should add labels above the inputs, and put the explanatory text in a tooltip
- You have a breadcrumb kind of display on the top right side. Usually that's on the top left. I also expected it to be interactive since it is styled in blue, like a link
- Can you put the search results in an iframe or something, keeping the user on the same page? Opening a new tab was unexpected.
Thank you for feedbacks! I have changed the tour to show how much it will last when it first show up. Labels are back. I first tried to implement search by Amazon Advertising API but it has lack of some features Amazon have so I changed my mind. I will think iframe option as you suggested. Thank you.
Thank you for feedback.
* You are right interface provide too much. My aim is not only provide deals. I mostly use it myself for books search. For technical books I always search for English books which are published in recent years (2 years) I saved my search parameters so I don't enter again again these. Sometimes I want to sort products by most reviews but this sort is absent in most departments.
* Hidden keywords are not much fancy I agree. Sometimes I use it to find more results like wrote a nonsense word with minus "-dgeygdeuydgede" Amazon gives more results.
* It against of Amazon terms of service.
Personally I like the interface and think dumbing it down would be a mistake. I would recommend adding a "minimum reviews" filter, as I sometimes sort by avg rating but get things with 2 or 3 reviews that are probably fake anyway.
You can do in two steps by jeviz.com.
1-) Choose sort by Most Reviews, which is an sort option Amazon generally hides
2-) From Average Customer Review choose 4 stars and & up
this will sort all products that are 4 or above stars but in most reviews order.
Yeah, I always look for something that has been reviewed by at least 5 other people.
I found most of sort features by try and error. I will look into it if Amazon provides it I will implement it.Thanks for the feedback.
Oh, you're not running the search over your own data?
No I am directing to Amazon with right search query url.
I agree that the interface is way overwhelming. It's very hard to see what the text boxes are for because the labels are positioned so funny. I was also not expecting it to open a new window to Amazon. I thought the results would stay on your site (like on CCC). Also, how do you pronounce the name of the site anyways?
From a functionality standpoint, I think this works great. I wish amazon would let me search by all these features. This saves a ton of time and headache with searching amazon.
One final thought. It would be great if it supported smile.amazon.com. I support the "Youth Competitive Programming Circle" with all my purchases. It would be nice if all the links went to smile.amazon.com instead of straight amazon.com.
Overall I like it. Keep at it.
From a functionality standpoint, I think this works great. I wish amazon would let me search by all these features. This saves a ton of time and headache with searching amazon.
One final thought. It would be great if it supported smile.amazon.com. I support the "Youth Competitive Programming Circle" with all my purchases. It would be nice if all the links went to smile.amazon.com instead of straight amazon.com.
Overall I like it. Keep at it.
Thank you for the feedback. I will add smile url option. Jeviz is pronounced like first parth of these words ge-neral and vis-io
I am the author of jeviz.com. Currently it is only for US locale. Immediate benefits are you have more options for search sorts. For example most choose a department and select "Most review" sort option to sort by number of reviews which is not visible in Amazon.com site. When you login you can save your search parameters and synch your mobile, desktop search parameters. There are about 50,000 categories in Amazon you can do full text search for categories. There is advanced book search more accessible than Amazon advanced book search. Please tell me what are the features you want more.
I like how you use the tour to explain the interface. Since you seem to be targeting power users although they could probably figure it out as you go along it makes it slightly less intimidating.
Yes, I target power users but even power users needs introduction I think. You can end the anytime by clicking End Tour button. It won't show up again unless you clear your browser cache.
Search by dimensions would be great. I've been wanting that for a long time.
Try to normalize unit prices, the absence of which I presume is for Amazon to move whatever product they prefer.
Try to normalize unit prices, the absence of which I presume is for Amazon to move whatever product they prefer.
Thanks for the feedback! I will look into it.
I really like the interface.
I played with resizing the window of my Chrome browser to see how it would react, and the UI is resizing really well. However I did it quite a few times, from phone size to desktop size, and after a bunch of times the sidebar (with categories)'s scrolling is getting more and more sluggish. Just so you know.
I played with resizing the window of my Chrome browser to see how it would react, and the UI is resizing really well. However I did it quite a few times, from phone size to desktop size, and after a bunch of times the sidebar (with categories)'s scrolling is getting more and more sluggish. Just so you know.
Thank you for response. I am lookşng into mobile UI problems as you said.
Is it possible to search for books that have been blurbed by certain authors? For example, if I'm interested in a list of books that Donald Knuth, or heaven forbid Gary Shteyngart, has blurbed and recommended, how would I go about doing that? Often the product descriptions will have blurbs or reviews from various sources listed on the Amazon page to induce individuals to read the book or atleast permit it to capture their attention.
> blurbed
What does this mean? Is it a typo for blogged, a new social network used by Knuth and Shteyngart, or a word I've never heard of?
What does this mean? Is it a typo for blogged, a new social network used by Knuth and Shteyngart, or a word I've never heard of?
I think he means the quotes praising the book that appear typically on the back cover of a physical book. https://susanleighnoble.wordpress.com/2012/09/18/writing-an-...
I think they may refer to the actual Amazon page, found under "Editorial Reviews". For example, from a random book I found.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385542364/ref=s9_qpp_gw_d...
Editorial reviews by Oprah, someone from the NYT, People, NPR etc.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385542364/ref=s9_qpp_gw_d...
Editorial reviews by Oprah, someone from the NYT, People, NPR etc.
It is not possible, but can be implemented Amazon Advertising API /scraping and machine learning.
Say I want to search a shirt of specific brands only e.g. "Calvin Klein" and "Versace". If I misspell the name, Amazon won't complain, rather it'll show the incorrect brand name in the left pane. Would it be easy to add auto-suggest for brands so that I get the name right.
Auto complete these features are not provided by Amazon but I really thinking of implement it myself. Thank you for the feedback!
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LOVE this! Thank you for sharing.
I've wondered, is there a way to combine book format searches? Books have Paperback AND Audio CD, for example?
I've wondered, is there a way to combine book format searches? Books have Paperback AND Audio CD, for example?
Thank you! Let me check if it is technically possible if so I will implement it.
Author of jeviz.com here. All started with a question on Quora https://www.quora.com/What-kind-of-features-would-you-like-t...
I'd really like to search by product dimensions.
Thanks for the feedback. I will look into it.
Is this tongue in cheek?
No it was an idea I submitted here 2+ years ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7542631
Nice job :)
Sad though, once one considers what Amazon has begun as: a search engine...
And yes, somehow and for some reason most ecommerce sites are not good at filtering their data on more criteria in categories...
Sad though, once one considers what Amazon has begun as: a search engine...
And yes, somehow and for some reason most ecommerce sites are not good at filtering their data on more criteria in categories...
Amazon has hundreds of millions of items, search at that scale is not as easy as it is for a few thousand books. E-commerce search is not the same as google search. Relevance by words and associations like google creates is much different than how people search when shopping/exploring.
If you have a better way to do it, Amazon is hiring and I am sure they would love to hear your ideas.
If you have a better way to do it, Amazon is hiring and I am sure they would love to hear your ideas.
I am not so sure they really care about changing their search.
They only recently started to change their recommendation stack, after years of using outdated technologies. I think it is somewhat similar with search.
It's not so much that "it's complicated at their scale" as "It works somewhat okay, which translates into X hundreds of millions of $, so don't touch it".
I know they could (and they most probably do) run A/B tests, but the thing is, how do you run MVT tests on such a large infrastructure, with such a varied catalog, etc...it all gets very complicated at their scale, just from an org perspective.
Many "power users" complain about the state of Amazon search, but I doubt the average joe really cares about that.
A more recent (and with a much smaller catalog) player, zalando (rocket internet) has a modular org and a modular approach to their stacks and they, apparently, change or update their tools much more often than Amazon.
I am pretty sure zalando being more "agile" come from their much smaller size (both in inventory, turnover and org).
Large organisations have a harder time moving than smaller ones, after all...
They only recently started to change their recommendation stack, after years of using outdated technologies. I think it is somewhat similar with search.
It's not so much that "it's complicated at their scale" as "It works somewhat okay, which translates into X hundreds of millions of $, so don't touch it".
I know they could (and they most probably do) run A/B tests, but the thing is, how do you run MVT tests on such a large infrastructure, with such a varied catalog, etc...it all gets very complicated at their scale, just from an org perspective.
Many "power users" complain about the state of Amazon search, but I doubt the average joe really cares about that.
A more recent (and with a much smaller catalog) player, zalando (rocket internet) has a modular org and a modular approach to their stacks and they, apparently, change or update their tools much more often than Amazon.
I am pretty sure zalando being more "agile" come from their much smaller size (both in inventory, turnover and org).
Large organisations have a harder time moving than smaller ones, after all...
Thank you!
Amazon CA locale is requested and I will add it ASAP. Any locale you want to see?
Amazon DE would be perfect! Great tool btw!
Selam Ceyhun,
I'd be a constant user for Amazon DE. Can help you out with testing.
I'd be a constant user for Amazon DE. Can help you out with testing.
Selam, Hakan.
I would be very happy if you can help as I don't even speak German. Thank you keep in touch.
Thank you, I am adding it to my shortlist.
How are you planning to monetizing? Are you an amazon affiliate?
Yes I am an affiliate. I am putting my tag to searches.
Many of these sub-categories have useful filters that aren't available in the general product list, but if I want to use them, I must open tabs for each category.
If this site could do a union on all the categories, offering sub-filters where available, filtering in the products that meet those filters and categories, out the products that have different categories, and in the products that have no categorization at all for that filter, that would be very useful.
On the other hand, if Amazon would just do a better job of curating the metadata on all these products, that would be great too. Maybe it takes a full time effort for a few people to maintain the compatibility lists for all the phone cases on Amazon. But that has to be more efficient than having thousands of under-informed consumers try to repeat that work over and over again...