posted on October 20, 2011 12:02:07 PM new
Overall I like using your software. Your CSR respond quickly and professionally. But there are some significant problems with your software in my opinion and I am wondering why these problems are not really being addressed. Its like to me Vendio is a company on the verge of greatness at what it does but has not taken the final step to do so. What would be involved in the final steps? I think developing a close relationship with some key users of your software to implement changes and proposed improvements would be key. I’m not saying I should be one of them either. I am still a small company and just starting with Vendio, only 3 months in. I think you need “consultants” that are bigger businesses and have been using your software for much longer.
I’m not at all ready to abandon Vendio but just perplexed as to why lots of seemingly simple program glitches just are not being addressed. Also, the CSR support is quite good. So why not go a step further and offer great videos and remote support. It is very odd. You are on the verge of greatness. Why not become great? To make a football analogy its like you guys are making the playoffs every year, but aren’t doing what it takes to win the Super Bowl.
To me it seems that upper management of Vendio is disconnected with the actual users of Vendio and their efforts are being focused elsewhere. Wouldn’t it make sense to have some key customers on Vendio board or a panel of long time customers that work with Vendio to make recommendations and to bounce potential changes off of? Just seems like there is a disconnect with Vendio for their customers that they are serving.
Problems with using Vendio. This is not a complete list. Just the ones that I have asked Vendio to fix that I can think of right now.
1. when there is a significant problem it goes to the engineers and don’t get fixed.
Problems that the engineers said that they would fix but have not:
a. Fedex does not work waiting 3 months on this one.
b. Major glitches with Amazon. Waiting 2 months already. It does work but Vendio auto updates my item title and descriptions and when I ask it not to clicking off some optional functions Vendio offers) it will not save and will not list.
2. does not auto send email confirmation of shipping to customers. No brainer. Why not offer this?
3. can not select when we email coupons to customers. Who want coupons sent out immediately to customers? They will forget to use it. Send out coupons a week after you have shipped makes more sense. They have their product by then and hopefully are ready for more. The coupon gets lost in all the other confirmation emails they are getting from us, ebay, and for me shipworks (the tracking number with link to usps that Vendio does not offer).
4. Where are the videos? All other companies your size are offering video tutorials. Written instructions are very hard to follow and time consuming. Vendors don’t have time for that! There are a few videos. But they only scratch the surface of what should be on video. The whole user guide on Vendio help page should be converted to video with audio. It would be pretty easy to do I think. Very odd that something this simple and logical would not have been done by now.
5. Why isn’t remote support an option for csr? Emailing is often very unproductive. I suggest doing a time study test and I would guess that if you offer remote support you will have much happier customers and your csr will be more productive. Your csr say that they it is not included in the costs of the company. I think you will find it costs you more not to have. Plus you will have MUCH happier customers. This is recent trend in support that seems that you are behind on. Eveyone else is doing that I have been working with and we quickly fix any problems and communication is much better. Help your retailers to grow! I spend up to a week sometimes trying to explain a problem that if remote login was available could be explained in a few minutes.
6. I asked if there is any recommended shipping procedure using your software. I was informed there is none. Video tutorial perfect here. There are too many problems using Vendio for shipping. I just changed over to Shipworks and it is GREAT! Support was great. They remote into my computer for setup while asking me questions and 15 minutes later I am completely setup. Amazon and Ebay integrations. Auto emails sent to completed orders. Links to order images. Numbered orders for easy identifations. Thumbnails on invoices. So much more…… So many cool functions that make paying a bit extra paid for. And I had a few questions to start out and they answered questions right away. Vendio could do the same easily I think…….
7. no email updates of major changes. There is an announcement with link on login page. This somehow does not seem like enough to me.
8. no video tutorial of the major changes for the new item screen that you implemented. Its like we are supposed to figure stuff out from your written instructions. Again, everyone else is doing it. It would be easy to do. Why aren’t you?
9. If customer leaves a message in ebay for shipping there is not obvious way to see this.
10. Amazon integration not working properly.
11. Using software over the net is glitchy. A lot of the time changes made especially in Google Chromse (the best browser for now in terms of speed). Sometimes changes don’t take effect. We are recommended to use another browser when this happens. It is odd. Can’t something be done for this?
12. Significant changes announced in a half assed way. The new item page has quite a few glitches. For a few days it caused me not to be able to effective launch items.
13. Dazzle/Endecia integration is very cumbersome to use. Shipworks does it right.
Minor annoying things:
1. when you make an editing change Vendio brings you back to opening screen for whatever you were working on for almost any function. Is not logical. Even on the net most other companies will take you back to the previous screen you were working on. Very odd. I have to hit a couple buttons sometimes to get back to where I was working before after saving some changes.
2. When there is an error launching to ebay you don’t know. and when you find out where to go for that it does not list the name of the item in the errors tab and other key information that would make identifying the item easy. Also, new errors are listed last on list of error. Shouldn’t new error show up first when open the page? THERE ARE SO MANY SMALL THINGS LIKE THIS THAT DON’T MAKE THE SOFTWARE UNUSABLE, BUT MAKE IT HARD TO USE AND COUNTERINTUITIVE.
Why not become great? I don’t think it would add much cost, and in fact may cut your costs by becoming more efficient.
posted on October 20, 2011 12:59:51 PM new
Hi there, and wow! Thanks for the feedback. We really appreciate the time you took to write up this comprehensive outline. We agree with many of your points, and we are actually in the process of re-prioritizing bugs and enhancement requests (which is a much more complex process than it might seem from where you sit.)
Regarding your suggestion that some of our bigger customers act as consultants, we are actually in touch with key accounts all the time and we gather feedback as much as we can.
I will be happy to forward your comments regarding bugs and enhancements on to the product managers and development teams for evaluation.
We are also working toward improvements to our videos and online help - this has proven difficult due to the large amount of time it takes to make videos and documents, and the numerous changes to our site (which then makes re-creating the video and updating documents necessary.) Unfortunately, help documents and other media are quickly outdated given our pace of development. We also charge for premium support because we prefer not to build it into our costs, this way you can opt out if you find you don't need it all the time (rather than paying by default even though you may not use it.)
I know you have filed some cases with us and we will be in touch as soon as the Fedex issue and some of the Amazon-related issues are ironed out.
posted on October 26, 2011 09:06:28 PM new
It is interesting that you sign your response "Diana". Diana who? What is your position? Most people would at least add their position in response. hmmmmm. anyways....
You say that my outline was comprehensive. Actually, in daily use of the software I find many many things like that. Those are the ones that I just remember off the top of my head. There are many more problems or oddly programmed functions. This kind of works funky, or this would be better if it was like this. And its not just things specific to helping me. Its things that would help everyone. Some of them are pointed out below. But from reading blogs it just seems like a lot of things just never get fixed by the engineers.
That is a bit odd to me too. Its not like you are paying USA programmers. Eastern Europe and especially India programmers get paid far less compared to usa counterparts at 80% less (India). I digress. Anyway, it seems like the manpower should be there especially with the number of customers you have to make the big and small changes happen. but its not happening. hmmmm.
I agree that videos might take time to develop. But I don't think things are changing so fast that they still would not be worth it.
At the very least you could do videos for your own store hosting as YOU are the ones in control of those changes, not ebay or amazon.
Your premium support prices are quite cheap. Only $15 for 5 calls. Not too bad. But its kind of an insult to call in for problems that are NOT our fault. Sometimes it is caused by your software. Why should we pay you to point out your programming errors?
It took me a week of back and forth with the csr to finally come to the conclusion that yup... it was a Vendio bug on why the Amazon listing is not working properly. And it is not a small bug. I don't think that you should advertise that Vendio can help us list on Amazon- it does not work properly and overwrites any existing descriptions if it is an item that already exists in Vendio. My ebay and store listing get all messed up when I try to list an item using Vendio.
So now I'm listing my product on Amazon directly. This ruins keeping effective track of my inventory. Guess what? I had something on both ebay and amazon and it sold out on ebay and sold it on amazon as well, but I did not have it. Why? Because I can't use Vendio to list my Amazon items. Amazon is fanatical about not having an item that is listed. I blame this on Vendio.
Also, I have been told that many times that remote support is not part of your cost structure. I can see not giving that to free or $20 customers. But I think when it is $60 customer and up it should just be included.
But please look at it another way. You should take a look at how long it takes, and over how many days to fix some problems when it is being done by email. I think sometimes you would be better off just remoting into your customers computer and making the changes yourself or guiding them through it while you watch. I'd bet you that your company in the long run would be far better off with that. Do a business analysis of what I am saying. Talk to your CSRs. I think they will confirm what I've told you. Remoting in would be far less time consuming than your email support and more cost effective for select cases. Maybe it would be a matter of where you draw the line then. Not sure. You guys would have to work that out.
There are alternatives out there for other companies. I liked the fact you did not charge fees on sales and seemed to offer a lot of what other companies like channel advsior also offer at much less of a price. But maybe that lesser price comes at the cost of software that is buggy. Software that sometimes does not work at all. Volusion includes chat support for the $60 and they allow up to 1000 items for that, better than Vendio. But I have not tried them out yet. Often the devil is in the details, as I am finding out with Vendio. But maybe they have similar small problems, and a few bigger ones. I just don't know.
After the New Year I'll be looking into some other companies that could compete with Vendio. I'm sure you guys are looking at your competition. The nice thing for you though is once you have a customer it is hard for them to change because a lot of the work in getting items up properly must be done all over again. Also you must learn a new system, and who know after a few months if its really any better. Maybe just different problems? If I do change I will do a lot more homework next time though and take full advantage of the trial offers to see how it really works.
It sounds like I hate your software. Not really. I like a lot of what it can do. But I feel that my perspective is somewhat limited in that I have only used Channel Advisor in the past and that also is not without its bugs. For them too, eBay was a big headache to keep up with all the changes. So, just in trying to gain some perspective on what is out there after learning Vendio indepth I will know more of what to look for in one of your competitors.
You could avoid all this though. If you just fixed a lot of the bugs I don't think I would be thinking along those lines.
Also, why don't you showcase some of your successful retailers? Ask them to do a video on how they source product, manage their shipping process, how they take their photos, manage inventory etc. I bet at least a few would bite on that. I think it would be incredibly helpful for some retailers, and most would probably at least pick up a few ideas. For example, I just started using eye fi with picassa for images and it is quite amazing in terms of the kind of images I am able to output quickly. I know you have community forums? but how many really look at that. What I'm saying is why not give your customers some fundamental valuable videos that demonstrate some of the basics of online retail that may not be so basic to some. You have the perfect venue to do that. But not on these community pages. I just don't think they get much exposure compared to a lot of other online communities I've seen. Just an idea.
But why not? I mean, isn't one of your stated goals to try to help your retailers become successful? What better way to do it than showing videos from successful online retailers. Or you could have your own employees do it, but I don't think that they are in the trenches everyday like the people using your software. I think success in etailing is all about organization and developing good systems and of course having a great product to sell. Us etailers are all out there trying to make systems on our own and I think that Vendio could help that along by helping the retailers help each other. This sounds good and all, but sometimes I feel the way you respond to questions that you guys are just barely keeping up with all the changes as it is so I guess this idea would be put to the bottom. But it shouldn't be.
If your customers saw a video on how to make a cheap lightbox, and have images download directly from their camera (no wire using eyefi) to their pc using picassa they would benefit hugely from that. Why not do those kind of things for them? I know if I were the ceo of Vendio I would be excited to offer something like this to my customers and get a lot of satisfaction from seeing them make their business grow and make their operations more efficient.
How to mass upload items using an excel spreadsheet in a video would be awesome. Much easier to follow a video than written instructions. That is something under your control. Why not make a short video on that? I would love it!
Many other things work great and without a hitch when considering the changes at ebay and amazon is no small task to keep up with.
Passion and success for smaller businesses usually comes from its owner. And it seems that the original owner of Vendio has moved on from active management. Maybe that is the problem over there... the management team has lost its passion to be the best? Not expecting an answer, just wondering aloud. Mr. Effle has a lot of degrees. Does he have the passion to make the company he is managing the best at what it does? I hope he does... for my sake and all the etailers sakes that depend on him and the people around him that depend on him. It all starts with him and how he implements things make or break the company in the long run. Feel free to pass this email on to him. Its always good to hear an honest opinion. Why don't we ever hear from him by the way in any of the communications you send out?
I'm just trying to give you guys some objective analysis from someone who is in the trenches using your software everyday. If you know anything about business you will know that 99% of people never complain about inadequate goods or services. They just stop using those goods and services and find a better one. So please don't think I'm one of the few. I'm using your software every day. I would hazard a guess most of your customers would have a lot of the same comments that I do, they are just not telling you about it and switching over to Volusion etc.
Honestly though, this is the first multi channel software that I've learned in depth so my perspective is limited. Channel Advisor I had employees running that one for me so I never got to know it well. So maybe how you do it is how most of the multichannel providers do it. I just don't know... yet.
To end on a good note I really like your new item listing and sorting ability. Its already saving me a lot of time.
I like your customer service response time (just wish remote and live chat was part of the non fee system).
Things aren't all that bad with Vendio. Like I said before I think you guys are like a team that is good enough to make the playoffs every year, but you are not winning any Super Bowls.
