The New-Look Flippa Auction Listing Page
Posted on June 16th, 2010 by Luke Moulton
Today we launched a new-look Flippa auction listing page. TA-DAAA!
Before you run off to admire the shiny new live version that’s operating right now on all our auction pages, stay with me, I’ll explain some of the method to our madness.
More Space For Stats
One of the main reasons for the redesign was so we could add more stats. We’re always stressing that buyers should do their website due diligence before placing a bid, so we like to give you as much information as we can to help (pssst – we’ll be adding even more soon!).
We’ve also been adding bits and pieces to the auction page for some time now so decided it was time to re-organise, re-prioritize, and generally clean up the place a bit.
SEMrush.com keyword stats have also been added. SEMrush provides some great information about what keywords a website is ranking for and the approximate traffic the site should be receiving via these keyword rankings.
Factual Information First
Usability testing on the old Auction page with the help of Clicktale, told us that the most important information to potential buyers is the site’s stats. Specifically information such as PageRank, Alexa Rank, Yahoo links and Google Links is of primary importance. So with this in mind, instead of making people scroll down the page, we’ve placed these details towards the top.
Easier to Bid
The Bid and Buy It Now buttons have been made more prominent. We’re big fans of usability (in case you hadn’t guessed already) and given the sole purpose of Flippa is to help people buy and sell websites, we’ve made it easier for people to find the Bid and Buy It Now buttons on auctions.
Social Media Buttons
Now you can promote your auction with the addition of Twitter and Facebook buttons or share other auctions with Twitter and Facebook followers and friends.
Go ahead – check out some website auctions.
Feedback?
Tells us what you think! Leave a comment below with your feedback.
Comments (111)
Comments are closed.
June 17, 2010 - 11:13 am
I wish I had known this change was coming hours after I posted a listing! There was no warning that my subtitle would be taken away & I think that is wrong. I put a lot of time into developing the listing based on how the previous look and options. This changed only hours after I posted this and I think that is wrong.
Flippa – you should have alerted the people paying a lot of money to post here that their posting would be different only hours after they submitted one.
Had I known my subtitle would simply have been deleted – I would have written things differently. Now, I don’t have the time.
June 17, 2010 - 11:53 am
I honestly think this new format is not very user friendly and everything is so cluttered and hard to read. You have to search the page trying to find things. The old layout was so much better, I have no idea why you’ve changed it, you should just add extra stats to the old one instead of re-hashing everything to make it complicated.
June 17, 2010 - 12:30 pm
Sorry to come back with further comment on the new layout….
There are two minor anoyances with the new layout than the old….
1. To send the seller a PM this has been removed from the face page – u can still go to the seller profile, but not as easy.
2. The time left to the end of Auction does not reduce unless the page is refreshed – but if u are a bidder the time left to end of auction does still countdown. Therefore if the auction has 4 hours 6 minutes left – if you leave the page open to watch the progress – the time reamains the 4 hours 6 minutes – even 3 hours later. Obviously if u keep refreshing it is current _ the old page was not this way.
A further reply to some comments above – the previous Listing of the auction site is still on the new layout – a very small symbol next the the sites URL.
June 17, 2010 - 1:56 pm
Please can you change the auction owner comments from bold + graident background to something more subtle.
June 17, 2010 - 2:13 pm
Overall, I like the new look but as many others have mentioned, there are a few things that need to be put back in place:
1. The prominent “Reserve not met” text by the current bid price needs to come back. Nobody new to Flippa is going to know that a red price means the reserve hasn’t been met.
2. The prominent link indicating there are previous listings of this listing needs to come back. I would put it in just below the green highlighted area where the current bid price is shown.
3. The link to PM the seller needs to come back and will fit perfectly in the “Seller” section.
4. The link out to the actual website for sale should target a new window so that I don’t navigate away from Flippa like it currently is set up.
5. The screenshots are much worse in the new version but I know you are aware of that as you said you are addressing it
6. The different colored background for the seller’s comments should be slightly darker. At a glance, you can barely see the color difference. The seller’s comments should be more prominent so the blue should be slightly darker than it is.
7. For each of the section headings (i.e. Site Visibility, Domain, etc. etc.) you should put a background color behind them – like the same dark blue behind the tags header at the top of the page and then change the font color of these headings to white/bold. That way each section will “pop” more and create some separation from all the stats.
Travis
FlipWebsites.com
June 17, 2010 - 3:23 pm
Previous Listing should be mentioned there at least by a small heading instead of the contextual Help No.1.
Where is the Views section where we were able to view the number of auction views?? It helped to know the amount of interest.
Please don’t add so much information for the sake of older important features.
Additional and more information should have been added at the bottom or bottom of the sidebar so if anybody is genuinely interested will check it there and do the due diligence.
Accessibility is always compromised by Flippa whenever they change the design, whether it be the Listings Page or the currently modified Auction Pages.
June 18, 2010 - 7:43 am
Where is the contextual help? I can’t seem to find it.
I hope Flippa chimes in here soon with updates on what suggestions (if any) they’ll implement with this new look. If history has anything to say about it, don’t get your hopes up. Flippa has the tendency to do things their own way – regardless of what we all say;(
Travis
June 17, 2010 - 5:33 pm
I personally am not really liking the new look. Everything is so small and cluttered, it makes it very hard on the eyes and difficult to find what you are looking for.
The link to PM the seller needs to be added back to the listing page.
The link to previous listings of the site should be put back.
Teresa
June 18, 2010 - 12:53 am
The more I look at it the more I realize I don’t like this new look either. Please put it back to what it was, this is too much of a mess. Sorry
June 18, 2010 - 1:57 am
As much as I would like to send compliments, the new look is not good for every website, buyer & seller.
As others have mentioned it’s overcrowed, showing all the stats is a great idea for established sites who have them, as that is their strong selling point, however for those startup sites who don’t, the listing doesn’t look all that attractive with all the zeros parading the stage.
At least give the listing users an option, so they can choose whether to include those stats or not, or in what order they show them (movable widgets on the backend would work great here) so they can present their listings as they see fit, and let the market decide what the best listing designs are.
jm2c
June 18, 2010 - 3:42 am
Please make it easier to see if reserve has been met or not. Red – green font colors for below reserve vs. has met reserve is too subtle and has major usability issues for people with red/green color blindness (the most common form of color blindness)
Please put back the number of views. I use it to gauge interest.
Please do NOT let users design the layout of the listing or provide widgets. Listings will take on all sorts of layouts and I will lose the ability to quickly scan the contents. For quick scanning, the listings need to have a standard layout.
I would like to be able to quickly see when the auction started and when it ends.
The font is small but that’s OK with me because you did a good job with css of enabling relative font sizes. Thus, “control +” sizes the font larger (at least on chrome, my browser; other browsers OS might use different keys)
I frequently check listings on my iPhone, especially when I am bidding on one. Regarding the location of the current price, # bids, bids pending, BIN price: I much prefer it on the left. Now (with it on the right), I refresh my browser and have to scroll horizontally right to see the price, and can no longer see the auction title and time remaining.
Please keep in mind the listing pages have different use cases. Each use case, I spend my time in different areas of the listing. One use case is checking out a listing to see if I am interested. That is where the stats, domain registration, monetization, etc. are useful. Next, I spend my time on the description. Another use case is where I am bidding on the auction. This is there my above comments about the price come into play. Another use case is watching the auction. In this case I check price and comments.
June 18, 2010 - 3:50 am
The table on top made everything harder to read. older layout was much better
June 18, 2010 - 1:14 pm
I agree, the grid-like table on top is not good. I understand about showing stats, but show them all on the side going down in a clear layout. People were used to seeing everything over there. Also, we could easily click over to see whois, the domain registrar, etc.
This is very intimidating to a new buyer looking at all those stats on top. They don’t know what they mean. Seasoned buyers know what to look for. New buyers need to see a user friendly page and that’s not what it is. Please get rid of that grid table on top.
June 18, 2010 - 8:31 am
Flippa is a good market place for new kid on the block but doing this type of change will make the buyers out from this market.
New kids think simple and want to get it in easy way where as the page looks so pro but new buyers will not understand it.
So this is too bad for flippa and also too bad for sellers.
I am using flippa as a seller for one year up and i see that the changes are reducing the sell.
So i like to request Flipp to make the sells page simple so the buyer can take action cos too many info is not good it will take there attention from the sellers page to the info box What is not good.
Thanks
RAY
June 18, 2010 - 8:51 am
Hi, I am not really excited about the new listing, as I see that there will be no styling of the sales page. I liked it before, when we could add our own flare to our listing, such as different fonts colors and size.
June 18, 2010 - 1:26 pm
I agree with dzinerfusion, taking the power away from the users is not a good idea, let the “creative” sellers style their own listings …
June 18, 2010 - 2:56 pm
The fonts sizes are too smaller.Also the keep the started date inside the bid box.Otherwise great
June 18, 2010 - 3:23 pm
I don’t like the new look that much either, it’s too crowded. Also, I can’t seem to find a way to stylize my sales copy. When I put my website for sale I had some highlights in different colors on things I wanted the buyer to take a closer look at. After the switch all that went out the window and now my copy is less exciting and harder to read and does not highlight the most important things about what I’m selling…
June 19, 2010 - 2:20 am
I don`t like , old it was nice and easy
June 19, 2010 - 2:51 am
PLEASE fix the html editor…I just spent over an hour getting it to look decent. I understand some were getting carried away with their extremely large fonts, etc. but it has to be a more user friendly….please.
June 19, 2010 - 7:26 am
To the Flippa powers that be. Let me preface by saying I truly do enjoy and value this site.
That being said, like it or not the public perception out there in regards to the likability / friendliness / caring of the company as a whole is lacking.
What a wonderful opportunity this would be to turn that perception around by actually listening to the critical feedback (of course, as well as the positive) and implementing changes based on user feedback.
I agree that layout is just too small and cluttered. Before you had the ‘less is more’ factor going where it was just so simple and easy. Now it’s overwhelming and hard on the eyes. I miss the personality of the older version.
I miss being able to track page views on auctions. As another user said, it was a somewhat viable way to gauge interest in different auctions.
I miss the live update of the time remaining.
It is difficult to find the previous listing url.
I miss the byline. At least it was one additional way to have a small attention grabber since the editor is lacking.
I am merely echoing the sentiments of those before me, but echo I shall to at least be another small voice trying to be heard.
June 19, 2010 - 12:52 pm
Not liking the new look at all! Please change it back to the old one.
June 19, 2010 - 2:04 pm
the web screenshot is really sucks! please fix that
June 19, 2010 - 8:49 pm
The new look is terrible!
and the “best of all” is, we cant wiew some older auctions…just take a look at this http://flippa.com/auctions/42602/Top-Men-s-Entertainment-Website—2000000-Unique-Visitors-Monthly—XXXXX-Monthly-Profit—4000-Registered-Members
….
June 19, 2010 - 11:55 pm
Agree with JD – the HTML editor is horrible, please give us an option to make larger one-line sentences (or to insert a short divider) and one color.
The editor was not good earlier, now it is just plain stupid.
June 20, 2010 - 2:38 am
I know Flippa’s thinking. Release something new, then everyone will complain..then get used to it.
However the simplicity of the old setup was great..perhaps this will change later so my eyes can adjust, but the small font text, the long width page, the complex list items at the top and right side and the removal of sub titles is too much, too soon.
Can we have an option to switch back to the old style in our setup?
June 20, 2010 - 8:49 am
Alexa Rank is n’t correctly formated
as example it is shown 656887 which is hard to read
that should be 656,887.
June 20, 2010 - 4:31 pm
Am I just having a hard time seeing it, but did you guys also take away the actual list date of the auctions? You took them off the main search pages a long time ago (which I didn’t think made any sense) but at least you had the actual list date on the auction pages.
However, it looks like you also took the list dates off the auction listings themselves as well. If you didn’t and I just can’t find them, I apologize for the complaint and I ask that you point me in the right direction.
If you did in fact remove it, can I ask you why you would do that? It doesn’t make any sense…
Travis
June 20, 2010 - 5:38 pm
If I were new here, I wouldn’t knew whether the reserve has already been met or not. Maybe instead using only colors to differentiate (reserve met/not met), try adding text.
Fonts are little bit small, increasing the size should fit I think.
Auction Views, in my perspective it is kinda important for us (seller). I know it can be manipulated easily by just pressing the refresh button (but won’t work on logged-in user am I right?). In my perspective as seller, some way it did helped me doing split testing on my auctions. At least I know which of my listings performed best, what time has the most traffic (still figuring out). Sadly, I can’t find auction views stat anymore here. If you guys going to add it back, fix it to make 1 view stat added per IP/Cookie etc. We sellers appreciate it much
Add icons? Example
[icon] Google PageRank
[icon] Alexa Rank
[icon] Links in Google
[icon] Links in Yahoo!
.
.
.
[icon] Uniques Per Month
Allow seller to re-sort attachments since I see it is going vertically?
“Seller accepts payment using Escrow.”
“Seller does not accept Escrow payment.”
What about others? PayPal, Checks, etc.
Others is good, so far is okay
Just my $0.01
yurckk (Anwar)
June 21, 2010 - 1:26 pm
What happened to being able to watch auctions? Is this gone too? Please, pretty please just change everything back. It was so simple and user friendly before, what have you guys done???
June 22, 2010 - 6:07 am
Found it, right at the top =)
June 23, 2010 - 12:49 am
I don’t like the new layout either. It was perfect before, I don’t know why it has changed. Everything is very cluttered and tiny now. The listing view count has disappeared completely.
The old layout was easy to use, neat and was just better altogether.
June 23, 2010 - 3:23 am
Many things have already been stated about why this “New” look is not working…
I’ve been selling sites on Flippa since 2007, and this seems to be the “biggest” screw up yet!
What are you guys doing??? Is anyone home?
We all got used to the “new” layout and “Windows” like look when you moved from Sitepoint to “Flippa” now you’ve mucked with the interface…
Where’s the “Views, Watch this auction, Reserve Met or NOT”???
Flippa wasn’t broken, who’s “lame” idea was it to “fix” it???
Hopefully you’ll listen to the masses and return everything back to normal…
~AzSno…
June 23, 2010 - 12:22 pm
Well, I must say I just listed my first site since the change-over and it was very easy. Still like the old layout better, but the listing went very smooth.
Thanks for all you guys do and putting up with my insanity =)
N.
June 24, 2010 - 11:34 am
Can we get it where everyone can see each other’s listing views like it used to be? I think this really helped create urgency and also show the buyer’s what’s popular and what’s not. Thank you
June 25, 2010 - 8:28 am
Hi,
i dont really like the new interface.. but ive noticed few changes i totally dont get!!
like now the auctions’ time dont get extended in last 4 hours??/??? why is that????
is it just me?? or you have changed the system???
June 25, 2010 - 11:10 am
the last 4hrs extension period not working!!! what happened to no sniping policy ????
its really bad for auctionss…. all my sites ive ever sold were success because of this as people tend to bid in last moments.. and by extension, more bidder gets the chance to bid again.. but now it aint working!
pleasee some one atleast reply to me?? is it just me?? or is that a bug????
what is it??/ and when will it be solved????
June 25, 2010 - 12:00 pm
That is definitely a bug and MUST be fixed. This is one key thing that separates flippa from the rest is the “no sniping”… PLEASE put things back!
June 25, 2010 - 12:04 pm
WOW! Is this really happening? I’m SOOOOO confused to the reasoning behind taking away the time extension when someone bids in the last four hours? I can see making some things more “buyer” friendly than “seller” friendly like you’ve done, but to take THIS away – what gives???
June 25, 2010 - 5:37 pm
Flippa’s new design sucks!!! big time!!! you know why??? too many bugs!!!
the time extension bug??? and you didnt even care to fix??? my auction just ended and its not even close to what i had for the price in mind!!! just because, the time was never extended!
whose to be blamed for this?? who will compensate for the loss????
i had to many views and people watching over the site.. but because of this bug.. im not even close to what price i was hoping to go to!
NICE MOVE FLIPPA!
June 25, 2010 - 6:06 pm
We’re not aware of any “time extension bug”, so I’ve emailed this user to ask for more specifics.
June 25, 2010 - 8:24 pm
ive replied to ur email.. please have a look and get back to me asap.
thanks
June 30, 2010 - 2:34 am
I do not like flippa´s new design. The previous one was better. Please flippa team return to the previous one.
Thanks
June 30, 2010 - 7:27 pm
Auctions used to previously include a note / warning if the site had been listed previously. Is this no longer the case? I can’t seem to find this information anywhere on an auction for a site that I know was listed a few months ago.
This was really useful info to have on the listing, either please put it back, or make it more obvious (if it’s still there and i’ve overlooked it).
As with others I find the information on the new page much harded to digest, the old layout (in my opinion) was much more user friendly!
July 1, 2010 - 9:13 am
Thanks Chris, this indication still exists as an icon next to the domain name, but we obviously need to rethink this as people aren’t finding it there. We’ll find a better location for this.
July 3, 2010 - 11:04 am
Loving Flippa now, getting the kinks worked out and really settling in with the new layout. I’m happy again =)
July 19, 2010 - 10:05 am
We asked, you guys delivered! Great job on making the requested changes to the marketplace and taking our opinions into consideration
November 24, 2010 - 9:17 pm
That is definitely a bug and MUST be fixed. This is one key thing that separates flippa from the rest is the “no sniping”… PLEASE put things back!
November 24, 2010 - 9:29 pm
I’m sorry, I don’t understand your comment. This post is five months old. Do you have an issue with Flippa which we should fix?
January 2, 2011 - 3:25 am
You the people! Unless our responses not the best champagne?
May 9, 2011 - 9:28 pm
the web screenshot is really sucks! please fix that
http://www.e-joc.info