Streetglow website

I'm sure a lot of you are like me and don't check out SG anymore, but I got bored trying not to study, so I saw their new site. I've got a lot of complaints about it, but I don't really care since I'll probably never go back... just thought I'd share with everyone else and see if anyone really cares....

http://www.streetglow.com/

they have too much going on there

Mmm I hate the new site

Flash is not cool

Fast loading, easy to navigate, plenty of information is cool

ahhh dont like it at all. Im with Phil, I hate flash.

Flash is nice, if used correctly. They obviously don't use it correctly. IMO, it should never be used for navigation. Also the small scrolling boxes suck b/c it's harder to read. I'm also against Flash with sound and welcome pages that serve no point but to say "hey look what I can do with flash..."

Brandon wrote:

"hey look what I can do with flash..."

word....it hurts just to look at it because they have so many things going on at one time.

augh it's aweful. you are correct Flash is nice when used properly

its too slow. takes forever to load.

loaded fast..but i dont like it..this site is so much easier to navigate. everything it just there like BAM! and easy to see

i dig it

My only gripe is the little scrollers in the middle. I hate little scrollers.

too many clicks just to find anything and they jsut now got alarm leds? a little late

I can never use it at home. My connection is to slow.

I love flash, however NOT when advertising products. Plus their site is very harsh on the eyes.. I like simple sites like this one!

Way to busy and if I still had 56K I doubt the site would even load.

I didn't mind it too much but I like oz's setup much more. They had some cool little gismo's comming out soon though. I'm digging the wheelwell LED and Door handle LED kits. Think you'll get something like that phill?

PlasmaGlow has had the door kits for a long time I think. It's just an LED or two if I remember correctly

The Wheel well kits do look nice; iceled needs those

Brandon wrote:

Flash is nice, if used correctly. They obviously don't use it correctly. IMO, it should never be used for navigation. Also the small scrolling boxes suck b/c it's harder to read. I'm also against Flash with sound and welcome pages that serve no point but to say "hey look what I can do with flash..."

Good to see you Brandon. First I would like to say nice signature always nice to see a non-supporter of SG supporting it

Although I am not a big supporter of flash I do believe SG's site blows all other sites in our category out of the water. As far as layout...design... speed... navigation... information...NO COMPETITION.... We believe most of our customers on our site are computer savvy, considering the poor navigation on the old site. So SG even made it easier for non savvy users to navigate and purchase products... everything is a click away. Also we are improving our online support with customer service and warranty issues via our forums and contact form located on our website everyday... As well as ensuring our inventory levels are at 100% to ensure fast turn around time on deliveries. Finally we increased our bandwidth to 5mb per second on output. In a few months it will be 20mb. So there should not be any reason for slow startups unless you are on 56k. Sorry to those who have.

As for the small scrolling boxes... Well that is Adam's coding am I am sure he will be here soon to defend it. Beautiful work if I do say so myself. So I will leave that arena for him...

As for our newer products... Well I rather by SG...

Always nice to see all of you... Look forward to the next time we chat...

------------------
StreetGlow SHeriff

to say Im' a non-supporter is a huge strech. Obviously you don't know who I am, I'm not gonna blame you for that, but I have been a member of streetglows site (one of the more active ones at that) since early 2000. I've ALWAYS had streetglow products in my cars and I've ALWAYS demanded them for my friends as well. I've done my time for SG, I support it.

As for the website, Phil will back me up on this. To say "there should not be any reason for slow startups unless you are on 56k." is basically to deny 56kers the right to a enjoyable experience at your website. Not the brighest move IMO.

To say that "We believe most of our customers on our site are computer savvy" is demanding too much out of your visitors. Now you've excluded 2 types of ppl from your site: 56k users and computer novices. That's a decent percentage I can guarantee!

Your navigation, sadly, is not easy to use. The links move and that takes getting used to. Even for me, I had to stop and look at it for a second (and I'm a computer science major that has designed a number of websites).

You say you have no competition? Keep up that business mentality and see how long a company lasts...


I will say, however, that it seems you did add some new content to the website; that's a start.

Hire me and Brandon to do the website. I guarantee it'll look a lot better than it does now.

Brandon wrote:

to say Im' a non-supporter is a huge strech. Obviously you don't know who I am, I'm not gonna blame you for that, but I have been a member of streetglows site (one of the more active ones at that) since early 2000. I've ALWAYS had streetglow products in my cars and I've ALWAYS demanded them for my friends as well. I've done my time for SG, I support it. As for the website, Phil will back me up on this. To say "there should not be any reason for slow startups unless you are on 56k." is basically to deny 56kers the right to a enjoyable experience at your website. Not the brighest move IMO. To say that "We believe most of our customers on our site are computer savvy" is demanding too much out of your visitors. Now you've excluded 2 types of ppl from your site: 56k users and computer novices. That's a decent percentage I can guarantee! Your navigation, sadly, is not easy to use. The links move and that takes getting used to. Even for me, I had to stop and look at it for a second (and I'm a computer science major that has designed a number of websites). You say you have no competition? Keep up that business mentality and see how long a company lasts... I will say, however, that it seems you did add some new content to the website; that's a start.

Oh, a debate... I love these....

Glad to see you still like our products...Sorry you are offended I am only going by what is posted in this thread.

Brandon Wrote:
I'm sure a lot of you are like me and don't check out SG anymore, but I got bored trying not to study, so I saw their new site. I've got a lot of complaints about it, but I don't really care since I'll probably never go back...

We are not saying we are trying to deny 56kers access to our site, it just will take a little longer to load.

Our site has been in design mode for 1 year. Since you are a science major I am sure you know what stats are. In 2004, 51% of computer users in the U.S have broadband speeds. 59% percent of those home's young people ages 18-20... you know... our demographic? Well they use broadband... With a growth increase of 38% per year. Those are stats... Those are what SG looks at... Those are the people our site is targeting.

Good to hear your opinion regarding the Navigation.... As it is only that ... your opinion...

Brandon Wrote:
You say you have no competition? Keep up that business mentality and see how long a company lasts...

If you miss read my statement, I meant no competition in the design of our site. As for how long a company will last... If you mean SG... LOL... If you get a chance November 1, 2005 is SEMA, in Las Vegas. The largest trade show for dealers in the country. I will be there with 10,000 other people just in case you cant find me follow the purple bag that say StreetGlow (that every person at the show will have in their hand) to our booth...

Where we will be celebrating 15 YEARS of service in this industry.

hey. your a *** and streetglow is over priced garbage. theres my 2 cents. debate that *****.

Rags real mature. This fella hasnt come in flaming anyone or anything. Its a simple online debate between customer and owner/rep.

Sure SG is the biggest name in car lighting they are slowly being bumped out by ICELED and the like. Im sure those who are buying neon lighting to compete would much rather have ICELED then SG. Just my opinon ofcourse. Sure you will see alot of SG bags at SEMA but im willing to bet that if Oznium and or ICELED set up a booth at SEMA you will see a **** load of those bags too.

So to come in here bragging about your company makes me want to not buy from your company and I will tell those I know not to buy from you. Sure it wont affect you, but if I tell enough ppl then they tell people and so on and so forth. SG will slowly disappear as it already has. I first started out on the SG forums in 2001. Its now 2005 and i havent been there in a good 2-3 years. The "Seniors" on the forum are as big headed as you are and push people away. I found Oznium when I was pushed away and im sure alot more members can say the same. Plus Phil, the owner of Oznium is always there to answer questions, Gets items out crazy fast, and is one of us. He doesnt hide from the forums, he participates as much as anyone else. He also is easy to contact and will get back to you the same day. Can SG say the same?? So to say SG is the leader is hardly true. They may be the most recognized name, but when it comes to selling their products they are nothing more then corporate bastards, who dont care about the customer but instead how many UB kits they can sell. I think you should take a look at Oznium and see just how to run a successful business. By successful I mean keeping customer loyalty.

All of this is my opinon ofcourse and I dont mean to offend you with the terms I have used.

see i am pmsing. and everything you just said sortof sums it up. but still. my way was shorter.

Rags wrote:

see i am pmsing. and everything you just said sortof sums it up. but still. my way was shorter.

You might have heard of this guy Jakob Nielsen from the Nielsen Norman Group.



People call him:
"the world's leading expert on Web usability"
"the world's leading expert on user-friendly design"

He says Flash: 99% Bad Here's the article: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20001029.html

And here is another interesting article: http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=2524

If you want to design for the current, and be ready for the future: don't use Flash, use CSS and HTML

StreetGlow, you just wasted a lot of time and money.

I'm looking forward to SEMA!

^ Few words said. But dayum. Go phil haha

My words include the full text of both articles. Read them if you want. I didn't want to take up a bunch of space with quoting them.

StreetGlow.com wrote:

Oh, a debate... I love these.... Glad to see you still like our products...Sorry you are offended I am only going by what is posted in this thread. Brandon Wrote: I'm sure a lot of you are like me and don't check out SG anymore, but I got bored trying not to study, so I saw their new site. I've got a lot of complaints about it, but I don't really care since I'll probably never go back...

Honestly, that website offers nothing for me anymore. I've made it a point not to re-register; it (until now) was my very quiet boycotting. The boards have been crashed and lost too many times, and now the clean wipe ruins ALL of the GREAT threads that some of us put together a long time ago. Back when people were first experimenting with your products (Carl, Ben, Roger, Mark, SoSilencer, etc. etc.) There was hands down the best search engine for neons and 12v lighting in your website. That's powerful. It's transfered to this site now and if you don't believe that, you're mistaken.
This is not to say I'm against buying SG in the future, but I'll be hanging out here for sure...

StreetGlow.com wrote:

We are not saying we are trying to deny 56kers access to our site, it just will take a little longer to load. Our site has been in design mode for 1 year. Since you are a science major I am sure you know what stats are. In 2004, 51% of computer users in the U.S have broadband speeds. 59% percent of those home's young people ages 18-20... you know... our demographic? Well they use broadband... With a growth increase of 38% per year. Those are stats... Those are what SG looks at... Those are the people our site is targeting. Good to hear your opinion regarding the Navigation.... As it is only that ... your opinion...

Make a website a nusiance for your visitors, and they won't stay. 59% of your target audience is BARELY half. If you had a physical store front that made 59% of your customers sit outside in traffic before they could come in your store, do you think they would? I hate traffic, but that's my opinion

StreetGlow.com wrote:

Brandon Wrote: You say you have no competition? Keep up that business mentality and see how long a company lasts... If you miss read my statement, I meant no competition in the design of our site. As for how long a company will last... If you mean SG... LOL... If you get a chance November 1, 2005 is SEMA, in Las Vegas. The largest trade show for dealers in the country. I will be there with 10,000 other people just in case you cant find me follow the purple bag that say StreetGlow (that every person at the show will have in their hand) to our booth... Where we will be celebrating 15 YEARS of service in this industry.

Giving out the most stuff for free at SEMA means you are the best company? I've been to many many car shows through the years. I have free stuff from companies I'd NEVER purchase from, but we see free stuff and we have to mulitples of it all.



And to add to Phil's post; this is the article that starts off Nielson's series of articles: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/designmistakes.html

All I have to say is: Go Phil!

Wasted time and money... Well I doubt that... We look at stats everyday. Numbers do not lie...Yes a complete site made in flash I would say is a bad call. StreetGlow.com is NOT completely done in flash. So it is tastefully done. Although the navagation is done in flash, it is a simple design. The navbar is consistent throughout the site so it only needs to be loaded once. As for the scrolling banner... well.... So many new things for 05 at SG we want to make sure you get to see them ALL.

Brandon I would say our website is a matter of choice. You can buy Streetglow and OPTX products all around the world, when it comes to our website we feel it is important to make a statement. Phil and I spoke about the site before it launched. We both share some opinions and differ on others. Since we actually make products rather then just sell them... Our design/marketing department feels we need to be a little more cutting edge. An I agree.

Although I see some of us still love template websites. So I could see how a person might not like ours

This has been fun. Anytime you want to pick it back up you are more then welcome to come to our NEW boards.. See you there Phil. Brandon hey, your ok... hope to do this again...

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StreetGlow SHeriff

I'm glad we could keep it friendly (except Rags........). I have been known to lurk over at SG and almost registered once (basically to say what I've said here), but I doubt I do.

No hard feelings against you or SG, I was just stating my point from a web designer side.

dude, you just totally got destroyed and all you can say is "this was fun hope to see you at the boards"
you dont get the simple fact that, you may say it was tastefully done; however, if it was truly tastefully done than why is it people are arguing against it. phil brings up a valid source of information rebutting your theory that it is "easy to use" stating the opposite. a 1% chance by the statement saying you have tasteful flash. but for you to first hit a narrow margin of "tasteful flash" you would have to have overwhelming support. and seeing as people on this forum who seemed to have come to a consensus that it is NOT tasteful flash it obviously misses the narrow margin disproving your theory that it is in fact "easy to use". and if you want to argue the credibility of the people on this board its obvious alot of people here do in fact like streetglow. we state the fact your webpage sucks. you rebut this statement with opinion. we refute your opinion with fact and source. you say this is fun. you=bad debator and failed to prove anything to us.
and for the record i still think streetglow is overpriced garbage.

Rags - I'm sorry, but that was pointless beyond any shadow of a doubt.

i like cheese.........

i must admit though from another web designer standpoint it is a little more difficult to use but i have seen sites way worse.....and i'm sure since it has been changed recently they will get more customers input on it and will decide upon that i am sure....i also must admit SG is what got me started in glow in the 1st place and i will always remember that

Aken wrote:

Rags - I'm sorry, but that was pointless beyond any shadow of a doubt.

Ya I agree.

This topic with the exception of Rags just goes to show you the kind of community Oz has. SG use to be like this then it went down hill when the big members got big headed. I hope that Oz stays this way as it seems the moderating staff has done an amazing job thus far.

Scrolling boxes??? What scrolling boxes did i code??? My code is FLAWLESS. And the flash does take time to load, and i TOLD THEM ABOUT THAT WHEN I WORKED THERE! - I fought countless times with them that they can't have a 1 megabyte nav bar. They reduced it to like 400k which i argued with but accepted, who knows what its at now. I told them, but NOOOOOO don't listen to me.

Look, i like the new SG site, its a NOW site, its not a business site, its a fancy shmancy FUN site. Thats the way we were aiming for when we came up with the design. Sure i coulda made a boring quickly loading site, but come on, thats BORING. And you all know you like the TECHNO feeling of the site, you guys just ALL love to put something down and argue because it makes ya feel better, either that or yer jealous. Okay... im not gonna sit here and argue that fact, because ive seen the site, i helped design it, i coded it, i know how it works and what its achieving. its a killer looking site thats designed for today's FLASHY and FANCY genre, its not designed to load quickly or to be boring and to the point..

If yuo want a boring site, goto google, if you wanna see flash and cool things, goto streetglow.com - I honestly dont care if they lose customers right now, they didnt keep me around long enough for me to make an alternative site, but in defense, its not supposed to lure mom and dad in. its supposed to lure that college kid in with a college connection because THAT is the target audience, not mom/dad/grandpa on the 56k. And if yer on a 56k browsing the net now adays, gimme a break, you neeeeed to get with the times. Technology these days is hardcore and intense. Look at todays games where you need a KILLER machine just to load it.

for everyday people like me that was two much to look at, but after a few minuts it wasnt that bad

yes i am the anomoly idiot. but aken, whys it pointless. not trying to start an arguement, just wondering.

I understand your point Adam, you did what you're told I'm sure. My rant here was more aimed at SG in general for their poor choice in their online image. Their excuse seems to be that they don't care about if their customers like the site or not, they built it for SG... their art department, who whoever decided on the site, needs to sit and read about websites, and what makes them successful. Hell, they should probably sit and think about what a website is and what it's PURPOSE is. It's not for SG to be happy, it's for the visitor/customer/POTENTIAL customer to be happy.