Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#11

Post by jph » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:43 PM UTC

Great idea. Here's my two cents on feedback.

* I like the footprints in the logo a lot - it makes me realize quickly that this is an app for exploring nearby. The logo could be easier to read. White line on red outline is pretty hard on the iPad.

* The "Click here for travel dates" is too faded to read easily.

* When I type "San Francisco", the AJAX loader takes quite a while. This may just be server load - consider pre-sending some results for popular cities, or the most likely cities, or ideally do a geolocate on my IP.

* I like the page slide effect a lot.

* I don't understand some of the images, like the mardi gras mask on the "Contact" page, or the gray drops on the "Work with us" page. On all these pages, consider moving the logo from upper right to upper left where it's more typical thus easier to find.

* The explore page UX/UI is gorgeous. Very well done. The pics though seem to be quite vague, especially of the bars and restaurants many of which look like blurry snapshots of unknown backgrounds. See San Francisco "Baretta" or "Clift House" for examples.

Great site overall - will definitely use it.

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#12

Post by jakedowns » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:44 PM UTC

The site is really coming along! Large, gorgeous, intuitive user interface coupled with a smooth user experience that begins with the 'as you type' search suggestions on the main page. I love it- it's snappy. My only suggestion at this point would be the ability to click the city name in the header to begin a new search rather than forcing me back to the main page. Ideally it would just become a text input field on click rather than being a link. I love the idea of pulling the info from other sites that my friends already use rather than relying on them creating a gtrot account to start populating the site with info relevant to me. Keep up the great work.

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#13

Post by jph » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:46 PM UTC

iab wrote: post #2

I really liked it - tried it out for my hometown here in the UK and got some pretty pertinent results. One thing though - why is there no persistence of my facebook opt-in choice across the session? For instance, if I tried 'Oxford', and then 'London', I was prompted for facebook permissions both times - was that by design?

Same experience here - your app re-prompted me for Facebook for each city, so each time I had to say no. Would be better if you could ask once, not each time.

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#14

Post by aterris » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:51 PM UTC

jph wrote: post #11

Great idea. Here's my two cents on feedback. * I like the footprints in the logo a lot - it makes me realize quickly that this is an app for exploring nearby. The logo could be easier to read. White line on red outline is pretty hard on the iPad. * The "Click here for travel dates" is too faded to read easily. * When I type "San Francisco", the AJAX loader takes quite a while. This may just be server load - consider…

Thanks for the feedback, you called out a bunch of interesting points!

The AJAX loader for cities preloading some results resonates strongly with me and will hopefully be implemented soon as we work on tightening the UX. Facebook(among plenty of others) does this for friend search and it makes a huge difference in the experience of using that search.

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#15

Post by getsat » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:56 PM UTC

aterris wrote: post #8

danso wrote: post #5

Very nice looking, but you should consider having descriptive URLs. So instead of: http://gtrot.com/explore/2517446 http://gtrot.com/explore/new-york

That is something that has been on my radar forever and was just waiting for me to find a free weekend to code out the script to set everything up. I finally found a free minute and got it all setup so it should be live this week Thanks for the feedback!

#to_param is your friend. :)

Liking the site!

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#16

Post by Blocks8 » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:58 PM UTC

jollyjerry wrote: post #10

Just a stream of notes as I go through the first time around. The fixed bottom footer could use a bit more contrast. When the white text from the main body slides over it, it gets garbled and messy looking. Also, there feels like too much space between each section when I scroll down. I like that I can see results without having to sign in with Facebook. It lets me try out the service before I commit. The color schem…

Thanks for your feedback. We've got a few thoughts on the color scheme too. Appreciate you taking the time!

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#17

Post by Blocks8 » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 9:59 PM UTC

gsmaverick wrote: post #4

Clickable: http://gtrot.com Personally, I would just go to the results page and encourage the user to connect to facebook in a less obtrusive way. Also when clicking on an event it would be nice if you could pull in some more information through some API be it the specific event information or details about the artist playing.

We're currently using SeatGeek for our events. Will work with them to provide a richer event experience.

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#18

Post by alexschiff » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 10:03 PM UTC

Cool to see you using the HN community. I met one of the founders (not sure if it was you by your username) when the University of Michigan visited Lightbank.

So I'm going to New Orleans in January. I typed in my dates and all and started clicking around. The design is beautiful and UX/UI was intuitive.

Some product feedback:

I'm overloaded. There is way too much to look through in New Orleans. I need a better way to filter and curate. This would be really useful if I had the time to sit down and go through all of it but I don't. I might be missing some obvious stuff (it's happened before), but I also don't know how things are being ranked. I literally want one page to go through and ignore the rest, hopefully feeling somewhat confident in knowing that the first page is the most relevant for me. Just my two cents!

-Alex

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#19

Post by Blocks8 » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 10:11 PM UTC

alexschiff wrote: post #18

Cool to see you using the HN community. I met one of the founders (not sure if it was you by your username) when the University of Michigan visited Lightbank. So I'm going to New Orleans in January. I typed in my dates and all and started clicking around. The design is beautiful and UX/UI was intuitive. Some product feedback: I'm overloaded. There is way too much to look through in New Orleans. I need a better way to…

Hey! Thanks for your feedback. What would you imagine better way to educate the user that we rank results based on your likes, so first page of results should be the best (if you login)?

Re: Ask HN: Review my startup, gtrot.com

#20

Post by Blocks8 » Tue, Dec 13, 2011, 10:19 PM UTC

jakedowns wrote: post #12

The site is really coming along! Large, gorgeous, intuitive user interface coupled with a smooth user experience that begins with the 'as you type' search suggestions on the main page. I love it- it's snappy. My only suggestion at this point would be the ability to click the city name in the header to begin a new search rather than forcing me back to the main page. Ideally it would just become a text input field on c…

Thanks for the feedback. Did you link your Foursquare account, did you see results update? (or was it unclear you could even connect with Foursquare?)