WordPress Confusion Continues

CodingJack said

GravityDept said
Perhaps ThemeForest is too strongly associated with WordPress?

This situation is the buyer’s fault, but Envato’s problem. Everyone is responsible for their own knowledge. It’s not the kindest truth, but I don’t think putting “Not WordPress compatible” tags on everything is the solution.

That only perpetrates the WordPress-centricity of ThemeForest.

I hear what you’re saying. Maybe this is why the “new member” videos would work best. Because if an author sells Joomla plugins, they probably don’t want to draw attention to WP in any way.

The video idea would take some work but I think it could pay off in the long run because it could cover so many things that would be important to a new buyer.

I guess they won’t watch it. Just a guess.

omarabid said

CodingJack said

GravityDept said
Perhaps ThemeForest is too strongly associated with WordPress?

This situation is the buyer’s fault, but Envato’s problem. Everyone is responsible for their own knowledge. It’s not the kindest truth, but I don’t think putting “Not WordPress compatible” tags on everything is the solution.

That only perpetrates the WordPress-centricity of ThemeForest.

I hear what you’re saying. Maybe this is why the “new member” videos would work best. Because if an author sells Joomla plugins, they probably don’t want to draw attention to WP in any way.

The video idea would take some work but I think it could pay off in the long run because it could cover so many things that would be important to a new buyer.

I guess they won’t watch it. Just a guess.

I would say that’s the biggest obstacle we’re facing. No matter how obvious we make it, there’s no guarantee that buyers will use it or see it. Japh has been working on some new training materials, and we looking closing at our UX to make some changes across the Marketplaces.

VF said
I think the reason for such high number of mistaken purchases are due to false advertisements made by 3rd parties who targets referrals. I am not sure that is the only reason but looking at how many unknown friends referring our files, this also could be the reason. Such cases, buyers may not go completely through item description and assume the category name they looked at 3rd party sites.

That’s probably the biggest issue to be honest with you. I already suggested that if you abuse the referral system with false advertisement, you should have your referral status revoked immediately, it’s getting out of control and causes more work with support tickets and upset customers.

I see on Adobe exchange, users who are trying to gain referral revenue never update the products and there is a ton of misleading and false information linking to the product pages on Envato Market Place.

There needs to be more done regarding misleading and falsely advertised products, because to be blunt, it’s a huge [language removed – keep it clean, please] problem that is not getting taken serious in my opinion… just because I’ve single handedly experienced this more than a few time, A BUNCH !

Here’s the lackluster response from support regarding what type of punishment is taken when there is false advertisement on products:

If we receive multiple complaints for an item we have our reviewers double check the item to make sure it is working as described. If the reviewers deem the item is corrupt or not as described we would then remove the item and ask the author to address the issues.

This is not the way you handle this type of situation. I sent screenshots and google cached pages showing where the false advertisement was at and still nothing was done… these issues date back more than a year as well, also one of the products from a year ago still shows screenshots that are misleading.

I couldn’t tell you the amount of refunds I’ve had due to false advertisement. Quality control is becoming a huge issue around here. This is why I’ve signed up with ET and RT to purchase all of my future themes for my freelance clients. I am through with these issues being brushed under the rug.

Here is an idea: Make this area more visible.. or add it also in the main Item Info.



That is pretty much the only text that officially tells in what type of theme is displayed, except other small text from item table that says the cms version compatible.
I think a good idea is to have a special field, a highlighted area that says what type of CMS the current theme is using. Wordpress, Joomla, No Cms – HTML template, Custom, etc.



CMS : Wordpress.

KingDog said

omarabid said
I guess they won’t watch it. Just a guess.

I would say that’s the biggest obstacle we’re facing. No matter how obvious we make it, there’s no guarantee that buyers will use it or see it. Japh has been working on some new training materials, and we looking closing at our UX to make some changes across the Marketplaces.

If the user is shown an introduction video when they sign up, they’ll see it. Maybe they don’t watch it, but at least an effort was made on our part to help create a high quality buying experience.

Another reason why I think an introductory video would be great is for navigating the site. As regular users we forget what it’s like to encounter the marketplaces for the first time. But if we think back to some of the big overhauls Envato’s done over time, there was always a learning curve involved to get used to the new changes. So the curve is there, we just don’t see it.

It also helps if Authors upload their contents into the correct category. I’ve seen a couple of WP items on CC uploaded to php Scripts/Misc instead of WP/Misc.

These were reported and Support said they’d move them to the correct category yet they are still listed in the wrong category

Well I think we are in a very debatable problem here. We can not say anything whether the buyers are responsible or not.

For example, if we say that there is very less information on an item page to represent if its a HTML template or a CMS theme. This can be true but again there are so many things which represents what an item is actually and i do not thing so many things can be missed at one.

1- At the navigation, the buyer can clearly see there is a separate tab/menu for “WordPress” which is different from site templates. So they will know just by landing on the website that there is a difference.

2- Just as wickedpixel has mentioned, there is this breadcrumb which allows buyers to see where they are and understand that they are not in the right category so they can not expect a WordPress Theme Here.

3- If the buyer is referred through a link, then he can clearly read the item title. Which never says “WordPress” when its not a WordPress theme.

And also, neither we nor envato stuff really know the faith of the buyer, so I do not thing a refund is possible. What if they need a site template and buy it, once they download it, then they will ask for refund. If this starts working for them then I do not think they will ever get charged for any theme they buy here.

Possible Solution:

1- Since buyers are too lazy to read, may be just like the badges, we make small icons of the WordPress, Drupal and other popular CMS and have something like this.

“This Item is Compatible With” And below this, we can have the WordPress icon. This way they do not have to read anything, just seeing it and they will know what this theme is all about. And if the same theme is available in multiple CMS , we can say.

“This Item is also available on” And below we have icon of the next CMS with the correct link. Once they click, they will go to the correct CMS theme they want.

2- The referral problem, if we do not want these sites to link to our products with their referral links. Then there should be a setting which can allow us to mention which usernames can use our items with their referral ID, like a “Safe List”. This way, only people we know like our friends can get the benefit and these sites will soon stop doing this once they find out they are not earning anything. In other words, anyone else out of this list no matter how many referrals he send, the referral code should not work.

What you guys think?