50% off all fiction, romance and biographies for this weekend only!

Direct Ebooks · 10-16-2009, 01:06 PM

Hi guys n gals!

This weekend at www.directebooks.com, we are having a massive sale. 50% off all fiction, romance and biographies. We have over 140k books available for sale. No coupons, micro money or codes - just a straight money-saving offer.

So if you've had your eye on a particular title or were thinking of getting the next book in that series, now is the time. This offer will only last until Monday morning, so get to the store now - www.directebooks.com.

Thank you and enjoy your reading!

P.s. Any feedback on the site is very welcome! We want it to be as user friendly as possible, so let us know!

JSWolf · 10-16-2009, 01:49 PM

I would like to make a suggestion. That is to change your listings from Adobe Digital Editions to PDF. Adobe Digital Editions is not a format and will only confuse people. They may not know they are not ePub, but PDF and incorrectly purchase in PDF when they want ePub. Adobe Digital Editions is the software to view ePub and PDF (both with and without DRM). It is not a format.

Ea · 10-16-2009, 01:58 PM

That certainly looks interesting

As for feedback; pages with multiple results are extremely slow to load - looks like it's the book cover images that slows it down. I tried browsing a little, but I got really tired of it very quickly. This is definitely something you should work on optimising.

It's good that you have many results on a page - but I think you could use smaller cover images and use the space that's freed up for such essential information as price and avalable file formats.

Direct Ebooks · 10-16-2009, 01:59 PM

Good suggestion, Thank you. I'll change that first thing monday. As with anything its always useful to have another pair of eyes look at these things.

Ea · 10-16-2009, 01:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I would like to make a suggestion. That is to change your listings from Adobe Digital Editions to PDF. Adobe Digital Editions is not a format and will only confuse people. They may not know they are not ePub, but PDF and incorrectly purchase in PDF when they want ePub. Adobe Digital Editions is the software to view ePub and PDF (both with and without DRM). It is not a format.

What he said. Because I don't want to buy PDF, I would choose not to buy anything at all, if I can't be certain that I am buyng epub.

Wenn · 10-17-2009, 07:00 PM

Hi-thanks for notifying of the 50% off sale--since the price was right, I just purchased 3 books yesterday by authors I had been wanting to try for a while. I thought I might even purchase a couple more today, and searching through your site again just now is what prompted this post: If you're sincere about welcoming user feedback, please seriously consider Ea's advice in the above posts.

Unfortunately, as Ea noted, pages with multiple are slow to load due to the large book covers. While I like seeing the covers there since they help me recognize books I've seen & wanted to read, they could be made smaller. Also, to echo Ea, it would be great if the price (with sale marked next to it in red, if such a thing should apply) and the available file formats were also shown under the book cover. It would be great to even take this a step future by listing copyright date of the book so the reader knows when it came out, perhaps the publisher of the book as well, and if the name of the series underneath the title (as well as the sequence number of the series) if that book is part of a series. (Oddly, you do this with a few books not not many and not even all books within the same series. For instance, you mark "Bloody Bones" by Laurell K Hamiliton as being "Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 5" but nothing is indicated her "The Killing Dance," which is also an Anita Blake novel.)

Also, it isn't clear to me how the books are presented when doing searches for the different categories, such as "Fantasy-General." How are these books being ordered? By bestselling? They don't appear to be arranged alphabetically by author's last name or book title. It would be very handy if the customer was presented a way of further ordering the books, such as by sorting by popularity, or lowest/highest price, author's last name, series, etc. If such a means already exists, my apologies, but it wasn't readily apparent to me that it did.

It would be nice, as well, if the customer had the option to chose how many books to display on a single page. I prefer to scroll down rather than keep hitting "next" and waiting for the next page to load--which takes a bit of time due to the size of the cover graphics, as mentioned previously.

Moreover, it would be nice if you offered a definition for all your various categories/subcategories somewhere--something to explain the different between "Fantasy-General" and "Fantasy-Epic" and so on. Sometimes it's easy to figure out, but a glossy would be nifty. Again, if it exists and I missed it, my apologies, but then it needs to be made easier to get to.

On final suggestion, on the same page where you provide the info on a book, it would be handy if you provided the author's name underneath the title and a link to a page with further books by that author. Sometimes, a particular book might intrigue me but I don't want to take a chance on purchasing a dud that may have a great summarizing blurb about it. So, I like to see what else that author has written. The way your site is set up, I have to type out the author's name into the search box. The way other sites (Fictionwise, for example) are set up, all you have to do is click on the author's name underneath the book title. That's more user friendly and convenient.

I hope these suggestions help. Thank you again for notifying us of your sale & while I signed up for your email notifications, I hope you will continue to MobileRead of any future promotions!

Direct Ebooks · 10-18-2009, 09:24 AM

Hi Wenn.

Thank you very much for your custom and the feedback! you have some great ideas and I will be looking into them in the coming days.

Part of the problem we have is that we are dependent on our suppliers for information about the books, authors, series etc, so this limits our ability to provide many of the functions as suggested.
Our future plans are to build a catologue of titles that we sould manage on a non exclusive basis for publishers and authors. This would enable us to go into incredible detail on titles to provide really good searchability and UI for the customer. We would make the titles available on our site as well as providing them for other retailers. We think there is the opportunity there for an independent distributor.

Just to let you know also, that on the individual books page, there is a link to other titles by the same author under "related searches", - maybe this need to be re-titled or highlighted.

So, thanks again and we will be implementing many of your suggestions in the near future!

JSWolf · 10-18-2009, 09:36 AM

I just took a quick look at science fiction and found trashy romance type books in the SF section. They don't belong.

Direct Ebooks · 10-18-2009, 11:06 AM

Thanks JSWolf.
Again, its an issue with the information we get from the suppliers/publishers. Because of the number of books we have it is difficult to monitor issues like this.
Hopefully, when we can control our own content as I mentioned earlier, we can resolve this.

Jonas777 · 10-18-2009, 11:18 AM

all defective by DRM.

Direct Ebooks · 10-19-2009, 05:24 AM

A big thank you to all the mobileread members who visited the site over the weekend.
We are a small company and all theinsightful suggestions will certainly help us in the long term. We are commited to being customer friendly and giving e-readers exactly what they want.

Thanks also to those who purchased eBooks over the weekend. feel free to share your experience here or direct to us.

Keep checking the site as we will have continuous special offers and promotions.
Please email us if you have any requests or any more suggestions.

bookratt · 10-20-2009, 05:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I just took a quick look at science fiction and found trashy romance type books in the SF section. They don't belong.

Maybe the "trashy" romance type books are science fiction - doesn't ever happen! LOL!

I took advantage of the sale, and stocked up on 8 books Saturday. Thanks for the good deal!

ahi · 10-21-2009, 10:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I would like to make a suggestion. That is to change your listings from Adobe Digital Editions to PDF. Adobe Digital Editions is not a format and will only confuse people. They may not know they are not ePub, but PDF and incorrectly purchase in PDF when they want ePub. Adobe Digital Editions is the software to view ePub and PDF (both with and without DRM). It is not a format.

Or, indeed, expect a professionally formatted PDF and get an ePub instead... even worse, really.

So yes, I agree with JSWolf, the format should be made very clear.

- Ahi

10-16-2009, 01:06 PM	#1
Direct Ebooks Hibernian eBook Warrior Posts: 184 Karma: 1264 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Cork, Ireland Device: Sony Reader	50% off all fiction, romance and biographies for this weekend only! OFFER EXPIRED Hi guys n gals! This weekend at www.directebooks.com, we are having a massive sale. 50% off all fiction, romance and biographies. We have over 140k books available for sale. No coupons, micro money or codes - just a straight money-saving offer. So if you've had your eye on a particular title or were thinking of getting the next book in that series, now is the time. This offer will only last until Monday morning, so get to the store now - www.directebooks.com. Thank you and enjoy your reading! P.s. Any feedback on the site is very welcome! We want it to be as user friendly as possible, so let us know! Last edited by Direct Ebooks; 10-19-2009 at 05:25 AM.

10-18-2009, 11:18 AM	#10
Jonas777 Groupie Posts: 153 Karma: 364 Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Sweden Device: Amazon Kindle 2 Intl	Nice offer but... all defective by DRM.

10-19-2009, 05:24 AM	#11
Direct Ebooks Hibernian eBook Warrior Posts: 184 Karma: 1264 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Cork, Ireland Device: Sony Reader	Thank you! A big thank you to all the mobileread members who visited the site over the weekend. We are a small company and all theinsightful suggestions will certainly help us in the long term. We are commited to being customer friendly and giving e-readers exactly what they want. Thanks also to those who purchased eBooks over the weekend. feel free to share your experience here or direct to us. Keep checking the site as we will have continuous special offers and promotions. Please email us if you have any requests or any more suggestions.

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10-16-2009, 01:49 PM	#2
JSWolf Resident Curmudgeon Posts: 73,975 Karma: 128903378 Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Roslindale, Massachusetts Device: Kobo Libra 2, Kobo Aura H2O, PRS-650, PRS-T1, nook STR, PW3	I would like to make a suggestion. That is to change your listings from Adobe Digital Editions to PDF. Adobe Digital Editions is not a format and will only confuse people. They may not know they are not ePub, but PDF and incorrectly purchase in PDF when they want ePub. Adobe Digital Editions is the software to view ePub and PDF (both with and without DRM). It is not a format.

10-16-2009, 01:58 PM	#3
Ea Wizard Posts: 3,490 Karma: 5239563 Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Denmark Device: Kindle 3\|iPad air\|iPhone 4S	That certainly looks interesting As for feedback; pages with multiple results are extremely slow to load - looks like it's the book cover images that slows it down. I tried browsing a little, but I got really tired of it very quickly. This is definitely something you should work on optimising. It's good that you have many results on a page - but I think you could use smaller cover images and use the space that's freed up for such essential information as price and avalable file formats.

10-16-2009, 01:59 PM	#4
Direct Ebooks Hibernian eBook Warrior Posts: 184 Karma: 1264 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Cork, Ireland Device: Sony Reader	Good suggestion, Thank you. I'll change that first thing monday. As with anything its always useful to have another pair of eyes look at these things.

10-17-2009, 07:00 PM	#6
Wenn Member Posts: 19 Karma: 52 Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Denver, CO Device: Motorola DROID, Kindle 3, ColorNook	Hi-thanks for notifying of the 50% off sale--since the price was right, I just purchased 3 books yesterday by authors I had been wanting to try for a while. I thought I might even purchase a couple more today, and searching through your site again just now is what prompted this post: If you're sincere about welcoming user feedback, please seriously consider Ea's advice in the above posts. Unfortunately, as Ea noted, pages with multiple are slow to load due to the large book covers. While I like seeing the covers there since they help me recognize books I've seen & wanted to read, they could be made smaller. Also, to echo Ea, it would be great if the price (with sale marked next to it in red, if such a thing should apply) and the available file formats were also shown under the book cover. It would be great to even take this a step future by listing copyright date of the book so the reader knows when it came out, perhaps the publisher of the book as well, and if the name of the series underneath the title (as well as the sequence number of the series) if that book is part of a series. (Oddly, you do this with a few books not not many and not even all books within the same series. For instance, you mark "Bloody Bones" by Laurell K Hamiliton as being "Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 5" but nothing is indicated her "The Killing Dance," which is also an Anita Blake novel.) Also, it isn't clear to me how the books are presented when doing searches for the different categories, such as "Fantasy-General." How are these books being ordered? By bestselling? They don't appear to be arranged alphabetically by author's last name or book title. It would be very handy if the customer was presented a way of further ordering the books, such as by sorting by popularity, or lowest/highest price, author's last name, series, etc. If such a means already exists, my apologies, but it wasn't readily apparent to me that it did. It would be nice, as well, if the customer had the option to chose how many books to display on a single page. I prefer to scroll down rather than keep hitting "next" and waiting for the next page to load--which takes a bit of time due to the size of the cover graphics, as mentioned previously. Moreover, it would be nice if you offered a definition for all your various categories/subcategories somewhere--something to explain the different between "Fantasy-General" and "Fantasy-Epic" and so on. Sometimes it's easy to figure out, but a glossy would be nifty. Again, if it exists and I missed it, my apologies, but then it needs to be made easier to get to. On final suggestion, on the same page where you provide the info on a book, it would be handy if you provided the author's name underneath the title and a link to a page with further books by that author. Sometimes, a particular book might intrigue me but I don't want to take a chance on purchasing a dud that may have a great summarizing blurb about it. So, I like to see what else that author has written. The way your site is set up, I have to type out the author's name into the search box. The way other sites (Fictionwise, for example) are set up, all you have to do is click on the author's name underneath the book title. That's more user friendly and convenient. I hope these suggestions help. Thank you again for notifying us of your sale & while I signed up for your email notifications, I hope you will continue to MobileRead of any future promotions!

10-18-2009, 09:24 AM	#7
Direct Ebooks Hibernian eBook Warrior Posts: 184 Karma: 1264 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Cork, Ireland Device: Sony Reader	Hi Wenn. Thank you very much for your custom and the feedback! you have some great ideas and I will be looking into them in the coming days. Part of the problem we have is that we are dependent on our suppliers for information about the books, authors, series etc, so this limits our ability to provide many of the functions as suggested. Our future plans are to build a catologue of titles that we sould manage on a non exclusive basis for publishers and authors. This would enable us to go into incredible detail on titles to provide really good searchability and UI for the customer. We would make the titles available on our site as well as providing them for other retailers. We think there is the opportunity there for an independent distributor. Just to let you know also, that on the individual books page, there is a link to other titles by the same author under "related searches", - maybe this need to be re-titled or highlighted. So, thanks again and we will be implementing many of your suggestions in the near future!

10-18-2009, 09:36 AM	#8
JSWolf Resident Curmudgeon Posts: 73,975 Karma: 128903378 Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Roslindale, Massachusetts Device: Kobo Libra 2, Kobo Aura H2O, PRS-650, PRS-T1, nook STR, PW3	I just took a quick look at science fiction and found trashy romance type books in the SF section. They don't belong.

10-18-2009, 11:06 AM	#9
Direct Ebooks Hibernian eBook Warrior Posts: 184 Karma: 1264 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Cork, Ireland Device: Sony Reader	Thanks JSWolf. Again, its an issue with the information we get from the suppliers/publishers. Because of the number of books we have it is difficult to monitor issues like this. Hopefully, when we can control our own content as I mentioned earlier, we can resolve this.

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