Tumblr is a very easy to use microblogging platform and social networking website, owned and operated by Tumblr, Inc. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content to a short-form blog. Users can follow other users' blogs, as well as make their blogs private.
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Volusion
Score 4.9 out of 10
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Volusion is a cloud-based ecommerce solution from the company of the same name in Austin, TX. It features an intuitive dashboard, built-in marketing and promos, SEO, templates, and tools to customize look and appearance.
Tumblr can be complicated when it comes to using it in a work setting. With the privacy options being somewhat limited, you will want to make sure that your staff are only sharing information that they are comfortable with in the public realm. You'll need to put some effort into designing an appropriate policy that covers the use of Tumblr and what content can be shared. If you're simply finding a way to engage staff and perhaps show outsiders what it is like to work at your organization, it can be used quite effectively, but you have to be mindful of how involved it gets.
Volusion is a good company if you're starting out. The problem is that, if you want more complexity out of the program, you're kind of stuck. Also the regular time out errors and slow downs can be very frustrating. Packages that miss overnight deadlines because your system stops working can cost you customers. In today's highly competitive market, that's just something that's hard to put up with. If you have a lower volume of business you might be able to work around these issues.
Templates are pre-built for a good end user experience. I've gone through the process of building custom sites as well as tweaking both free and paid templates that Volusion's design team provides.
Their support team didn't use to be as helpful, but in recent years have answered nearly all questions I've had. Their support section within the database provides detailed walkthrus as well.
Order processing is easy once you've been trained on the system. We got to a point where nearly the entire process was automated from initial purchase through shipping.
It can be hard to get followers, similar to Twitter.
Also similar to Twitter, its possible to get followers that are in no way interested in your business and seeking to promote themselves.
If you want to use Tumblr to promote your products online, it can be a trial and error process that can be frustrating for businesses that have little experience with photography.
API calls use the previous call as a reference, even if you weren't the one we made the previous call. Can lead to data gaps, so you often have to set a manual date range to look back to make sure you aren't missing any data.
Because of its ease of use - both on desktop and mobile - and the perks of being able to schedule a post for future release, Tumblr is a tool that we plan to continue using in the long term. Despite feeling like a primairly one-sided tool, it can also start conversations online, which is something for which we are always striving.
When you spend so much time with a product like this and not only have you witnessed its growth, but you almost feel like you are next those that make the decisions of building features a certain way, you can't help but want to stay and be a part of their continued growth. It's simply a great product. Can it improve? By all means! But it will only improve because of users and avid resellers like me.
Tumblr is an easy to use tool. If you're looking for a simple platform that isn't complicated Tumblr works well. There are even ways to embed it to a company website.
You have to wait on hold for at least 45 minutes every call—the tech support person never knows the answer right away so they put you on 10 minute holds only to come back and say they're still looking for answers. The chat function could take days to get a response. Our "Dedicated Account Manager" never checks in or answers, nor are they ever in the office when we call. It's like they try to be as unavailable as possible until you forget why you even called in the first place. Insane.
It is best to use the built-in features and recommended services for the most turn-key experience (ie. Skipjack for payment processing so that it can all be done from the Volusion backend).
Tumblr turns out to be better than Facebook Pages as it allows the pages to be in the form of customizable templates. It doesn't conform to specific rules for publications beyond the provided templates. Compared to WordPress, Tumblr is much simpler to use. It doesn't require any page management skills.
While k-eCommerce was very glamorous to us because it integrates with our main workflow, it just didn't have some of the marketing features that are so integral to the way we do business online. The set-up costs were also way too high. Volusion is so affordable and feature heavy, it makes it very difficult for any shopping cart provider to compete. You can find others who are competitively priced and have similar features, but they simply aren't as robust (at least for the way we use it)
Honestly, when you're in the dashboard, the UX is simply horrendous. I mean, everything that should be 1-2 clicks away is 4-6 clicks away, and each pages takes at least four seconds to load. You just find yourself wasting a lot of time waiting for things to load. This should be more simple.
