I was having a conversation with my roomate this evening about web design. He’s studying to become a grade school teacher so I always enjoy conversations with him where we can relate similar opinions to each other from different perspectives. So tonight I mentioned that I believe that every e-commerce site should integrate a community section on their site. Why not? E-commerce sites have built up a user base of like minded people who have already proven their willingness and ability to spend money, so why not put them in touch with each other? Give them a public profile (hiding private information of course) but if you’re selling trading cards, let them upload images of their best cards, or collections, or their thoughts/opinions/comments on what everyone else is up to. It makes your company more transparent and thus trustable, it makes your site more sticky for existing customers and so is a natural retention effort, and also allows you to put your own products back up in front of them for FREE. It’s a very simple concept, and being an entrepreneuer in the process of building such a site, I imagine other companies will follow suit soon enough.

The punchline of my story is my roomate’s remark in response to my rant, he said, “Just Google it.” Not as in “just search for it”, but as in - make it simple, usable and enjoyable. It’s an interesting perspective which I agree with and which I thought I’d share.