I realised a week or so ago that I was about to hit the 500 review mark and so thought I would take the opportunity to write something a little bit different to the usual style of review-writing that I undertake.

As I have been a member of Dooyoo for some time now - well over two years in fact - I feel that I have gained sufficient experience of the site to be able to share my opinion properly. (I must confess that I find it slightly irritating when new members - often with their 'new member' badge still intact on their profile page - see fit to give their views and advice on how improvements to the site can be made, or suggestions on how members should compose their reviews!!) A little experience goes a long way with giving advice and making suggestions, in my view.... Anyway....


** First (and cursed..!) **

The first thing that springs to mind, when thinking about possible improvements to the Dooyoo site overall, is the introduction of some sort of 'indicator' on members' pages of reviews, which would indicate to me which of the reviews on the page I had already read. A simple coloured highlighter, or a coloured dot, or really any sort of marker would surely not be too difficult for the Dooyoo team to implement?

The reason behind my wish for a coloured marker is quite simple. I often need to spend a lot of time (and effort!) going through other members pages of reviews, to attempt to find one that I have not read before. The simple addition of a coloured marker next to each of the reviews that I had previously read would indicate to me at a glance which review I should be reading next.

There are a lot of great writers on Dooyoo (and on the 'other side' too of course!) and this means that I regularly 'seek out' many members whose reviews I know I am going to enjoy reading. As I read and rate quite a lot of reviews over any one week, I can find it difficult to remember which ones I have already read, and so a little indicator here would make the whole process much easier.


** Suggesting is Testing!...(With much Protesting..!!) **

When it comes to product suggestions, I have witnessed several changes to the suggestion process during my time with Dooyoo, but have only recently found a few gripes with the most recent changes that Dooyoo have introduced to the system. There was a previous change, where the number of suggestions that a member could make in any one week was reduced to only five, but this in itself didn't really pose too much of a problem for me personally as I generally only write one review a day, so five suggestions in any one seven-day period was quite ample for my own needs. At the time however, I could quite understand how members who chose to write more than myself felt frustrated and, well, restricted by this new limit to how many items they could suggest in one week, as it no doubt 'curbed' the volume of reviews they submitted in that week.

I have recently felt more sympathetic towards these members because the newest restrictions that have been introduced to the suggestion process have had quite a big effect on my own review writing, and so I can empathise with the feelings of being "dictated to" that other members were voicing earlier in the year.

That said however, I can sympathise too with Dooyoo, who no doubt have huge piles of suggestions to wade through each week and yes, I agree that in times gone past the waiting times for product suggestions to be accepted into the system were rather unacceptable for a lot of the time. I do not, however, feel that the current system of only allowing product suggestions in certain product categories each month is a satisfactory solution to the problem - from the review writers' point, at least.

What has happened in the case of my own review writing is that I have found that the new products I have purchased cannot be reviewed because the product does not already exist on the Dooyoo database, and there is a restriction or 'ban' on suggestions being made within the relevant category that month. This has caused no end of frustration and disappointment and as I have been unable to suggest my product, resulting in me being unable to write my review, I have tended to feel my enthusiasm 'dwindling' slightly, resulting in my motivation being lost, usually for several days at a time.

I understand that I can write the review and suggest it the following month, when, presumably, the relevant category will no doubt be on the 'selected category' list issued by Dooyoo, but this would not always appear to be the case in EVERY instance. A perfect example of this would be some Christmas confectionary items that I purchased at the start of November. Thinking that they would be an ideal item to write a review on (let's face it - most people buy Christmas-based foodstuffs at this time of year, don't they?) I found the product online and was all set to submit my request to Dooyoo, only to find that the Food/Drink category was not an 'approved' category for making suggestions during the month of November. I grudgingly decided to wait until December to make my product suggestion and of course again, during December, the very 'soul' of the festive season(!) Dooyoo have seen fit to refrain from allowing suggestions to be made in the Food/Drink category once again.

I, as both a review writer AND a consumer, am absolutely flummoxed by the decisions Dooyoo have made in terms of which suggestions are allowed, for both November and December. In particular, I find it ludicrous that I cannot suggest and subsequently review items of food (particularly when you consider the amount of party food items that the average household buys (and consumes!) at this time of year, not to mention festive/Christmas confectionary items and chocolates, Christmas puddings, Mince Pies and so on...) as I don't know anybody who doesn't spend a fortune on foodstuffs and alcohol at this time of year, but maybe that's just me.

As Christmas approaches, it is obvious surely that consumers want to read product reviews on gift items, such as perfumes, toiletries and gift sets, toys, games and the like, in order to make the best purchasing decisions? Whilst this is probably the case for most of the rest of the year too, I would have thought it was even more so at Christmas time, and yet not one of the items I have listed here is on the 'approved' list of Dooyoo suggestions for December.

I can quite understand the need for Dooyoo to regulate the suggestions process, or make it fairer or control the volume of suggestions submitted. What I can't get my head around is the decisions behind the restrictions on certain categories.

Perhaps a fairer way of 'restricting' which categories suggestions can be submitted in, would be to have 50% of the entire category list available for one month and then rotate this with the remaining 50% of the category list the following month. That way, at least, no one single category would be excluded for more than a month (unlike the food category, in the example I have given earlier) and hopefully no members would be left feeling "dictated to" or, in my own case, slightly resentful, due to feeling that my reviews were much less helpful, or carried much less 'clout' than other members' work, purely because they chose to write in a different category to myself.


** Editless?!..... Creditless!! **

This is quite a simple, straightforward point to put across. I would like the choice to 'add' a little to my reviews by the addition of a different font, or at the very least a bold and italic option for the font contained in my review.

By editing my reviews in this way, by using little tools here and there, such as being able to adjust any headings, make any important points stand out by using bold and the like, I am able to give my reviews a more detailed look and they come across as looking more professional in many cases. This is a tool that is available to users of other review websites such as Ciao, so I'm not entirely sure why Dooyoo can't offer a similar facility.

In addition, there is the option to upload photographs onto my reviews on Ciao which can be a very helpful tool in showing off a certain feature of a product or even just to show the product in a little more detail. It is quite a big bugbear of mine to have to spend a bit of time looking for a picture online to submit to Dooyoo when I am suggesting a product, only to then have the suggestion accepted by the team, and find that they have omitted the online picture I have submitted, meaning that the Dooyoo page has no picture on it for consumers to see what I am talking about! If I was allowed to upload my own photograph, then this wouldn't be an issue, but I must admit that I find it slightly disappointing when I am going on about how pretty a product is, or describing the detail on an item, only to find that Dooyoo have failed to add the online picture that I've submitted.


** To Conclude...! (And not Brood, Dude..) **

Throughout the time I have been a member of Dooyoo, I've enjoyed my time using the site for the most part. It's true that there are a few little 'niggles' I would like to see ironed out, and not to mention a few members who I would like to see having a little 'talking to' about their conduct, and in particular the way their behaviour can come across as being like that of a bully. I think it's important to remember that we are all equals on Dooyoo and nobody is any better than anybody else!!

Overall however, I have enjoyed my time writing on Dooyoo and have found it to be a friendly environment for the most part. I have made some very good friends on here, and I have enjoyed expressing my opinions and sharing my experiences.

Will I write another 500 reviews?....... Yes, Probably.
(But only if I am allowed to suggest the products in the first place.. *Ahem*!!)