New website at Herbert Woods

[Dan]

Hi Everyone

Noticed that Herbert Woods have now got their new website live, after having a bit of a not bad stopgap since breaking away/being sold by NBD earlier in the year.

I've only had a quick look so far, but it looks quite unique compared to their competitors which I think is good, and it also looks fairly up to date and I think a fair amount of cash must have been spent on it.

So far the boats I've looked at have just one internal photo but the odd one has several , and by the look of it a 360 degree tour of each class, so good to see for the first time in many years that I can remember Herbert Woods may be about to lead the market in some areas. I think internals have become vital now as many other operators have moved forward on this and having the tour of every class is a very smart move and want people want. The clips of many of the boats on youtube is another nice feature that's a bit different from what everyone else is doing.

What does everyone else think? I think they have left Blakes for next year so no doubt they will need an amazing effort to let their boats at a good level, so this looks a good and no doubt vital start... I wait with much interest if part of the plan to succeed more on their on two feet for 2011 will include what I consider Woods to have got most wrong in the last 17 years or so - and once again return to be good value for money for each boats standard and style?

http://www.herbertwoods.co.uk

Dan

[Guest]

Hi Dan

its not bad but what i hate is if your planning on bringing out a new brochure or doing a new website is put new upto date shots on the inside & out as sometimes it can be misleading as some of the outside & inside shots they have used for the website & brochure are qwite old now...

if your going to have a revamped website & brochure do it proper

thats what realy grinds my gears

Jonny

[Dan]

Hi Jonny

The internal video type shots are all brand new as are most of the internal photos I've seen so far. Some of the externals aren't, and some are still old airbrushed photos of the boats from years back but generally most of the stuff is quite new, clicking on the youtube link would give you as good an idea of the outside as I think you could possibly get without turning up to see it really so I think they've done well on that personally.

Hopefully though the external ones that aren't new (or look old/grainy) can be changed to more recent high quality ones in time, but someone or several people there have organised or spent time getting an absolute stack of new material together.

Dan

[Dan]

Just had a look at the history/about us section... the about us doesnt seem to be about them and if clicking on the history button there is a few charming/interesting old pictures but surely a boatyard with a history spanning 80 years should be able to span more than two very short paragraphs. As a potential customer reading that I could only interpret the lack of information to mean the current owners have no passion, interest or knowledge in its history.... surely it deserves a lot more space and information, or if not then would be better removed entirely than left in its current briefness?

http://www.herbertwoods.co.uk/history.php

Best pipe down now!

Dan

[jillR]

i agree dan

better nothing than that

i looked at the cottages and could not see any internal shots

but thats just probably me missing the right button

jill

[Dan]

Hi Jill

There are some on the ones I've looked at. What you have to do is click on the cottages, then enter the dates you'd want to go and do a search. You can then click for more info on what comes up which is where you find the pictures. Its possible you were maybe browsing the brochure, which is not really whats new. Using the search boxes should eventually get you to an accommodation information screen with the odd overview/appetiser picture and one or two virtual toors to click on.

It does highlight that I think you only really get the best out of the site by putting in an availability date and searching, which is a shame as to start with people might not do that, as often exacting dates are not known to start with so that would be done further down the line. If you want to view the entire fleet I think you can only do that by the brochure, which isn't as good. Really they could do with a view the fleet, and with size, berth, price order filters that you can change priority of... or just making it so that if you dont put a date in the search boxes then their boats in that size bracket all come up. When I didnt enter any dates for a two berth and clicked search it just said there were no holidays... maybe that's a bug or the systems not tried to be broken or used too much yet.

All the best

Dan

[Broads01]

I agree with what's been said so far. It really is good to have so many 360 degree internal views available. I'd like to have an 'Our Fleet' link though just to go straight to the boats without needing the availability thingy. The home page is too busy and confusing for me, but that's probably personal taste. It opens on the 'choose your adventure screen', which is fine, but when you click on boats you still get all the other stuff as well!

[Guest]

I agree with what's been said so far. It really is good to have so many 360 degree internal views available. I'd like to have an 'Our Fleet' link though just to go straight to the boats without needing the availability thingy. The home page is too busy and confusing for me, but that's probably personal taste. It opens on the 'choose your adventure screen', which is fine, but when you click on boats you still get all the other stuff as well!

faircraft Loynes have done that on there site http://www.norfolkbroadsdirect.co.uk/cruiserhome.asp?page_id=87

look half way down on the right hand side see all our cruisers

Jonny

[Dan]

Been having a good look through the downloadable brochure for next year and the off peak weeks looked a lot less than I remembered.

Doing some price comparisons from 2010 shows these are now much more sensible and more in line or closer to some of their competitors, though the peak season has increased (as is the norm I guess).

Also the re-naming of some of the cruisers appears to be to make two classes out of one large class, to allow for pet free boats

Just a shame the website hasn't got that all cruisers option discussed, and list by berth/price etc and only works well by doing an availability search, a shame as they have a lot of beds to fill.

Dan

[Guest]

i received there 2011 brochure this morning i have to say they have tried very hard

Jonny

[Dan]

...Just a shame the website hasn't got that all cruisers option discussed, and list by berth/price etc and only works well by doing an availability search, a shame as they have a lot of beds to fill.

I see they have now added a "Click here for our 2011 Fleet" button

With their revised pricing pockets of exceptional value have appeared, for example if you were wanting the last week of September they are at their lowest price band where most competitors are not (normally about band C still), so that week in particular they can be much cheaper or you can potentially have a bigger boat from them for the same price as elsewhere.

Dan

[Hemel_Dave]

Well spotted Dan

Dave

[Dan]

Hi Dave

I hadn't spotted it until you told me, but it does increase their value for money that week especially. I wonder if other people will take advantage as you have and they may be much busier that week?!

Dan