TheParty.Net provides event-specific, unbiased, single-click, localized search results for wedding, event and party planning.
Target Audience: Individuals planning a party, wedding or corporate event, the soccer mom planning a season-ending party and anyone going to an event looking for a fresh idea.
Website URL: https://www.theparty.net
No. of Feedback Providers Requested: 3
Note to Feedback Providers:
Please note that businesses are looking for in-depth feedback that gives them thorough, insightful and actionable input. A ‘superficial’ submission that does not add value, is not thorough (i.e. written in a hurry, with poor grammar, punctuation etc.) and does not offer any concrete, constructive feedback is not helpful and will be rejected.
Feedback sought:
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which on do you prefer? Why?
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have.
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
My attention is immediately goes to the three large pictures and I am curious why they are there so I scroll over them to see what happens. Then as I look around the page I note that it is simple and colorful but I feel like the focus is taken away from the search options and put on the large pictures.
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
Planning a large event such as a wedding takes weeks, even months. I would imagine smaller events could take anywhere from 5-10 hours depending on how elaborate it is.
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
It is much quicker to simply scroll through a list and select the event services that I want verses searching each one individually on Google. It is also nice to use the list because it may help me think of services I may have forgotten to include otherwise.
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which on do you prefer? Why?
I prefer The Party.net in the sense that it makes it very easy to see all of the services I need at once, in one list. But, overall, I prefer the other website that I found simply because it provides more functionality such as user reviews, results sorting options, favorites, etc.
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have.
On the home page:
– The Details dropdown is difficult to use. Scrolling through a dropdown that long, selecting so many options, not being able to see the different types of photographer options for example make it very difficult to use.
On the search results page:
– The results came back very quickly. I was impressed with the speed.
– There is almost zero functionality here. I can’t even click on the url of a vendor to go to their website. I would like to have save/favorite features, print options, user reviews, sorting options, etc.
– The whole ‘hold down shift and click View All’ thing is really annoying. Every time I hold down shift I am moved to a different place on the page because all of that instructional text is removed and the page adjusts and I lose my spot.
– Listing the address to a vendor without the city is very confusing for my area because I selected a 20 mile radius and there are at least 7 different cities in that radius and I can’t tell from the listed address where the vendor actually is.
– I do like how overall it is very clean and simple.
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
I like it. Colorful, which is perfect for the concept. The photos show some of the variety.
One misconception that I am getting from the home page is that these are for personal events only. Since people visit a website for an average of 6 seconds, many people aren’t going to take the time to check out the “Event Type” menu to see if corporate events are included. You might either want to indicate that on this home page or create a second home/landing page for corporate customers.
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
That depends on the kind of party. A children’s party would probably take a few hours, an elaborate wedding could take months.
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
I’m not certain what you mean? I would generally search for the event services through networking: asking friends, family, associates who they used for a birthday party or a wedding and find out how pleased they were. I would call at least three places, check out their websites, etc.
If I didn’t find any associates with connections to certain products or services or types of businesses that I wanted, then I might Google. Then, I would look on line for reviews of these. I would call. Check out samples of their work.
In either case, these aren’t a quick search, they would take hours and involve other people, which would not be practical during this feedback.
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which one do you prefer? Why?
I didn’t find many sites that do what you do. There are those for party invitations and for creating an instant party website.
The one similar site I did find is smartcrowdz.com. However, it is for a variety of events, many that require marketing and are fee based. It does not appear to make suggestions for the businesses that provide the products and services the way yours do.
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have.
I have three major suggestions:
(1) Provide references, reviews, star ratings so members of your site will know which service providers will be best for their needs. That would be a huge time saver.
(2) You might be able to improve your search engine. For instance, I am in the Salt Lake City area and put in an bar mitzvahs (bat mitzvah) for event type. I also was looking for bookstores. One bookstore that came up was Deseret Books—an LDS (Mormon) bookstore, when bar mitzvahs are Jewish events. It is quite possible that someone doesn’t know that and would waste time.
(3) Using #2 as an example . . . not all service providers need to be local. It is possible that one of the local synagogues would have the book or recording. And I’m sure that there are excellent Jewish bookstores in other areas of the country and world that could supply the desired books and recordings. These would be a much better fit for someone planning a bar mitzvah. It would be helpful if your search engine recognized that an came up with the appropriate providers rather than ones that are local but are not helpful.
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
My initial impression is that this site looks like it’s going to be fun to join and plan my anniversary party. I immediately noticed that it is free as well. I actually am going to be planning my 25th wedding anniversary for this summer and I really could use a site like this to help me out.
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
Oh my, well I would say this would take me probably 3 hours a day for almost 2 weeks to try to plan this out. There are just so many decisions that I am going to need to make. Not counting the few hours it is going to take me just to start my initial list of all the different services that I am going to need. This is a rough guess of course, but I know this is going to be a lot of work because I don’t have much experience in planning a party like the one I will be having. I actually had my parents plan my own wedding years ago so all I had to do was basically pick my colors.
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
Using The Party,net, it took only about a minute to click on the services that I would need for my anniversary party.
Well, it took a few minutes of searching on Google, but I did manage to find a site. The only thing is, the site I found is an actual event planner.
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which on do you prefer? Why?
This site is the closest I could find to compare to.
https://www.easyeventplanning.com/
I don’t like the way they have their events set up. I don’t see how to put in my anniversary. It just has the checklist of services for me to only choose one and not all the services I need. I clicked on “Get Started” and the event checklist that came up was way too much information and spaced too close to each other that it was hard to read. I did not see anything that I liked on their site. It was set up very messy and way to much information to weed through to find what I was interested in.
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have.
I didn’t like the way the “details” drop down menu was set up. When I clicked on “Anniversary” for event, I was expecting to see a basic check list of the common services that most couples would utilize for that event. I did notice that the “details” do change upon the different events, but for an example, under “Anniversaries”, there is an “ANTIQUES-REPAIRING & RESTORING” in the details section. I think a lot of those have nothing to do with an anniversary so I found this very confusing to use the “Details” filter. However, after I clicked on all the details that I would need and entered my zip code and miles, I really liked seeing a custom list just for me with all the venues information available.
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
I like the layout and the colours. It has pictures which explain what the website is about from a first look. It looks professional.
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
For planning a party I would need at least 2-3 hour of research, if not more. I always do a thorough research.
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
Using google will take at least 3 times longer.
I did a quick comparison for an adult birthday party at a bed and breakfast with restaurant and bars. Results: a few minutes (2-5) vs. 10-15 mins on google.
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which on do you prefer? Why?
I found Daveandbusters. It seems that this website offers party or events planning services. After comparing I would choose theparty.net because it looks professional and it saves a lot of time.
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have
It would look even better on a more dark background color.
It would be nice if the Zip code field would have a list or if it would auto fill from the city name entered.
The pictures with the links open in a new tab. It might be more elegant if it would open the link on the same page.
It would be easier to have the search options listed differently. A lot of scrolling is needed to check more options.
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
The website doesn’t take up too much space – no scrolling is required. Very visual. Good interface – interactive images. Good search bar with criteria.
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
I will need to look for space, catering service, live music etc. Perhaps an hour, two hours would be required.
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
Google options are quite limited and the search took a lot longer, whereas we have all the criteria needed on TheParty.net. Given that many options are provided by the website already, I finished the search twice as fast.
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which on do you prefer? Why?
I have come across celebrations.com. It is overflown with information, too many colours and images. I give my preference to TheParty.net It is well-organized and neat.
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have.
The zipcode feature is an extra that I have never come across before but I find it handy.
Some interesting articles on the blog – it shows that the website is being updated regularly and is active. I liked the layout of the calendar and the space designated for google maps for a better visual location.
1) Look around the home page – what is your initial impression of what you see?
Looking around the homepage, I though the design was really nice and simple. I like the clean layout of the page and the colors used. It gives off a party vibe while not being too loud.
I immediately saw the header “FREE & SIMPLE WEDDING, EVENT & PARTY PLANNING” which easily gave me an idea of what the site is about.
My attention went to the three images below and I think the effect used on it is a nice touch.
I’m not a fan of the sidebar though. Personally, I don’t like having to click around just to get to a menu.
I noticed the search options but I feel like they do not really stand out. It looks like social media sharing buttons so that my eyes just passed over it. Perhaps moving it to the center will help.
After looking around more, it was only then that I realized that the line “An Event Planning Community Designed for You is Coming Soon – Join Today!” is actually a link. I though it was just a title.
Also, I noticed that the links at the footer are hardly visible. They look too light on the white background and I can’t read them easily.
2) Think of what it takes to plan a party: how many services you need to search for, such as bakeries, venues, florists, entertainment and where you would find them. How long in minutes or hours do you estimate this would take?
Considering that I am not familiar in planning parties, it’ll probably take a half day for me.
3) Would you do a quick comparison search for the event services you may need vs. Google? What was the time differential?
Using the site’s search options, it was a lot quicker to search for the needed services since it’s already provided. The list gave me an idea of what I may need plus everything is one place.
With Google, I have to search for some ideas first and check various sites.
I guess it was a lot quicker by 20 or 30 minutes.
An advantage I found with Google however, was that it provides me a glimpse of the service provider’s reviews, rating and the like.
4) Go to search engine of your choice and find one other company that offers a similar service. Compare the two companies. Which on do you prefer? Why?
So I searched and found https://www.eventective.com/
I found eventective.com to be a lot easier to use and more informative. Searching for services is much quicker with their site. I like the way they list the vendors/services (similar to a directory listing) as opposed to theparty.net’s drop-down menu.
I guess theparty.net’s drop down options is just too buggy for me (some features won’t work) and as I am unfamiliar with planning events, it would be nice to see the available event services in a list without having to select anything first.
I still like the feature of theparty.net wherein selecting an Event will list related Services. I think eventective doesn’t have this option.
5) Please share any additional feedback/comments you may have.
I find the search options a bit difficult to use. The Details’ Check all option does not work. I still get prompted to select a Detail when I have already selected “Check all”.
The Details list also turns empty so that I have to re-select the Event to reset the Details list. The Search button won’t work at times too.
It would be a nice feature if the search results had links to their websites or maybe some ratings.
Another issue I have is that I have to go back to the homepage to perform another search. Maybe it’ll be easier if the search options are also available at the search results page.
I think theparty.net is a useful tool especially for people who need ideas as to what services to avail for certain events. The problem i just have with it is that it’s Search feature is difficult to use and the search results could use some extra info (like website links). Addressing these issues will definitely turn this service into a time-saving tool for event planners.