Online Bathrooms Blog

As you may be aware we have not been blogging on the site much. This is down to the effort being put into more technical modifications to the site, and maintenance of all the products. We want to ensure that you have all th information you need right in front of you. About the products, deliveries returns and more.
So a lot of time has been spent on each product, filling the details with information allowing you to make the right choice when buying anything from OnlineBathrooms.com.

So, what else have we done over the past few weeks? Firstly, the Multi-Buy feature can now include up to 3 Multi-buy products, compared to the original one multi-buy. This means we can not only recommend more products to you, but give you massive savings when you choose to purchase the items as a bundle. Want to try it out? Check out the Anico Quadrant Shower Enclosure at only £229! You can choose to add a shower valve at a discounted price. If you want to get more than one to get a higher saving, feel free!

Secondly, we have been putting together a newsletter manager to allow us to generate email newsletters very quickly. If you have selected the option to receive the newsletter, it is possible you will already have one by now! Check your emails every Friday as this tends to be when we send them out and also tends to be when the new offers begin!

And finally we have been working on improving the system which monitors customers who have left their baskets. The system will now flag up any shopping carts which have been left by current customers, and only allow us to notify you once, as we don’t wish to mither but we know that with our understanding of bathroom products we can give you enough information to make good decisions on your bathroom goods and it is likely we will have exactly what you need.

I will keep you up to date more regularly from now on. If you have any questions, problems or general queries please do not hesitate to contact one of our friendly sales team.

That’s all for now!

Online Bathrooms Freephone: 0800 389 4857
Customer Services Email: info@onlinebathrooms.com

Welcome to a special blog about our newly launched mobile site! Online Bathrooms is now mobile! Which means you can now buy your bathrooms from the comfort of, well, anywhere! If you visit the site on your iPhone, (We’ll be testing consistency for all other mobile browsers soon), you will be automatically redirected to our mobile site. But don’t worry, you can still access the full version if needs be with the simple push of a button. The mobile site can also be viewed on your PC, just click the link below!

OnlineBathrooms Mobile Site!

This also works if you type the above link in your non-iPhone, mobile browser! But be warned, it may not look as tidy!

I would like to point out that the mobile site is as secure as our real site, as your phone browser connects to our secure web page, and your payment is still taken through our fully secure protx payment site. If you have any queries about security on your mobile, please don’t hesitate to give us a call!

We have also developed a newsletter feature which allows us to send you on a weekly basis an up-to-date list of either our best sellers, our hot-picks or just a list of our favourite products to tempt you into bringing that bathroom idea to life! So if you haven’t already, head over to the Online Bathrooms Registration Page, and be sure to check the ‘Newsletter’ box to get the regular email. If you feel like you’ve missed out, you can always view the Most Recent Online Bathrooms Newsletter by clicking this link.

Just a quick update on what new features have been added to the site recently. The first, will hopefully cut down on the number of queries from customers asking whether our site has picked up on the Multi-Buy option they added to their cart. This was because, confirmation of the discount only appears on the final page of the checkout. But now, when a product and it’s linked product are placed within the cart, a small notifier appears next to the price, just to let you know we’ve noticed. There is also a key at the bottom of the pace explaining that the discount is taken at the checkout. The small notifiers also carry a hover effect which displays a bubble with more information about the multi-buy product. Why not check it out? Have a look at the Anico quadrant Shower Enclosure and add the discounted Thermostatic shower Valve. Then look at the checkout!

The new cart with a notifier of Multi-Buy confirmation

Another feature I implemented into the admin section of the site will hopefully save the Warehouse staff some time looking for the BOM codes of products! Originally, they had to print the PDF order off to view the BOM breakdown, one of my earlier mods, but now, with a similar rollover to above, they can view the BOM breakdown of each main product (if one is in the system) and it’s one or many options (if in the system). This will save time and trees!

I’m still working on some other mods but will keep you posted when they have been implemented!

At Online Bathrooms we are continuously striving to bring you the best bathrooms at the best proces. Thats why we add new bathroom suites almost everyday, to continually give you the most modern looking bathrooms in the UK and a shockingly good price. The bathroom suites we get are of high standards and because of our good reputation with bathroom suppliers, we can buy large quantities and pass these fantastic savings on to you. Take a look at our New bathroom products, where our latest addittions include..

Kalahari Steam Cabinet

In creating the Kalahari Steam Cabinet, the manufacturer has given you the opportunity to share in the wonderful experience of surrounding yourself in delicious, warm, hazy water.

Sahara Shower Cabinet

The Sahara Steam Cabinet comes with a host of clever accessories, so your enjoyment features high up. Tune out the days stresses with a hydro massage, or tune into your favourite music with the built in FM radio.

Gobi Shower Cabinet

Stepping into the Gobi Steam Cabinet and letting the heat and humidity envelope you, is still one of life’s luxuries. Just sheer bliss.

We also have a large number of stocked items in our Next Day Delivery category which, depending on courier availability, can be with you the very next day.

So for the latest bathroom trands at the lowest proces, Visit OnlineBathrooms.com NOW!

It’s been a whIle since I updated you on the techy part of Online Bathrooms, which means I have got a lot to cover! I will split the post over two days so you don’t get too bored!

Firstly, I mentioned not too long ago about the possibility that an iPhone site may be on the horizon, well, its almost here! Myself and Michael have been working on maximising usability of the site, but minimizing file size. We want the iPhone experience to be compared to that of large e-commerce sites such as Amazon and we feel our efforts in customizing the mobile site to suit our needs can be seen throughout. We have also begun working on implementing a fully Mobile Safari compatible image gallery, to showcase all of the images attached to our vast product catalogue. This will mean flicking around our site is done with ease and you can get all the information straight from your phone. The site is fully implemented to our current checkout so orders made at your PC or on the move will be received by us in the same way, and we can get on to processing your order as soon as it comes through. The mobile site also offers full account control allowing you to view, add to and modify your details wherever you are! The full site will also have an auto redirect feature so that it will know if you are on aniPhone and can take you straight to the tailored mobile site. Upon completion we will let you all know that the iPhone site is ready, for you to begin making your on-the-move Online Bathrooms purchases!

The ‘Work in Progress’ mobile site on an iPhone

It pains me to do so but I will also keep you informed about some minor problems we have had over the past week with some of the features of the Online Bathrooms store.

The first problem was with the Next Day Delivery selection box, which failed to pass your request through to our delivery team. I do apologise for this inconvenience and this was resolved after about an hour of finding out there was a problem. And just for you interested in what the problem was, it was down to me reverting to a previous backup of one of the checkout pages. Yes, the one which writes the request to our database! Luckily only a couple of customers rang to inform us that their request had not been met, which means our ability to process orders for next day delivery even without it being requested is stillup to scratch and working as we like it.

Secondly, I have now resolved the problem with the shipping cost calculator, which for some reason decided to say that everything only incurred a £12 delivery charge, and this only when the customer was logged in! How bizarre! However after small bit of digging I realised that thepopup window which holds the data was messing with the URL of the calculator page. This meant the variables that are A, the product, and B your postcode were not referenced properly. a smalltweakand a PHP condition later, the problem was resolved.

Finally, we noticed that with our new together specials feature popup, the options selected for the main product were too not being passed though to our warehouse upon an order being placed. I am still working on resolving this problem which is very, very nearly done. We do have a temporary solution in place so if you spot it and do notice what the problem is (which hopefully you won’t), be sure to let us know. It has involved a bit of research into more complex javascript, where I normally only dip my toes in the sea that is Javascript, and that is why the problem is taking slightlyloger to resolve. Each day I get ever closer to the solution. Ill keep you posted on this and when its sorted I will explain the solution.

And touch wood, those are the only major problems with the site this week, but if you notice anything unusual at any time, pleasedont hesitate to contact us on our freephone 0800 389 4857 or via our live support feature on the site.

That’s all for today but I will continue tomorrow with back-end updates and some info on how we can now track how effectively our marketing is working! So be sure to check back tomorrow and we will keep youupto date with all the news, at Online Bathrooms!

I will begin this blog by first apologising for the post Happy new year, happy new checkout! which states we installed a new checkout at the start of the year, in order to reduce the number of pages you pass to make an order at onlinebathrooms.com. We had to remove the checkout as some data wasn’t being passed through into our sales area. I cannot stress enough, this in no way affected the customers or their orders when this checkout was live. But noticing this small problem we immediately reverted back to the original checkout and orders continued to come in. I have been working on and off to resolve this problem and after thorough testing, testing and more testing, I can now announce that the new checkout is live once again! So to experience our reduced page checkout, visit onlinebathrooms.com, place goods in your cart and follow the on-screen instructions through the checkout process! This new condensed checkout is fully compatible with the Next Day Delivery request, meaning we can process your order with added priority if it is possible to get your goods to you next working day.

I can also announce that that a modification to the search feature on the site has also massively increased the accuracy of your search. A bit of code which removes the ’s’ from a search has increased the number of products which display when typing in a plural search. For example, a search for ‘vanity units’ may list no products, as we have no products called, ‘anico 750 vanity units’. Your search now, for ‘vanity units’ would be the same as a search for ‘vanity unit’, (as in 750 vanity unit!). This will make searching easier and much more intuitive.

Alongside this mod to the search, I have been putting myself in the place of the customer, and searching for products and seeing what result I get to ensure your search gives you exactly what you want! Some of the product searches we log are as vague as ’showers’ or ‘baths’, so we made the search navigate to the relevant category for you to further narrow down your search to a product list of exactly what you want. (Good Eh!).

So head on over to onlinebathrooms.com now, to experience our new, more powerful search and our improved checkout!

Weve been working alot on the banners this week as mentioned earlier by Michael. But another thing we have been focussing on, is making the landing pages more defined. This means we can focus more on creating links to these categories, thus giving you a much more accurate result when you search in google. (Or at least that’s what we’re aiming for!) These categories banners have been up over the weekend and are looking great!

Technically there were a few hiccups and typical cross browser compatibility issues, but these have been removed and as far as im aware it’s running perfectly. We can now start working on combinig these banners with more category specific offers, so you can finsd a great deal on exactly what you are looking for.

In terms of technical modifications to the site, this week i have been mainly fixing small errors which crop up without notice, just to keep me on my toes. Alongside this we’re continually looking to advertise around the UK to get our products out to as many people as possible. With a recent listing on hotfrog, more people looking to buy bathrooms outside of the manchester area can see a detailed business card of Online Bathrooms and navigate to the site from there.

I also made some small changes to the account login area of the site. Cleaning up the layout and alligning the input fields so they no longer looked scattered over the page. The small things like this are rarely overlooked at Online Bathrooms, as we know that you want to place your order and get your goods as soon as poissible, and a clean site makes this so much less of a chore, and more of an experience.

So for the best deals, dont forget to
bookmark our homepage, or keep checking the blog as it is constantly updated!

As we will soon be entering 2010 I would like to wish you a happy new year from everyone at Onlinebathrooms.

2010 will be a good year for Onlinebathrooms, as we have now settled into the new warehouse, business is getting back to normal and orders are getting processed much more quickly. This will mean that as we will be spending less time working on orders we can speed up the website, continuously modify banners and add new products. We will also be able to offer even better customer service.

So, don’t forget to make your order before 31st December to avoid the VAT increase and from all of us at Onlinebathrooms, HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Christmas is fast approaching and although we here at Online Bathrooms hate to be the bearer of bad news, we are now fully booked up with deliveries during the Christmas and New Year period. The next available deliveries will be from the 6th of January 2010.

On a good note you can still make your purchases now in time to beat the VAT increase and make yourself a saving.

Just a recap but the next day delivery section is made up of all of our top selling and most popular items, which allows us to buy them in such large bulks, that the bulk savings are able to passed on to you. So why not check them out and grab yourself a bargain. As mentioned above we are fully booked up with deliveries now until 2010 however items ordered from the next day delivery will have first priority for the next earliest deliveries.

As Alan mentioned in the last post a lot has been happening internally at Online Bathrooms, with the building of a whole new network system (Thanks to our IT Manager/Expert; Mark) and the moving to our new warehouse, all of which are designed to increase the proficiency of the services we can offer our customers. But many new products are being added all the time and I will be keeping you informed of some of these products on here in the near future. 

Stay tuned and have a lovely Christmas and a Happy New Year from all of us at Online Bathrooms. 

At onlinebathrooms we are continuously aiming to improve the usability and functionality of the site to make it easier for you to create your dream bathroom. That’s why, when we implement a change, we dont leave it there. We begin working on improving it so it’s the best it can be. Recently we implemented the Next Day Delivery feature which allows you to select nextday delivery if the products in your cart qualify for it. However we want that to be more interactive so we set out working on some fancy scripts to display the ND T&Cs of the nextday delivery only when you select the delivery option.

Preview of the next day delivery feature

To improve this further, we are working on creating a on/off switch for the next day delivery option so we can turn it on or off quickly arund the holiday periods where courier availablility is limited. We always advise you to ring around these times to ensure you understand when yoiur good will arrive.

We have also been running cables ffrom the IT dept to the office at the from of the showroom allowing us to create a much more sensible network which is much more reliable, stable and of course, faster! But this has meant climbing over the showroom, drilling holes and avoiding hitting your head in the narrow space above the showroom. But its all for a cause, and we’ll be running faster than ever after we re-open in the newyear.

For now, get your orders in ASAP for the best choice of timeslots. More updates to come, watch this space!