This part of our survey results deals with your views on this site.
PART THREE: ABOUT YOU AND JANCISROBINSON.COM
| How often do you visit JancisRobinson.com? | 2010 | 2015 |
| Once or twice a day | 33.6% | 31.4% |
| Once or twice a week | 41.2% | 46.9% |
| Once or twice a month | 19% | 11.6% |
| Every now and then | 6.2% | 10.2% |
This suggests a 5% increase in regular (more than once a week) visitors.
| Which of these interest you most? | 2010 | 2015 |
| Tasting notes and tasting articles | 79% | 76% |
| Tasting notes search | 65.2% | 53.7% |
| News (Free for all and Inside information) | 44.4% | 50.8% |
| Oxford Companion to Wine | 46% | 38.3% |
| Opinion (Don't quote me) | 47.5% | 36.9% |
| Wines of the week | 25.3% | 32.7% |
| World Atlas of Wine maps | 36.4% | 31.3% |
| Nick on restaurants | 26.3% | 29.3% |
| Members' forum | 34.1% | 24.1% |
| Resources / Learn about wine | 32.3% | 18.1% |
The apparent slight decrease in interest in tasting notes is contradicted by the large number of comments we had in favour of them. News seems to be perceptibly more popular, opinion and the Oxford Companion less so, the latter perhaps because so many Purple Pagers know that a brand new, much-revised (4th) edition will be published this September. The decrease in use of the forum should be read in conjunction with a specific complaint highlighted below.
| How well does our recently improved general search work? | 2010 | 2015 |
| Very well | 15.1% | 30.1% |
| Well | 51.7% | 50.8% |
| Quite well | 25.7% | 21.1% |
| Poorly | 6.9% | 7.9% |
We are delighted that our work on the search seems to have paid off and there has been a 21% relative increase in those who think our general search works well or very well.
| How well does our recently improved tasting notes search work? | 2010 | 2015 |
| Very well | 28.5% | 22% |
| Well | 43.2% | 50.3% |
| Quite well | 21.2% | 20.1% |
| Poorly | 7.1% | 7.6% |
About the same proportion of members, 72%, as in 2010 think the tasting notes search works well or very well. Many thanks to those who made suggestions for improvements – they have been noted.
| How do you feel about our membership charge? | 2010 | 2015 |
| Very good value | 15.1% | 12.7% |
| Good value | 40.3% | 63.3% |
| Fair value | 44.6% | 23.9% |
Phew. There is a 41% increase in the proportion of those who think our membership is very good value or good value.
| Do you prefer longer or shorter tasting articles? | 2015 |
| Longer | 27.9% |
| Shorter | 15.2% |
| Don't mind | 56.9% |
I think we will concentrate on the 'don't mind' faction.
| How important are scores to you? | 2015 |
| Essential | 24.7% |
| Quite useful | 58.8% |
| Unimportant | 16.5% |
The proportion of visitors to whom scores are essential surprised us, but we will certainly not ignore them. Scores seem here to stay – for the moment.
| How easy it is to find your way around JancisRobinson.com? | 2010 | 2015 |
| Very easy | 32.3% | 30.6% |
| Easy enough | 62% | 64.3% |
| Difficult | 5.8% | 5.1% |
This suggests a very marginal drop in the under 6% of visitors who get lost. That proportion is small but still too high.
| How well designed do you find the specifically customised mobile version of our website? | 2015 |
| Don't use | 66.5% |
| Very well designed | 10.4% |
| Quite well designed | 20.4% |
| Not well designed | 2.7% |
The vast majority of the third of respondents who visit the site on their mobile phones are happy with the design – although rest assured that we aim to continue to improve it. Many thanks to those who gave us comments on their bugbears.
| How well designed do you find the specifically customised tablet version of our website? | 2015 |
| Don't use | 68% |
| Very well designed | 13% |
| Quite well designed | 17.5% |
| Not well designed | 1.4% |
These are very similar results to the same question about our design for smartphones.
PART FOUR: WHAT COULD WE DO TO IMPROVE JANCISROBINSON.COM?
We had over 200 separate comments here, which we have summarised below.
Tasting notes
- Several people requested more detailed notes.
- Better consistency of scoring was also frequently mentioned.
- Requests for more tasting articles – all sorts of specific mentions: Riesling, verticals, retailer-specific collections (which are presumably chiefly of interest in the UK only)
Miscellaneous
- several requests for cheaper membership (although 75% of respondents think our price represents good value)
- request for podcasts
Editorial
- Dozens of ideas for content, including: articles aimed at a younger generation of drinkers (noted particularly in view of the drop in younger respondents reported in Part 1), tech revolution and its impact on wine, cellaring information, winemakers' stories, up-and-coming areas, producer profiles, natural wines, climate change, scientific topics.
- Dozens of requests about winemaking regions, including: north-east America, Portuguese wine and port, Spain, Alsace, Germany and the New World. We also had five explicit requests for more Bordeaux and Burgundy ... and six requests for less!
Design
- Reduce 'noise' and imagees on the homepage; allow personal customisation
- Improve contrast and reduce font size (see note immediately below)
Richard writes: we really do appreciate the feedback here, although we are in a position where we are never going to be able to please everyone. The colour scheme and layout of the re-design was specifically designed to make reading longer articles easier, by offering a narrower column of text that is more similar to print media, requiring less side-to-side reading. In this way it is similar to the BBC website, for which readability is paramount. This does require admittedly more scrolling, which many objected to. Those who asked for smaller text – please be aware that the 'aA' icon top right of every page allows you to choose your preferred font size.
Forum
The single most common specific complaint made by our respondents was that the forum had declined in tone and that there were fewer posters, not least as a result of the contributions of one particular member. We contacted him as soon as we saw the strength of feeling on this topic and he has acceded to our request that he no longer contributes to the forum. We believe that the forum, reached via Discussions, is already improving and look forward to welcoming back many contributors who gained our Members' forum its reputation as 'the most courteous on the planet' (La Revue du Vin de France). There is such a rich resource of knowledge and informed opinion among our members. We hope you will continue to share and enjoy it.
PART FIVE: WHAT DO YOU LIKE ABOUT JANCISROBINSON.COM?
Tasting notes garnered the most mentions here. We hope it is not too vain to include some of the other compliments our respondents kindly gave us, as follows:
- 'You aspire to cover more than the usual suspects. There is life outside Bdx and Burg which other sites seem not to realise.'
- 'Well written and engaging articles'
- 'The articles remain literate, informative, witty and wide-ranging. They are usually enjoyable, provocative and informative.'
- 'I rely on this site to report accurately on the state of each vintage from each of the world's major wine producing regions.'
- 'The passion. You lovely people have it and I appreciate everything that you do.'
- 'The obvious intelligence and humour running through the DNA of Team JR, without exception, whether it's Richard's battles en route to gaining a well-deserved MW (because he is a natural communicator) or Julia's ability, like Jancis, to explain complex aspects of oenology in terms I can understand. (At least, I like to think I can...)'
- 'Jancis is THE expert in my opinion; informative, accessible; comprehensive scope. I buy her books and value them a lot – an excellent resource for the enthusiastic amateur!'
- 'Alex Hunt's writing is highly enjoyable and a pleasure to read.'
- 'I particularly find Julia's tasting notes to be extremely incisive and insightful.'
- 'All round it's just such a great resource. All your contributors write well, and I believe what you write. I trust your opinions.'
- 'Very up to date with a regular supply of new information. I also like the gender balance which does not exist in any other wine website (or wine merchants).'
- 'The quality of writing, the look and feel and the indepth coverage of events makes it the best site around!'
- 'The clear integrity of the tasting notes and scoring judgements. I have come to value not only the wide vinous knowledge Purple Pages regularly gives me, but the undoubtedly deep insight and assessment of wines of all manner that the site also routinely provides. In addition the site is quite fun!'
- 'It's stunningly good value.'
- 'I like it all. It's solid journalism – which none of the site's competitors seem to offer.'
- 'This website is quality through and through with excellent content that I refer back to again and again. I love keeping up to date with wine trends both on a global scale and also country by country. Keep up the fabulous work, truly great stuff.'
- 'JR's tough scoring system, short pithy tasting notes and well written articles are the best in the business. The notes especially usually say more in a couple of lines than most tasters can cram into a whole paragraph.'
