Let's Look at a Storefront

Let's look at the different elements in the mall. First, let's review a basic storefront. Like in a "physical" mall, we have two basic types of storefronts. Anchor stores are the large ones at the end of a wing. The smaller storefronts in the other parts of the mall are referred to as perimeter stores.

Macy's anchor store

Ebags perimeter store

When you click on the doors of the storefront, the homepage of the advertiser opens in a new browser window.

When you click on an item in the window, you are transported to the 2D webpage of that item on the advertiser's website. So at the outset of the development of our site, we are a 3D mall that directs shoppers to the 2D websites of our advertisers. Yes, plan to add 3D stores behind the storefronts and have the technology to do so. We're approaching advertisers now to find interest.Each of the windows of a storefront can contain a fixed image, a slideshow with up to 10 slides, video, audio and coupons. If there is a video, audio or coupon in a storefront window, an icon of a video camera, music tunes, or a bar code indicates the existence of each when you hover on the window containing one of them.

Each storefront can also have a salesbot or a live sales persona out in front. A salesbot is an virtual salesperson who is not live in real time that can contain a recorded audio message or a coupon. A live sales persona is backed up by a live person, who can chat with customers in front of the store.

So a storefront in our virtual mall is a way to introduce or remind shoppers in our mall about the store. Standard retailers are primarily featured in the mall currently but we welcome any web retailer or service provider to join the mall. New participating advertisers pay per click for traffic driven to their 2D websites. We'll go into this further in another post as well as regarding opportunities for advertisers to create 3D stores to go behind their mall storefronts.

As always, we value your feedback and suggestions. Please contact us at support@virtualeshopping.com.

- virtualEmark

Let's Meet in the Mall!

Let's not go too far into the social networking features without showing you the heart and soul of our site - the 3D mall itself. This is where we're breaking new ground. To the best of our knowledge, we created the first, operational virtual, 3D shopping mall. I'll share the origins of the idea in a later post but for now, suffice it to say that we began development in December of 2005 and initially launched in July of 2008.

To visit the mall, one must first load the free software on your PC (sorry, Mac's not supported. borrow your parent's PC ;) Instructions for loading the mall software are at the Installation Guide Button next to the Load Mall Button on the main homepage. There's also a load mall button on the profile page in the upper right corner.

Once you load the free software, a launch button is installed in the lower right of your computer screen. It will appear each time you start your computer. This is how you enter the mall each time. Click anywhere in the center of the button to launch the mall.

You'll first encounter an entry screen. If you have registered on the website and have an account, you can enter your login/pw and enter as a registered users. If not, you can either go to the web pages and register or enter as a guest. Guests cannot create personas or collect coupons but can do anything else in the mall.

We have limited the number of malls to a main mall at present, but we'll add more - specialty malls (men, women, teens) and city malls - over time.

Click the main mall and wait a minute for it to load (or do something else. you'll hear mall noise when you have entered.)

You enter the mall in the main atrium.

You move around in the mall using your arrow keys: left, right, forwards and backwards. We'll look around in our next post but feel free to explore on your own.

As always, if you have questions, please contact us at support@virtualeshopping.com. We're open to your ideas, so please share them generously!

- virtualEmark

My Dates To Remember

Another neat social networking feature we're adding is "My Dates To Remember." On your profile page, you can list up to six special dates to share with friends and family so they won't forget your birthday and anniversary - again!



The add dates tool lets you customize your occasions and pick a date from the calendar.

When a friend clicks the more button on the profile page, it takes them to a dedicated page with all your special dates and even shows them a list of things in your "I Want It/I Got It" section so they can see what and what not to buy you if they wish to get you a gift for the occasion. It's like having your own gift registry - and not restricted by store!

Have fun and let us know if you have suggestions!

- virtualEmark

And now, an overview of our new features...

In the next several weeks, we will highlight our new social networking and 3D mall features as we prepare for a second launch of virtualEshopping.com. We're extremely excited about our new offerings and are eager to share the site with you.

Please feel free to login to our beta test URL between now and re-launch at: http://www.virtualeshopping.com/beta/virtualeshop/index.php

There are still some items not completed (pictures of personas for your snapshot, a rough cut video, and a mall demo movie) that are still in the works but much of it is functioning.

Please register and play around with it. All feedback welcomed and encouraged.

-virtualEmark

I Want It/I Got It!

Here's a sample of one of our most exciting new features. We're calling it, "I Want It/I Got It," and it gives shoppers an opportunity to show their friends cool items they have their eyes on and others that they have purchased that they think others may want to know about.

Once you register on our site, you are taken to your own personal profile page. Among other features that we will highlight over the next few weeks, you'll see on the right hand side of the page, the I Want It/I Got It feature.

Here's a screenshot of a few items I've started on.

As you will learn, I'm a gadget freak. I like all cool, new gizmos that make life easier and more fun.

If you click on the image or the label, you will open a new browser window linked to the page of the item you featured, so a friend or family member could look it up if they wanted to buy it for you or purchase it for themselves if they saw you had it and thought it could be useful.

Here's a screenshot of how you add new items.

You simply save an image on your desktop of the item you'd like to share. The closer you get to 125 X 125 pixels in size, the better. Save it in either .jpg or .png format. Then copy and paste the URL (or web page address) into the URL field. Lastly, enter some text to tell people about the item you are spotlighting.


When you save it, it appears in the proper column of "I Want It/I Got It."

You can make changes if you find that your image is not displaying the way you want it to by clicking the edit/more link. You can also move an item from "I Want It" to the "I Got It" sections by clicking the Move button on the Edit screen of the "I Want It" section. (See below.)



Have fun with this new tool and as always, let us know if you have suggestions or other ideas!

-virtualEmark