

Ask HN:  Rate a StartUp Zatista.com - keltecp11
http://www.zatista.com

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markbao
This is awesome. I always liked Zappos's drill-down search, and I'm really
happy that it works well here too <http://www.zatista.com/search> . See in a
virtual room is an awesome way to gauge placement and the size of the piece.

This is a great way for individual artists to get paid for their work. The
only thing I can really think of is for more sub-categories: you currently
have type -> medium -> style, but take a look at InterfaceLIFT's tag browser
criterion: <http://interfacelift.com/wallpaper_beta/tags/>

Color — Scene — Location — Medium — Event — Equipment — Subject. Some are
irrelevant, but if I'm looking to drill down even further, these could really
help. And, along with your explorer, it could drive a thing I call the Clicker
User: the guy that clicks around the site looking for awesome random stuff to
pop up.

+1 for favorites functionality. Dunno why, but a lot of startups seem to
forget about the power of favoriting. There are some sites that I wish allowed
favoriting that don't do it, which I can't understand.

I don't know about others, but I'm always looking for art to fill my pad with.
Awesome startup, awesome execution. Startups should look to this co for some
execution inspiration.

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quickpost
Nicely done. Clicking on your website instantly reminded me of this note in a
PG essay:

\---

Viaweb wasn't the first startup Robert Morris and I started. In January 1995,
we and a couple friends started a company called Artix. The plan was to put
art galleries on the Web. In retrospect, I wonder how we could have wasted our
time on anything so stupid. Galleries are not especially excited about being
on the Web even now, ten years later. They don't want to have their stock
visible to any random visitor, like an antique store. [2]

<http://www.paulgraham.com/bronze.html>

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andrewljohnson
Your website is extremely fast! That in of itself is a very good place to
start.

Your site is also easy to navigate and clear in what it provides.

Keep talking to your users... you seem to be on the right track.

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roundsquare
Very dangerous. The kind of "I might lose my job for spending too long on your
site" dangerous.

I'm curious, how did you market to artists? You seem to have a lot of variety
on your site so I'd like to know how you got so many artists to agree.

Edit: I like the Art 101 section as well. Especially this:
<http://www.zatista.com/art101/getting_started/good_art>

Edit 2: On this <http://www.zatista.com/art101/getting_started/hanging_art>

Some pictures might be helpful.

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fauigerzigerk
It's impressive what you have built, however I wonder about the market you are
in.

My perception was that the art market has two main categories:

a) Original art (no prints or reproductions), which is sometimes bought as an
investment or by people who think they are art experts and can buy something
unique from and up and coming young artist. It's not just a market, it's a
community with its own reputation mechanisms and fashions. Nothing coming from
that direction is ever being sold for $75 online.

b) Mass prints of stuff to decorate rooms.

It seems to me that you are trying to invent a new market. But it may be that
I'm just not sufficiently familiar with the art scene.

In any event, I wish you luck and congrats to your high quality website.

~~~
andrewcooke
well, things like etsy (have i got that right?) are catching on.

also, we bought a couple of paintings from a similar site about 8 or 9 years
ago, so this idea has been around a while (no idea of they still exist -
cannot remember the site's name; the artists were from ex-soviet block
countries, if i remember right).

love the site, btw.

when we bought something (from a similar site) we were a bit surprised by what
we received - we had no idea that one work included some collage, or that it
was so textured. showing that kid of information on a computer screen isn't
trivial. might be something to worry about (we kept both and still have them,
and really like them).

~~~
dabent
> well, things like etsy (have i got that right?) are catching on.

I know a little bit about Etsy - just enough to know that artists like the
ones on Zatista complain about being undeserved by Etsy. There are lots of
individual artists out there that don't want an art gallery for their works,
they want a boutique store that sells unique paintings.

The site looks great and I wish the founder huge success!

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davidcuddeback
Very interesting idea. I will probably even be a customer some day within the
next year. I've seen several pieces that I like. The website gives me a
feeling that I'm buying something unique (almost) directly from the artist. I
like that feeling.

My first impression of the site is that I see a big blank white space on your
home page (next to the green holiday gift certificate). That feels like a
glaring hole, especially above the fold on your front page. Perhaps you could
use that space to emphasize the relatively small text above it: "Real art,
from real artists. No prints, no reproductions."

Speaking of the holiday gift card, the green banner says I can save $100 on a
purchase over $500, then the product details page says, "Holiday Special: Get
$50 off a $500 order."

The "Zoom & Explore" feature isn't useful. The magnifier shows me a pixelated
version of the regular image. I think I would prefer to just see a higher-
resolution image with your watermark. Also, the first time I opened the "Zoom
& Explore" feature, I couldn't move the magnification and magnifier size
sliders.

Going back to your site's strengths, I like that on the product details page,
there is a picture of the artist with their name and location. It gives a nice
personal touch.

I hope you keep up the good work, and I wish for the best for you.

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tsestrich
Really well done. I love the idea too, and if I hadn't already started on
another project this was essentially going to be my next :)

Glad someone beat me to it though, since maybe now I can find an easy avenue
to sell some paintings on if I ever get back into it.

I agree with others about how awesome the speed of the site is. It really
makes a big difference, especially on a graphics-intensive site.

What are you using for hosting? Or are you guys running your own hardware?

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jmm
Agreed - pretty good implementation.

But I wonder how sales in the higher price range (> $500 or so) are going.
Historically, fine art pricing (especially as prices move out of the range of
the casual shopper) has been very much tied to the identity of the artist. Am
I going to pay $2000 for a painting from an artist that I know next to nothing
about? And from a virtual gallery? Probably not.

The brick and mortar gallery model relies on this kind reputation and
identity. And even when an artist is unknown, the reputation of the gallery is
shared with the artist.

So I guess what I'm saying is that I'm not sure about the consumer
fundamentals here. Etsy's pool of sellers is quite different in that prices
stay for the most part under a hundred bucks. With lower prices comes higher
volume. And Etsy's model ($.20 per listing per four months) exploits that
volume. Etsy also takes a percentage of the sale, which Zatista is doing.

Sorry for a little ambivalence.

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samdk
Immediately bookmarked. Others have mostly covered the things I like (in
short: the idea is great, the implementation is very good).

A few notes:

It would be nice to have the AJAX search stuff change the URL so searches can
be linked to.

 _(I have a lot of minor design quibbles. If you'd like I can go through more
of them. These next two are the first things that jumped out at me.)_

The 'get live advice' widget seems very out of place to me in terms of design.
The stock photo is annoying me particularly.

There are at least four different button designs on the front page. Some
difference is ok, but I think they need to have something in common.

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silverpen
Great looking site.

On my screen (1680 x 1050) the "live chat" graphic overlaps the "My Account"
link & text in top header.

Because, you're selling high ticket priced items, I would recommend you place
a seal or two in the footer. Possibly near the "add to cart" & checkout
buttons as well. I know it may sound silly, but a mcafee seal (as much as i
hate this fact) can impact conversions significantly in certain industries. Do
lots of testing before committing to any seal.

I'm curious, was your cart completely built in house or is it based on some
cart out there. I'm truly impressed with the sites performance.

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aw3c2
Blog and Newsletter buttons look out of place. I'd put those links into the
big "our blog is here" space. Might run into a human brain adblocking problem
though so be careful with the design.

Some \n\n in <http://www.zatista.com/product/details/4155/sequence-10>

I'd horizontally mirror the "why buy art here" bubble, so it does not look
like the content is asking but someone from the outside.

You need some <noscript> hints.

Nice!

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waterlesscloud
Very nice. Search is well done, though it's not immediately obvious there are
more categories than shown.

Explorer didn't seem to really show me things I liked, I think that's going to
be really tough with art, as each piece is unique and things that may seem
similar evoke quite different reactions.

Still, the site has me seriously considering buying something. So there you
go.

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3pt14159
Overall, I like it. It would be nice if there was less clutter, and larger
pictures to draw me in.

Being a data guy myself, it would be nice if you could build in some light
algorithms to hide all the art that I find distasteful, but I guess that is a
task for another day!

Good amount of pieces, btw. How did you manage to get that many people on
board?

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hpvic03
I'm seeing a text overlap in the "Modify Results" area of the search.

I'm on Firefox 3.5.5.

Here's a screenshot: <http://i45.tinypic.com/awywcw.png>

Other than that great site.

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cubicle67
Looks very good. I'm supposed to be working, but I've just spent far too long
looking through the art

I notice if I choose a large picture, and then view it in a virtual room the
picture overlaps the furniture instead of hanging behind it.

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pkc
Its awesome, extremely polished. Very well done. Though I am not interested in
much in art it has the drive to make me buy something. Very good work.

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sheena
Extremely well executed. My only quibble is the name, which makes me think of
Batista or Zapatistas. I could be the only one, though.

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Pete512
Thanks so much for the great feedback! Keep it coming (any and all honest
feedback is welcomed).

Pete Borowsky Founder/CEO, Zatista

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vaksel
I think for your art explorer instead of just giving a 3 tier cost image, you
should say the actual price.

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amohr
I LOVE the art explorer - it's like Pandora for art.

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icey
Is this your startup? It looks really well polished.

~~~
smanek
It's only been launched for 8 months - but looks really amazing.

As a complete philistine, I really like the search feature
(<http://www.zatista.com/search>). It's powerful, without being overwhelming.

~~~
sirrocco
The search is nice, but I can't really give a link to my friend to see some
items since it's ajax ...

