Decide what to buy: the Reevoo.com blog

In our newsletter last month, we asked you all to let us know how the credit crunch was affecting your shopping. The results are in and amazingly, all of you had the same attitudes towards shopping and money saving:

If you’d like to subscribe to our newsletter, just go to the Reevoo homepage and put your email address in the box in the bottom right, then click “submit”:

Just in time for Christmas, Reevoo has launched its own iPhone web application. This means that all you lucky folks who own iPhones will be able to take Reevoo with you to the shops. If you’re looking to buy an MP3 player, camera, laptop or any other product that is available on Reevoo.com, you can check out what people have said about it before you buy. Not only that, but you will also be able to see how much it is online! Very useful for saving some valuable pounds over Christmas.

If you’d like to have price comparison and helpful reviews in your pocket this Christmas, just follow these three simple steps and Reevoo will guide you through all your Christmas shopping.

To add the Reevoo iPhone app to your home screen just take your iPhone:
1. Open Safari
2. Go to http://www.reevoo.com/iphone
3. Tap the + button in Safari and choose ‘Add to Home Screen’

And to use it:
1. Simply tap on the Reevoo icon on your home screen

2. Tap search and enter the product name - you’ll get a list of search results with scores and the cheapest price available online from over 100 retailers

3. Tap on the product itself and you’ll be taken through to read the 10 most useful reviews (as voted by our community) on the product.

We’d love to hear your feedback on this app. If there’s anything else you’d like to be able to access or if you’d like to see something done differently, just let us know at feedback@reevoo.com.

There are lots of exciting things happening over on Reevoo at the moment. One of the most recent is something that I think lots of you will find really handy. It’s a way to see all of the products that you have been looking at on Reevoo so that when you need to find that MP3 player you were looking at last week, you can. We call it your “recently viewed”.

You can always get to your recently viewed with the link in the top right of the page, just under the search box.

Just click on the link and you’ll get a nice list of all your recently viewed products. Pretty handy, hey?

If you have any other things you would like to see us doing to help you decide what to buy, just let us know by leaving a comment or by emailing us at feedback@reevoo.com.

It seems us Brits are baffled by modern technology that was sent to help us. According to a poll of 2000 people (by the folks over at Reevoo), mobile phones, SatNavs and even TV remotes send us into panic and rage when we can’t figure out how to use them. In fact, a whopping 32% of people admitted to throwing a complicated gadget across the room when they couldn’t work out what to do with it.

Digital cameras were voted the most complicated with SatNavs and mobile phones close behind. Interestingly though, people are obviously happy to live in confusion with their SatNavs, as only 6% actually read the manuals!

More alarming is that the same numbers of us are as baffled by our laptops as our ovens (the nation’s health crisis suddenly makes sense now…). And people are more inclined to read their TV manual over their oven’s. Hmmmm.

And even when a device goes wrong, more than a quarter will try to fix it themselves, or even buy a new one, instead of turning to the instructions.

Here’s the full list of things we find complicated:

1.    Digital Camera - 26%
2.    GPS navigation    - 21%
3.    Mobile phone - 19%
4.    Washing machine - 18%
5.    Camcorder - 17%
6.    DVD player - 15%
7.    Games console - 13%
8.    TV remote control - 13%
9.    MP3 player - 13%
10.    Microwave - 12%
11.    Computer - 12%
12.    Digital photo frame - 12%
13.    Scanner - 11%
14.    Laptop - 10%
15.    Television - 10%
16.    Modem - 10%
17.    Oven - 9%
18.    Printer - 9%
19.    Answer machine - 9%
20.    Freeview box - 8%
21.    Broadband - 8%
22.    Sky - 8%
23.    Dishwasher - 7%
24.    Digital TV - 7%
25.    Hi Fi system - 7%
26.    Tumble dryer - 6%
27.    Iron - 6%
28.    Telephone - 6%
29.    Clock Radio - 5%
30.    Smoke alarm - 5%
31.    Electric timer - 5%
32.    Smoothie maker - 5%
33.    Alarm clock - 4%
34.    Blender - 4%

…and how many people bother to read the manuals for these items:

1.    I don’t read manuals - 46%
2.    Mobile phone - 19%
3.    Washing machine - 17%
4.    Television - 16%
5.    Digital Camera - 14%
6.    Microwave - 11%
7.    Oven - 10%
8.    DVD player - 10%
9.    MP3 player - 9%
10.    Laptop - 9%
11.    Computer - 8%
12.    Printer - 8%
13.    TV remote control - 8%
14.    Broadband - 8%
15.    Telephone - 7%
16.    Tumble dryer - 6%
17.    Iron - 6%
18.    GPS navigation - 6%
19.    Camcorder - 6%
20.    Dishwasher - 6%
21.    Hi Fi system - 6%
22.    Scanner - 5%
23.    Freeview box - 5%
24.    Answer machine - 5%
25.    Alarm clock - 5%
26.    Modem - 5%
27.    Smoke alarm - 5%
28.    Clock Radio - 5%
29.    Games console - 5%
30.    Sky - 4%
31.    Digital TV - 4%
32.    Digital photo frame - 3%
33.    Electric timer - 2%

When it comes to kids products, parents really tell it like it is in their reviews at Reevoo.com…

Kids Weather Shelter
Bad points: quality, it blew away on a day with no wind!!!!

Spider-Man Reversible Costume
Good points: My grandson loved it, the first day he changed from red to black 17 times and the second day 21 times.

Postman Pat Friction Van
Bad points: The noise when he pushes the van along drives me mad and I can’t hear the TV. He can’t get Pat to sit behind the wheel himself so I have to help. The rubber wing mirrors were chewed off within 3 minutes!

Universal Boys 24" Dual Suspension Bike
Bad points: Seat hurts bum.

BosieBoo Video Monitor
Bad points: kept picking up BBC1

Bratz Fairies Bubbles & Wands
Bad points: I purchased these for my little girl’s 5th birthday party, and the girls were seriously underwhelmed. If you can’t impress 5 years olds with pink, sparkly, bubbly Bratz items, you’re definitely onto a loser!

Dr Who Cyberman Classic Figure
Good points: Excellent quality and numerous joints allowing infinite positions. It is also an excellent replica of the cyberman. So good in fact that my son uses it to ‘film’ his own episodes of Doctor Who on You tube.

We know that reading product reviews when you’re looking to buy a new digital TV, mobile phone or other product is really useful. But one unexpected benefit is the humour you encounter when people speak their mind. Here’s a few of the choice nuggets Reevoo’s collected in reviews of household appliances over the last couple of months…

RUSSELL HOBBS 12911 kettle
Good points: It boils water.
Bad points: The kettle is so noisy that we use it only in our laundry room as we can’t stand the racket in the kitchen.

INDESIT IS60V VENTED tumble dryer
Good points: Good safety feature in that you have to close the door then press a button on the outside to start, so little ones can’t climb in and set themselves going (it has been known!)

BEKO CDA543FS fridge freezer
Bad points: It makes wierd noises. Quite loud and kind of scary.

DAEWOO ERF384MSG 11.9CF fridge freezer
Bad points: THIS IS THE NOISIEST FRIDGE FREEZER IN THE WORLD!!!!!! IT DOES NOT STOP BURBLING AND WHOOSHING AND MAKING A HELL OF A LOT OF NOISE.

NORFROST C6AEW 6.19CF fridge freezer
Good points: It’s in the shed
Bad points: can still hear it

ZANUSSI TC7103S + VENT tumble dryer
Bad points: seems to take a while to dry the clothes but I think that is probably my missus being rubbish

BEKO DWD5410S dishwasher
Good points: washes brilliantly, easy to fill the bottom, and mainly the top. Easy to work. Even the husband knows how to use this one.

We’re often asked which retailers display the ReevooMark and genuine customer reviews to help shoppers decide what to buy, so we’ll be updating you here now and again when new retailers come on board.

Carphone Warehouse
With over 2,000 stores in 10 countries and a high-traffic website, Carphone Warehouse is Europe’s leading independent retailer of mobile phones. The ReevooMark reviews went live a couple of months ago, and you can already see customer reviews across many of Carphone Warehouse’s mobile phones.

Microwarehouse
With computer supplies offering such variety of functionality, they’re potentially tricky products for shoppers without technical knowledge to make buying decisions on, so reviews have been immediately popular on this site. As well as computing items, Microwarehouse also sells phone and communications products, and other electronics including digital cameras.

HiFix
HiFix specialise in selling HiFi and audio visual equipment online and the ReevooMark reviews can now be seen across their whole range of electronics.

Related product categories on Reevoo.com:
Mobile phone reviews
Computer reviews
Home entertainment reviews
Digital camera reviews