Faster, Integrated Compare and Compete

Today we’re excited to roll out a project we’ve been working on for a while: combining the Verba Compare and Verba Compete applications into one back-end infrastructure.

While we hope clients will like the convenience of having a single management interface for both applications, we’ve accomplished some bigger goals by bringing Compare and Compete together, and paved the way for some great new features. Here’s what to look for:

Speed!

The new infrastructure is faster, more reliable, and more responsive on both the Compare and Compete sides. From processing imports to jumping between books in Quick View, clients can expect a rapid-fire user experience.

Improved Catalog Management

Showing and hiding terms in the old Compare interface wasn’t as intuitive as we wanted it to be. With the improved Settings page in Compete, users now have flip-of-the-switch control over which terms students have access to.

Sales Analytics for Compare-Only Clients

For a long time, the Compare-Compete division has meant that Compare-only clients have a hard time accessing their sales analytics. Starting today, every Compare-only store gets access to the same great checkout and affiliate earnings data that Compete users have enjoyed.

Some Other Tweaks

The simplified infrastructure has given us the opportunity to address some things we’ve wanted to do for a while. For example, on the student side, we now only show departments that are specific to the selected term. While these kinds of changes are small, taken together they make for a cleaner, more navigable user experience.

And More To Come…

Having Verba Compare and Compete in the same “stack” makes it easy for us to develop integrated features between the two. Want to know how that book you’re looking at in Compete looks to students visiting your Compare site? We’ll soon be able to jump right out to the comparison page for the course in which the book is used.

And with department, course, and section data now in Verba Compete, we have more ways than ever to analyze your store pricing and student preference data. This can lead to specific policy recommendations (“Work with Engineering to get adoptions earlier,” or, “Encourage history professors to allow old editions”) that contribute to both store competitiveness and textbook affordability.

Stay tuned!