Beauty Insider Community Feedback

[KatieBT]

Hello beautiful Beauty Insider Community members! 

We’re starting this thread for you guys to report any issues and weird things that you are seeing or ask any questions. We have a number of issues logged that we are already working on a fix for, so this is a work in process.

Some things to note as you are reporting issues:

• If you are looking for a thread and can’t find it, please post here. We’ll need to manually move some threads that got lost in the migration to their correct groups.
• If you are reporting a bug please be specific about the issue you're seeing, how you got there (“I clicked here and it did *this*”), the device you're using and which browser you're in. 

Some tips:

• If you are looking for a thread that you commented on in the old community, go to the front page of conversations and click the “My Posts” tab. This is where you will find all of your conversations activity, including your heart count.

• For more tips and information, check out the Community FAQs: https://community.sephora.com/t5/Customer-Support/BEAUTY-INSIDER-COMMUNITY-FAQs/m-p/2825445#M49862

It’s good to see you all and thanks for being patient!

Whenever reporting a bug we need as much info as possible or our tech team cannot reproduce the issue and verify it's actually occurring. If they can't see the issue they cannot fix it. You cannot overshare details, test on too many devices or share too many screenshots... The more detail the better!

[starsandbucks]

Hi all! I'm back and griping again. (Yay!!!) But seriously, can anyone explain the change in mobile reviews? They're much less user-friendly. All the usernames of the people who wrote them are gone. So if you liked a review they wrote you can't click on it and follow them around the site and get ideas of other products you want to try. Randomly someone who has a BIC profile will sometimes show up - but mine doesn't. I love writing reviews for the products I buy but I don't like doing it in the dark. Is Sephora planning on changing this? I'd also prefer to set the default display at "most recent" and keep that preference as permanent. Here are a couple of examples where no name or just one author name appears. (None of these are mine - just stuff I was looking at. Thanks.

[veronika23]

@KatieBT@candacebt@ShiraBT

I'd like to know what is being done about duplicate thread names? I keep seeing threads pop up that have the same names as others and most of the time they aren't even about the same subject. It makes it hard to find the ACTUAL thread in that chaos. If people who are used to the community can't even find the proper threads using the search how can new comers figure this out? Also what is being done about people posting the exact same thread in 4-5 different groups? How come there is no organization??? It feels like a free for all chat from the 1990's. People just posting in the void... no more community. 😞

[trishavt]

@veronika23 Nothing is being done about this problem. Scroll down the first page of this thread and you'll see countless posts where multiple mods are tagged and there isn't a single reply to anyone's inquiry or concern.

There's your answer. 

[Beadshopgirl]

They. Could. Not. Care. Less.

[prti]

My feedback is not directly related to BIC but to the Sephora online shopping user experience...

• We should be able to zoom in or get a closer look at the pictures uploaded by users when they review products. You could implement a "pop-up" box when you click on the uploaded pictures. (similar to when you click on the Quick Look function when you hover your cursor on a product).
• I miss the old Q&A system on a product page. I feel like bringing back the Q&A page for each product would reduce the amount of redundant threads on BIC.
• My current online shopping experience feels too bland and boring. I just dislike the whole black and white everything theme. I understand that you might be going for a minimalistic approach but minimalism doesn't have to mean minimal colors. For example, I think the stars on the product reviews page should be red. 
• Certain graphics on the website is a little pixelated probably because of the image compression process. I think the graphics are saved as .jpeg file instead of .png file? (Example: the graphic for the "Get 50 points by completing your community profile" is not of HD quality)
• The Sephora website on Safari browser is still pretty buggy. I cannot rate other people's reviews while I'm on the Safari browser. 

Sorry if I'm nitpicky. I just feel like my shopping at Sephora has gone way down after the site change and the change from BeautyTalk to Beauty Insider Community.

[HolySugar]

Is there an easy way to see Followers and Following? I can see the numbers on my profile page but can't click on them. 

[gonerogue]

Great point! I'm currently following one person but I never clicked on anyone's profile to follow them to begin with so I'm wondering who that person is? Would love an explanation of how this following thing works!

[HolySugar]

It would be great if you can click on username in the Live Chat and go directly to their page. This would make it easy to follow them and see their profile to give better, more informed advice based on their description.

[RGbrown]

@KatieBT@candacebt@ShiraBT

Can you please have the number of responses a thread has received added to search results? It would make it soooo much easier for someone searching say "Fenty" to see which thread is most popular based on the number of responses the main thread has vs the other forty eight thousand one-or-two-post threads.

Also, can we please get an update on when the feed will be fixed to display "everything minus cs" instead of the current "not much of anything, and certainly not the majority of the old popular threads"?

[alexasteph]

@KatieBT It looks like The Question Thread is no longer showing up on the main feed. We like having this one visual to cut down on the high number of new threads. Is there a way it can be restored? Please?

https://community.sephora.com/t5/Insiders/The-Question-Thread-2-0/m-p/2862786#M96580

ETA: Neither is Random Thoughts.

https://community.sephora.com/t5/Beauty-Confidential/RANDOM-THOUGHTS-BEAUTY-PART-DEUX/m-p/2461692#M1...

[BrandyCandy123]

Not sure if anyone else has experienced this, but I haven't received all of my beauty insider points (up to 50) for completing tasks on my profile. I've done all of the tasks, but have only received 30 points. I have not received the 20 for uploading a profile picture. Not sure why, or what I can/should do to receive those points. Help please!

[k617]

@KatieBT on the app in iOS, not sure if it applies to the app in general, 3rd level replies don't show up. So if I were to go to "My Posts" and click on a post I made that was a third level reply, if only takes me to the top of the page. This also means a post can show there are 13 replies but if 12 of them are third level replies, on the app, only the direct response would show. This makes it very hard to follow conversations on the app, the conversation is completely broken.

[veronika23]

@KatieBT@candacebt@ShiraBT  I've noticed a lot of threads are not showing up on the main feed. I've posted in a lot of different ones yesterday and today and they didn't show up. I hope this is a glitch? Also it seems some threads have now vanished??? What happened? Thank you.

[Mochapj]

@KatieBT @candacebt - I noticed this morning there is a new checkbox when I am typing a new post that says "Include in landing page feed"

Is the purpose of this to allow the user to decide what shows up in the main feed and what does not? 

[Beadshopgirl]

@KatieBT There are a huge amount of glitches that have shown up both in the app and on IPad using a browser since last night.  Strange skipping, long delays in hearting posts, and now I can't even access more than three posts without searching directly for them or going to "my posts". 

[suzyo]

@Beadshopgirl same! There are only a few posts on the front page for me and no option to click to go to the next page. I'm on Safari and Chrome.

[trishavt]

Dear Sephora,

I try to be fair and analyze things rationally and objectively (or as best as I can). With the recent changes I understand that the goal was to make the forum more inviting and user friendly. It's taken me several weeks of quiet observation to come to the conclusion that the forum has sacrificed quality conversations and the resulting sense of community in exchange for increased traffic.

The crux of the problems with this forum does not lie with the numerous posts that deal with sample complaints (They are legitimate complaints and people have a right to vocalize their frustration with Sephora, as annoying as it is for many people to see it on a constant basis). The concerns I have with the forum relate to disorganization and a lack of moderation.

And here is what I mean:

Any user can post the same issue in multiple threads. Doing that doesn't mean the issue will be dealt with any faster. It only clogs up the main feed with superfluous posts.

There seems to be no regulation on who can start a new thread and how many times a person can start a new thread. I could start 10 new threads right now and flood the main page. That is a problem as far as sharing quality content goes. People will either have to search for threads, or like myself, give up and log off BIC because it's too time consuming to wade through superfluous and often non-sensical threads to find quality content.

What is the point in giving people this type of control over your forum without any sort of regulation? It only leads to disorganization as we have seen thus far. I believe this is the fundamental issue that so many long term users have brought up to no avail.

Lastly, the sense of community has eroded as a result of these changes. It's hard to fathom this was Sephora's intent, but it's necessary to critique this outcome and understand how the changes negatively affected the community feel. So many of us have stopped posting regularly while others have completely stopped posting. There is no doubt this is due to the frustration many people feel in seeing this type of disorganization. Sephora no longer controls the forum; the masses control it.

We are not asking you to suppress people's voices but rather find a way to better manage their voices so that we all have a place to share our thoughts without feeling overwhelmed and frustrated.

Sephora had something very special as far as online forums go with the BT platform. Sadly, as so many of us lament the days of BT, many of your long term users have stopped logging onto BIC.

[misscg]

@trishavt I agree with you. I have significantly cut down on coming on BT lately, I think this week was the first in a while that I even browsed, let alone posted. All the fun threads are MIA and I have to actually search for them. The main page is filled with random questions or complaints. Heck I made a complaint and it got buried under all these new threads. 

I think what still bothers me is the ranking. I would love to just see who the old hall of farmers are without digging through someone's profile page. So many new users ask like one question and never respond...so there's no real conversation or sense of community. And to be perfectly honest...how much more do I have to pour into BT to move from rookie 1? 😼

[kso1225]

This post is spot on in describing my experience. I have been a long time, regular poster on BT but while BIC has many great new features, it has lost a lot of the value that kept me coming back as a regular.  I don't want this to be lost in a sea of complaints and I do truly appreciate the work that has gone into BIC, but I hope the concerns from long time BT members hold weight.  While we have many more users here now and that can be a great thing, the forum has greatly sacrificed in content quality and that has alienated many of the former regulars here.  

The main conversations page feels a lot like the live chat because it's just an influx of questions each on a separate thread.  The volume of threads means that I'm missing the important information that kept me coming back to BT. For example, I stumbled across the Pat McGrath LuxeTrance page on Sephora and had no idea those lipsticks or the eyeshadow palettes were coming out.  I searched for the Pat McGrath thread and found that not only had it been posted awhile ago, but several images of the lipsticks and palettes had been posted.  Unless I remember to search each of my favorite threads every single day, I won't see the new posts. And frankly, that defeats the purpose of the forum for me, because I could just as easily follow the brand Instagram/SnapChat accounts and get the same information.  This is what I used to do before BT and likely what I will have to go back to doing.

If I were a new user here, I would probably do the same as others - post each of my questions as a new thread.  However it was far more efficient when we had threads grouping content and then questions being asked as new posts in those threads.  I could see on the main page nearly all of the content I wanted - the skincare thread, the brand threads (which would get bumped with new releases), deals, etc. It was everything I was interested in summarized in one view.  Compared to now on the main page I typically see probably posts that are 75% questions that have been answered many times (again, akin to the live chat), such as what's the best x, generic skincare questions, etc. and 25% customer service complaints.  Most of the questions lack nuance - things like "what's the best skincare brand?".  There is no best skincare brand.  Whereas the old skincare thread would show recent posts with details like skin type, concerns, products previously tried and failed, etc and that prompted new users to include those things in their questions.  I love helping out with questions, but it is frustrating to see the same things asked repeatedly and without enough information for even an expert to answer.

I loved what BT was and I'll stick around tangentially to see if the sense of community returns.  I'm hopeful it will, but I'm also heartbroken to have lost touch with so many people that I considered good friends on here.  

[fatimamummy]

Ditto @kso1225  @trishavt It just doesn't feel like the community we loved which was my (and I'm sure many other people's) happy place. I forced myself to enjoy it but I'm constantly unsuccessful in doing so. Looks like many ppl want to make threads just for the sake of it as most of them don't even acknowledge when their questions are answered. 

[veronika23]

@trishavt@kso1225.   beautifully said!  This is what I've been wanting to say but can't seem to come up with the words... I'm just frustrated and honestly don't know why I still bother... it all gets lost in the millions of same types of posts... with some of these people never coming back. That's not a community. I find it just leaves the forum in a big pile of dog doo. Mass chaos, no organization.