AmzShop Builder – Product Review
The following is the review I posted at the Warrior Forum, about a product called AmzShop Builder.
The general concept of this is good. It should work at any page, post, or website that accepts HTML. And, with some bugs worked out of this, or added functionality in the online app, it might be a great product.
As the product is, right now, I can’t recommend it. With some improvements, I might give it a rave review.
I read the ReadMe.txt. I watched the videos. I know how to hand-code HTML (including tables) and tweak CSS, so I could see what this product did. To me, it looked like a good time-saver.
Creating the page was very intuitive. Top marks for ease of use.
The copy-and-paste step was simple enough for anyone to do, even if they’re completely new to HTML. No code knowledge is necessary, at all.
Up to that point, this product looked brilliant, and I still think this has potential, with some bugs worked out.
I tried the code in three different WordPress sites and two different Blogger blogs. (I did not try it in Facebook, so I can’t say how well it works, there.)
WordPress results
Two of the WordPress sites looked okay… but not good enough to use, as-is. The vertical dividers in the tables didn’t show up at all. The font size was kind of strange in one of the two sites.
One of the WP themes was WordPress Twenty Eleven, so it’s not as if I were using some odd theme with unusual CSS styling.
With some trial-and-error tweaking, hand-coding the HTML, I might be able to override the CSS to make the page (or post) look okay, but that’s what I wanted to avoid with this product.
This page in the third WP site… it was hideous, badly spaced, and completely unusable. I was pasting the code into the HTML tab in an Artisteer WP theme, but that’s the website I was most interested in using this on. It’s not a complex theme, just a simple two-column design.
Next, I tried the code at two of my Blogger blogs.
Blogger results
In Blogger, one of the pages turned out okay but the table was wider than my theme. Again, with some hand-coding, I could probably tweak it well enough to work, if I wanted to invest the time in it. I’m not sure. I’ve never tried to override Blogger’s CSS, and I’m not sure that I could make the table narrow enough without crowding the table contents too much. It might take a fair amount of trial-and-error.
At the other Blogger blog, the page actually looked pretty good… but part of it was underneath my widgets in the (single) right sidebar. So, with a Blogger design that doesn’t use sidebars or widgets, it might be fine.
My review
If all you want is something that will work with Facebook, or you’re willing to either use a single-column site design (something that accepts a 790px wide table) or hand-code the page so everything fits within the theme and looks good, this might be fine.
For me, the amount of work I’d need to do to get my page to look good, even with a basic WordPress theme… this isn’t a product I’ll use, so I’ve asked for a refund.
As I said earlier in this review, I think the concept is very good. This might be a useful product, as-is, for Facebook pages, or if your website’s theme is compatible with the table design.
For this to be a really good product, I think the online app needs to include more options, especially table width and perhaps adjustable cell padding and spacing. (The latter might not be necessary. I didn’t test any changes in the code to see what happens when you take the 790px default down to, say, 650px.)
Update
The seller asked me if he could process the refund in two days, so it won’t hurt his numbers in terms of refund rate, or affect affiliate success. Based on another (respected) person’s endorsement of the seller, I’ve agreed… with mixed feelings. If the seller improves the product so it actually works, as advertised, or changes his sales page, I’m okay with this, but not 100%. And, my review on the forum remains, as-is.
