Hello, my fine friends and welcome to my first official article written for Lulu! I've been working here for a few months now, having the time of my life, and am honored that I've been tapped to write about one of our exciting new features.
Whoa! What happened? Am I still at Lulu.com?
Back on October 10th, logging into an account on Lulu.com became a
lot more exciting, a
lot more immediately useful, and hopefully a
lot more pleasing. One of the major new features rolled out in that morning's 16.0 Release was our new
My Account page. Rather than simply a page o' links, the new and improved My Account page offers everyone a window into her or his Lulu world. It's chock full o' information about your Lulu activities, all available at-a-glance. It's your very own Lulu portal!
I Like Saying O' ... Especially Between Patches and Houlihan
We all think this new My Account page is so incredibly cool that we even made it the first thing those with Lulu creator accounts see after logging in (rather than the Publish page). But, rather than completely abandoning your list of amazing accomplishments (or accomplishments-to-be), the first section on the page is "My Recent Projects" which lists the 5 projects you most recently edited. So, hopefully you still have quick access to the things in which you're currently immersed. To see your entire list of projects, all you have to do is click "View all projects" at the bottom of the box. Easy, eh?
All I Need Is A Tall Ship And A Star To "Sale" Her By
One thing for which many of our creators visit Lulu.com most often is to check on sales. So, rather than just providing you a link to your sales data, the My Account page provides you a high-level summary of your data in the "My Sales and Creator Revenue" box. Don't worry, the detail is still there a "More Details" click away, but now you at least get a peek immediately. We have other ideas for this box for future releases, but for now it is simple and sweet.
Cool Peeps Rool
In other boxes on the page, we show you your 5 most recent orders, your interests, and your friends and groups. All of this information which was previously tucked away behind a link or two is now right there for you to use and enjoy. Check out the cool interface when adding and removing interests. Speedy, eh? I work with such cool people.
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes
For some of you with whom I have spoken since this change to the My Account page, I know it was a bit of a shock and perhaps slightly frustrating to have to deal with this change. But, we took much care to ensure that all links that had a home on the old My Account page now have a shiny new spot to live. If the link is not represented within the information boxes, you'll find it over on the left-hand navigation column. I just love that feature and am personally hoping we find cool ways to implement similar navigation throughout the rest of the site. Luckily, we have some extremely talented engineers and user experience folks here at Lulu who are passionate about making this site a comfortable home for all of you (and for me!).
Oooo pretty!
As of today, October 24th, we've just implemented another feature on the My Account page. You will now see a box displaying your most recent messages on Lulu. And these aren't just any old messages. These messages are now handled by the slick new messaging tool which was also a part of the 16.0 release and enhanced in today's 16.1 point release. Now it is easier than ever to keep in touch with your Lulu friends and Lulu staff. We'll be using this interface to present you with Announcements as well with our new announcement functionality. Cool, don't you think? I know I do...
Time To Cut Him Off!
Ok, I think that about wraps up my gushing over this beautiful new page. But I'll be back to gush more in the future as we have loads of ideas of directions to take it. Feel free to add comments here to suggest some ideas you may have for this particular page of our site.
Phew, I Made It! Did You?
Thanks for reading my first Lulu article! And if you're reading this sentence, thanks for making it all the way down here! I'm impressed and appreciative!
Till next time,
Chris
