Early Learning Centre: Bypassing plug-in requirements

An appropriate and value-adding use for a plug-in.

The Site

Early Learning Centre is the leading high-street seller of toys for babies and young infants in the UK. Its award-winning retail website carries a big selection of brand-name products that can be ordered and paid for online.

Toys can be looked for in various ways (name, catalogue number, use, word search) to arrive at a product description page. For toys that make noises the page has a Play Sound button in addition to the Add to Basket one – but only if the user’s browser is fitted with the required software plug-in, usually Flash. Should the site fail to detect the plug-in then neither the Play Sound button nor a link to a plug-in download appears on the page.

The Takeaway

Early Learning Centre has found an appropriate and value-adding use for a plug-in that will be greatly appreciated by parents who will have endless opportunities to hear the real toy in action. But it cleverly keeps unplugged-in shoppers shopping.

The decision to offer an enhanced feature usually needs to be backed up with a plug-in download option for the unequipped user, for example, where pages are formatted as PDF files. But Early Learning Centre’s product pages work well enough without the plug-in feature, so there is no reason to divert shoppers. It is essential to remove any hurdle, however small, from the journey from home page to check-out.

First published on 04 November, 2003