Tips and Tricks WP eCommerce

eCommerce Solution for WordPress Blog

How to sell Both Digital and Non Digital Product with the WordPress eStore plugin

The WordPress eStore plugin is mainly used for selling digital products securely from your blog but you can still sell non-digital products using this same plugin. To sell non-digital content just leave the Download URL field empty when you add the product to the database. This way when the buyer receives the courtesy/confirmation email it won’t have any link there. Instead it will say there is no downloadable content for this product.

Shipping cost is only added to the cart if any item in the cart has a product with shipping cost specified in the “Shipping Cost” field of the product. So for example, if a customer adds a digital product together with a physical product to the cart only then the shipping cost of the Physical product and the base shipping cost (If this is specified in the settings menu) is applied to the cart.

Below is a screenshot of how the shopping cart looks like when someone adds both a digital and a physical product to the cart:

Shopping Cart Screenshot with both Physical and Digital products

Shopping Cart Screenshot with both Physical and Digital products

And this is a screenshot of what the customer will see in the email or the “Thank You” page after payment:

Screenshot of a Post Payment Message

Screenshot of a Post Payment Message

Please refer to the shipping cost calculation guide to understand how shipping cost is calculated for non-digital products.

How the Shipping Cost Calculation Works in WordPress eStore

WP eStore’s main strength is selling of digital product so we do not offer complex shipping options in the eStore plugin in an effort to keep the plugin easy to use and lightweight. Please feel free to read the available shipping options in eStore from this page so you can determine if it will meet your shipping needs.

1. Simple Shipping Option

If you just want to use flat shipping cost for each item then just enter “0” in the Base Shipping Cost option in the settings menu and add the individual shipping cost in the “Item Shipping Cost” field when you configure the product.

If you just want to use a fixed shipping cost for the cart no matter how many items are in the cart then you can achieve this by specifying this fixed amount in the base shipping cost. Remember, the base shipping cost is only added to the cart if a product in the cart has individual shipping value specified (this way if a customer buys digital product he doesn’t get charged any shipping). Use an individual shipping value of “0.001” for your physical items which won’t increase the shipping cost but will trigger the base shipping cost to be added as a fixed shipping rate.

2. Using PayPal’s Profile Based Shipping

You can have PayPal calculate shipping charges automatically. PayPal calculates shipping charges based on rates that you specify in your account profile. You can set up shipping rates as follows:

  • Domestic (U.S.-only) shipping rates for regions defined by state or zip code
  • International shipping rates for regions define by country or jurisdiction

You can specify shipping rate based on the weight of the items too. Within shipping regions, you can specify rates for different shipping methods, such as standard and express delivery.

We have a tutorial on how to setup paypal profile based shipping that you can look at if you have never configured profile based shipping before.

To use PayPal’s profile based shipping simply check the “Use PayPal Profile Based Shipping” checkbox in the settings menu of eStore and the shopping cart will use the shipping options you have specified in your PayPal account profile:

PayPal's profile based shipping

PayPal’s profile based shipping

If you use PayPal’s profile based shipping, your customers will be prompted to enter the shipping destination when they go to checkout via PayPal.

Choose destination for shipping calculation

Choose destination for shipping calculation

After the customer enter the destination it will automatically add the shipping amount based on what you have specified in your profile (eg. based on the weight of item and or delivery location).

Shipping is calculated based on the specified criteria in your profile

Shipping is calculated based on the specified criteria in your profile

ecommerce-shipping

3. How to Give Shipping Discount when Someone Buys Multiple Products

What if you want to use the simple shipping option but be a little more intelligent with the shipping cost calculation and want to use Base Shipping Cost in conjunction with the individual product shipping cost to offer your customers a better shipping price? You can do that too.

The base shipping cost is added to the total of the individual products shipping cost (The base shipping cost is only applied to the cart if any of the cart item has an individual shipping amount specified for it). So for example if you had two products that costs $50 each and you want to charge $10 shipping for each item then someone buying both the products would have to pay $100(product cost) + $20(shipping cost) = $120(total). That is not a very realistic shipping price since you are shipping both the products to the same address in one package so it will probably cost you $15 instead of $20.

How do you handle this situation?
You use a base shipping cost of $5 and individual product shipping cost of $5.

Now when someone buys both the products the shipping cost will be calculated as following:
$5(shipping for product1) + $5(shipping for product2) = $10(total individual products shipping cost)
Total shipping cost = $10(total individual products shipping cost) + $5(base shipping cost) = $15!

When someone buys one product the shipping cost will be calculated as following:
$5(shipping for product1) = $5(total individual products shipping cost)
Total shipping cost = $5(total individual products shipping cost) + $5(base shipping cost) = $10! (this is the shipping you wanted to charge for one product)

So, hopefully you can see that using the base shipping cost in conjunction with the individual product shipping cost you can be very dynamic in determining the total shipping cost for a purchase.

4. Using A Shipping Variation Option

You can use the shipping variation option field to add more shipping options for your need. For example, you can add a variation called Shipping with the values “Domestic” and “International” that adds different amount to the cart based on the user selection.

Please refer to the WP eStore Shipping Variation documentation to learn how to use variations.

5. Using Bulk Quantity Shipping Discount

Check the bulk quantity shipping discount addon for details.

6. Using Amount Based Shipping

The Amount Based Shipping addon allows you to automatically apply a shipping amount to the cart based on a price range.

How to Test the WordPress eStore to Make Sure Everything is Working Properly

The simplest way to test if the WordPress eStore plugin is working is to create a test product with the price of 1 cent ($0.01) and purchase that product yourself as a buyer.

It is a good idea to turn on debug (check the “Enable Debug” checkbox) from the settings menu and you will be able to see every step of the transaction process (IPN validation, product verification etc) in the ipn_handle_debug.log file.

wp-estore-testing

How to Test Using PayPal Sandbox

You can also use the plugin in SandBox mode (PayPal Sandbox) which will allow you to test it without having to perform a live transaction. To test it using PayPal Sandbox do the following:

  • Go to the settings menu of the WP eStore plugin.
  • Enter your sandbox seller’s email in the ‘Paypal Email Address’ field.
  • Tick the ‘Enable Sandbox Testing’ checkbox.

Please turn on debug from the settings menu and you will be able to see every step of the transaction processs (IPN validation, product verification etc) in the ipn_handle_debug.log file.

If you need a more detailed guide on using PayPal Sandbox then check the following post:

What to do When Something is not Functioning as Expected

If something is not functioning as expected after the payment is made on PayPal (e.g. emails are not getting sent out) it is a good idea to enable debug and perform a test transaction so you can analyze the log file to identify the issue. The following URL will help:

Tips

  • Check this plugin testing checklist – setup preparation for testing
  • Remember to revert the changes to run the Plugin in Live mode again after you are done with the testing (change the paypal email address and uncheck the ‘Enable Sandbox Testing’ option).
  • The debug can be used in live or testing mode and can be very handy when you are trying to figure out an issue.
  • I always recommend testing the system in live mode, this way you have the plugin running in live mode and can see if it has any issues that the customers are likely to see.

WordPress eStore Installation and Update Guide

Installing and Upgrading WordPress eStore plugin is very easy. The installation of this plugin is similar to all the other WordPress plugins.

Fresh Installation of WP eStore

First deactivate the WP Simple Paypal Shopping cart plugin if you are using it. WP eStore plugin has all the functionality of the WP Simple Paypal Shopping cart.

  • Click on the “Add New” link from the “Plugins” menu inside your WordPress admin dashboard.
  • Click the “Upload Plugin” button from the top of this page.
  • Browse for the plugin’s zip file (wp-cart-for-digital-products.zip) and hit the “Install Now” button.
  • Activate the plugin through the Plugins menu in WordPress.

Installation Video

Upgrade WP eStore Plugin

Before you ask…

Yes, the plugin will retain all the previous information that you saved. No data (your product details, settings values etc.) will get lost during the upgrade.

Important Note 1: If you have a live site with high traffic where customers are constantly making purchases then you should consider installing the new version of the plugin on a test WordPress site first to minimize any chance of upgrade related issue taking you out by surprise. Most people prefer to have a copy of WordPress installed in one of the sub-directories for testing purpose (you can install it in a sub-domain too). This way if you face an issue due to upgrading, you can report it to us and while we work on it, your main site won’t be affected.

Important Note 2: Some users have this bad habit of keeping multiple copies of the same plugin in the “plugins” directory. This is the source of many problems. Please note that you should only have one version of any WordPress plugin in the plugins directory at any given time. If you want to keep backups then you can keep it in your “uploads” directory or on your computer’s hard drive.

With that said, please follow the instructions below when upgrading the WordPress eStore plugin from an older version to a newer version:

Upgrade Steps

Do the following steps to upgrade the plugin:

  • Deactivate the current version of the WP eStore plugin from the Plugins menu.
  • Delete the current version of the WP eStore plugin from the Plugins menu.
  • Now, follow the fresh installation steps outlined above to install the plugin.

Don’t be scared to delete the plugin. It will retain all the previously entered settings and product information (no data will get lost during the upgrade).

Basic Usage Guide

Step 1. First add the product(s) to the database through the Add/Edit Products interface. Products can be modified through the Manage Products interface.

Step 2. To add the Add to Cart button simply add the following trigger text to a post or page next to the product.

[wp_eStore_add_to_cart id=PRODUCT-ID]

Replace PRODUCT-ID with the actual product id of the product (example, 1). Product IDs are unique numbers that are automatically created for you when you add a product to the database. All of your products IDs can be found in the Manage Products section.

Step 3. To add the shopping cart to a post, checkout page and/or sidebar simply add the following trigger text to a post or page in HTML view or use the sidebar widget. The shopping cart will only be visible when a customer adds a product in the post or page.

[wp_eStore_cart]

Additional Usage Guidance

Please leave a comment below if you have any questions.

How to Use Buy Now buttons Using the WordPress eStore Shopping Cart Plugin

WordPress eStore allows you to create “Buy Now” type button functionality so your customers don’t have to add items to the cart. The “Buy Now” type buttons take the customers directly to the payment page for payment when clicked.

Creating a PayPal Buy Now Button

Adding a “Buy Now” type button is similar to adding an Add to Cart button. The main difference is in the shortcode that is used to place the button on a post or page. To insert a “Buy Now” type button add the following shortcode in a post or page:

[wp_eStore_buy_now_button id=PRODUCT-ID]

Replace ‘PRODUCT-ID’ with the actual product id of the product you are selling. For example:

[wp_eStore_buy_now_button id=1]

Try clicking on the following Buy button to see how it works:

product image audio selling
Name: Demo Product Four
Description: Demonstrates the
‘Buy Now’ type button
Price: $1.00

Each ‘Buy Now’ type button can have a unique return URL. When the return URL is used the customer is sent to the specified URL after Payment.

Customizing the “Buy” Button Image

You can customize the buy button image with your unique custom designed image by specifying the image URL in the “Button Image URL” field of the product.

For example I have used the well known “Belcher Button” image for the following buy button. It looks a lot like what you may have seen on may other sales pages, doesn’t it? 🙂

Using a Fancy Display with the Buy Now Button

Demo Buy Now button
Demo Buy Now button
This is a test description. This description is here to show how the description of this product looks like when used with the WordPress Shopping Cart.
Price: $1.00

Enter the following shortcode to display the product like the one above (1 is the product id of the product in this example):

[wp_eStore_buy_now_fancy id=1]

Display Buy Now button from Any WordPress Theme File

You can also use the following PHP function if you want to show the ‘Buy Now’ type buttons from your wordpress theme’s template files (eg. on the sidebar ‘sidebar.php’):

print_eStore_buy_now_button(PRODUCT-ID)

So adding the following line to a PHP file will display a Buy Now button for the product who’s product id is 4:

<?php echo print_eStore_buy_now_button(4); ?>

Creating a Buy Now Button For Other Payment Gateways

Check the following documentation to learn how to create a buy now button for the other eStore gateways:

How to Show Add to Cart buttons Using the WordPress eStore Shopping Cart Plugin

This is a step by step tutorial to setup an ‘Add to Cart‘ button for a Product using the WordPress eStore plugin to accommodate the selling of products from your WordPress site.

After you read this tutorial, you will be able to easily create “Add to Cart” button(s) on your product’s sales page and sell your products.

Setup a Basic ‘Add to Cart’ Button for a Product

Step 1) Think about the name, price and a little description for the product you want to sell.

Step 2) Configure the product using the ‘Add/Edit Products’ interface of the WordPress eStore Plugin. Take note of the ‘Product ID’ after you add the product (all the product ids can be found on the ‘Manage Products’ page).

Step 3)Design however you want to display the product on a Post or Page (the landing page of the product) where you want to sell the product from. I want to keep it very simple for this tutorial. So I am going to use the following as my product information:

Name: Demo Product One
Description: Demonstrates the Add to Cart button
Price: $1.00

Step 4) Now, all I need is the ‘Add to Cart’ button next to the product information so a customer can purchase it. To insert the ‘Add to Cart’ button that goes with this product, add the following shortcode below the line ‘Price: $1.00’

[wp_eStore_add_to_cart id=PRODUCT-ID]

Replace ‘PRODUCT-ID’ with the actual product id of the product you are selling in my case it’s 1 because this is the first product I just configured. So I am going to add the following text

[wp_eStore_add_to_cart id=1]

Step 5) The completed product display looks like the following:

Name: Demo Product One
Description: Demonstrates the Add to Cart button
Price: $1.00

Step 6) Finally, I am going to add the following shortcode in the post that displays the shopping cart when items are added to the cart. You can also use the sidebar widget to display the shopping cart. This will allow the customer to view their order and complete the checkout:

[wp_eStore_cart]

Feel free to hit the above ‘Add to Cart’ button to see how the shopping cart appears below this line and allows a customer to purchase the product.


You can copy and paste all the available eStore shortcodes from the shortcode references PDF file.

Common Pitfalls

The most common mistakes people make when using the ‘Add to Cart’ button’s shortcode and hence the button doesn’t appear are as following:

  • Use of hyphen (-) instead of underscore (_). Use wp_eStore not wp-eStore.
  • Use of lowercase ‘s’ instead of uppercase ‘S’. Use wp_eStore not wp_estore.
  • Forgot to activate the plugin from the plugins menu (Yes it does happen 🙂
  • Didn’t replace ‘PRODUCT-ID’ in the shortcode with the actual number.

How to use a Custom image as the ‘Add to Cart’ button

If you want to make the ‘Add to Cart’ button look nicer then you probably want to use a custom image for the button. WordPress eStore plugin allows you to specify a custom button image for every product. This way you can have nice call to action buttons on your product’s landing page.

When you configure the product, there is an optional product settings field called ‘Button Image URL‘ that you can use to specify a custom button image for the product.

wp_estore_button_image_url

I have uploaded a custom image to my site and used the URL of that image in the ‘Button Image URL’ field of the product settings and now the ‘Add to Cart’ button looks like the following (I have also embedded a picture in the post so the product display looks nicer):

Name: Demo Product Two
Description: Demonstrates Customized ‘Add to Cart’ button
Price: $1.00

The WordPress eStore plugin comes with a few different ‘Add to Cart’ and ‘Buy Now’ button images that you can use. All the images are included in the ‘images’ directory of the plugin. More style to the button can be added using CSS (stylesheet).

How to Display the Product in a Stylish Way

WP eStore comes with a few product display templates that you can use to display your product in a stylish way. Here is an example product display template:

Cool Test Product Two
Cool Test Product Two
Some test description of the product to show how this description field looks like. You can insert plain HTML in this description field too.
Available Qty: 44
Price: $50.00

Enter the following shortcode to display the product like the one above (9 is the product id of the product in this example):

[wp_eStore_fancy1 id=9]

Cool Test Product Two
Cool Test Product Two
Some test description of the product to show how this description field looks like. You can insert plain HTML in this description field too.
Available Qty: 44
Price: $50.00

Or Enter the following shortcode to display the product like the one above

[wp_eStore_fancy2 id=9]

You will have to fill out the Product Description and the Thumbnail image URL when configuring the product for this type of display.

More stylish display options are explained on the stylish product display documentation page.

How to Sell Limited Number of Copies of a Product

WordPress eStore plugin allows you to limit the number of copies of a product you sell. In order to sell limited copies of a product, simply enter the number of copies you want to sell in the ‘Available Copies’ field of the Product when you configure it.

The plugin will decrease that number every time that product sells. When the ‘Available Copies’ number reaches ‘0’ the plugin replaces the ‘Add to Cart’ button with a ‘Sold Out’ image like the following preventing further sales:

Demo Product Three
Price: $9.50

If you are having any problems please leave a comment below.