Will eStore Plugin Do the following:

[kbdunham]

I have looked at several ecommerce plugins for WordPress and am starting to get very depressed. I even paid for one that ended up not doing some REALLY basic things that one just takes for granted…so before I take the plunge again and plunk down more money on a plugin that may not work, I’d like to know if the plugin will do the following easily.

(1) I’m assuming one can place a product in either a post or a page. My interest lies in placing products via posts only. What I’d like to know is…I have several products I post in several categories. I’d like to be able to have a gallery view of each separate category on a page…and then be able to click on that product’s excerpt to be taken to the full post with a lot more detailed information.

I saw where you could have the gallery view, but I didn’t see where the gallery view could be just thumbnails with a small excerpt of the product with a link to the longer post.

If this is possible, I’m also not certain if I can generate multiple version of the gallery-like pages – one for each category of products.

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(2) I see that you have a feature that allows for offline payments. Am I correct?? Does this have to go through PayPal? I ask because I’d like the customer to select the products they want, go to the cart and hit submit and be taken to a page that asks them a series of questions. That information, as well as their order, gets emailed to me where I then review to see if I have all the info I need before sending them an invoice. This invoice would go through PayPal payments but wouldn’t necessarily have to go through my website, albeit doing so would make it easier to track.

Also, if this is possible, can I easily create the form that the customer gets after submitting their order. I am an HTML and CSS semi-expert and know enough about the WordPress framework to easily get into and out of trouble. So as long as it doesn’t seriously hacking the code, I can probably do it. I just want to know if its possible and if so, where/what page do I look at to make the changes.

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(3) When creating the “Add to Cart” buttons for the products, is it possible to have an inventory for the products that includes the variations. What I mean is…not an inventory of, for example, 6 red t-shirt, 5 blue t-shirts, and 1 black – each with the same or a different price.

Its a bit more complicated. Say for example I have computers for sale. I have 5 in the inventory for $100; add more RAM for $50 extra; add a bigger hard drive for $50 extra. Each variation adds more money to the cart…but I still only have FIVE computers for in my inventory.

I know this sounds like a stupid question…but you’d be surprised how this feature isn’t automatic with all shopping carts. (I know…I’ve been fighting with a few of them for days now!!)

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Sorry for the epic novel…I just want to be clear on what I need before buying.

Thanks in advance!

[amin007]

There nothing stupid about it… it is always a good idea to ask questions and make sure the product has the capability to do what you are after (this saves both parties time and money).

I am pretty sure WP eStore is not going to do exactly what you are after (mainly because I didn’t develop eStore to be a heavy weight full blown eCommerce plugin). It was developed mainly for selling of digital products.

1) You should be able to place a product anywhere you like. You can add products to a category then use the following shortcode on a post or page to display all the products from a particular category:

[wp_eStore_list_categories_fancy]

The following URL has an example and more explanation:

WordPress eStore Product Categorization

At the moment a product can only be assigned to one category (I think this limitation will restrict you from doing what you have in mind if you use eStore).

2) Manual checkout basically gives your customer the option to pay offline (e.g. manual bank transfer). The best to try it out from the demo page here:

WordPress eStore Plugin Demo

Yes, you can customize the “Buyer’s Details collection” page.

3) You should be able to do this one using eStore.

You will see that I mention the word “shortcode” a lot… all the shortcodes are listed here incase you were wondering:

http://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/ecommerce/wp-estore-shortcodes-and-functions-reference-460

[kbdunham]

Hi,

You wrote – 1) You should be able to place a product anywhere you like. You can add products to a category then use the following shortcode on a post or page to display all the products from a particular category:

[wp_eStore_list_categories_fancy]

The following URL has an example and more explanation:

WordPress eStore Product Categorization

At the moment a product can only be assigned to one category (I think this limitation will restrict you from doing what you have in mind if you use eStore).

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That’s great…but I’m still wondering about the other part of my question. Your example didn’t answer this. I want a gallery view of all products in a particular category, but when I click on the image or a link that says [More info] I’m taken to a page that gives me the full detailed info of that product. Your example only opens a larger image of the picture.

Can eStore do this? Thanks…

[amin007]

By default the thumbanail image points to itself (the bigger image) but you can make it so it links to another page (e.g. the product details page that you have created). You can specify this when configuring that product. The “Product Name” can also be configured to point to another URL. You can see how I use it here:

http://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/products

[kbdunham]

That all sounds awesome amin. I realize you said that your product might not be what I’m looking for but in fact I think it might be…and for my potential clients, it might be a good solution for some of them but of course, like you say, not all as it isn’t robust enough.

But thanks…I think i’ll be purchasing a copy for myself.

Cheers.

[Author]

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