ecommerce setups

[bacollier]

Hi Guys/Girls!

I'm looking for a poke in the right direction when it comes to ecommerce setups. I've got a few clients asking about upgrading their sites to include some ecommerce functionality.

I know a fair bit of xhtml, css and a little php but no-where near enough to put something together myself. Most of the work i do is done with wordpress so i'm wondering if there is any ecommerce solutions that work well with wordpress - i don't mind if it's a little expensive, if it works well i'm interested no matter the price. What software should i look into?

Any help is much appreciated!
Thanks

[YvetteKuhns]

You can choose the best shopping cart for the client, install it in a subdirectory and link from the Wordpress site to the shopping cart. They do not need to be integrated. If the client decides to change the site or the shopping cart later, then only that one thing may be temporarily inaccessible.

Zen Cart and OScommerce have been around a while and there is a lot of information on them. Each have a bit of a learning curve, but they are open source (free). Zen Cart digital downloads no longer work on PowWeb, though. Zen Cart has an add-on called Easy Populate which allows clients to import Excel or other files that add products to the cart.

[bacollier]

thanks YvetteKuhns,

I just downloaded WP-ecommerce on a local version of wordpress to have a look at all the options and functionality - it looks really good....do you have any experience with this set-up?

[YvetteKuhns]

I don't use WordPress, but I have experience with shopping carts. I normally try to keep them separate in case of problems. Another PowWeb customer here had problems when Joomla, Gallery and another CMS (it was a shopping cart, I think) were going crazy. I remember helping him with that. That was the BIGGEST website I ever saw hosted on PowWeb! Well, he did have old scripts and files to delete from the server, but wow!

WordPress forum post: [Plugin: WP e-Commerce] Not Worth The Trouble (http://wordpress.org/support/topic/194243) is a worry. Read the entire thread. See other links on the right for WordPress plugins comments (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-e-commerce/). It seems like the plugin is new and there isn't enough free online support for it. You would have to pay for support. I never had that problem with the carts I recommended (yet). ;)

[troycawley]

I tried WP ecommerce. I ran to enough bugs to give up. (It kept emptying my shopping cart when I was testing it. Not a great way to keep customers.)

I installed Zen Cart. I'm trying to integrate the site with WP and Zen Cart. I'll let you know in a few weeks how that works out.

[troycawley]

Sorry for the double post, but I thought I'd share this ... PayPal Shopping cart might be a way to go, if your clients are just selling a "handful" of items:
http://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/xcl/rec/sc-intro-outside

(That should tell you how well this zencart/wordpress integration is going, eh? I keep looking at alternatives. But I'll get it...)

[YvetteKuhns]

Why are you trying to integrate WordPress with a shopping cart? You can link to a shopping cart that is installed in a separate directory. Do you have a lot of products mentioned in WordPress? You can use image and/or text links to the shopping cart. I guess I am not a big fan of WordPress or integrating programs that were not created by the same authors. It just sounds like an accident waiting to happen. WordPress couldn't even get the bugs out of their own ecommerce solution (yet). ;)

[troycawley]

I'm adjusting the zen cart template to look like the layout of the site (which is managed by wp) ... and making the wp functions available within zen cart (to display relevant blog posts, for example). WP is my "cms of choice" ... so wordpress runs the site while zen cart runs the /store/ (as you suggest).

WordPress couldn't even get the bugs out of their own ecommerce solution (yet). ;)The shopping cart is a plugin to wordpress, so you can't really blame the WP folks for that. They never intended WP as an ecommerce solution. In fact, http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/ is pretty good at tracking what plugins work with what versions of WP.

The authors of WP E-commerce are trying to extend the functionality of WordPress a little too far (especially if you are trying to use it here in a shared environment ... and especially if you want to keep your WP-managed site updated without your site breaking.)

[YvetteKuhns]

Zen Cart has an add-on called Easy Populate to import and export products and other information into the database. Does WordPress have something to allow you to keep track of common topics, so you can manage links to and from WordPress?

[troycawley]

Not sure what you're getting at?

[YvetteKuhns]

You could create a bridge that would match store products in Zen Cart with posts on WordPress if one doesn't already exist. I was thinking that you wanted products (in the shopping cart) to appear on WordPress, but you are trying to get WordPress posts to appear on Zen Cart without manually adding them. Easy Populate can easily let you add a link to a product description if you create an Excel spreadsheet for each product and its corresponding link to the WordPress blog, then import it.