Jamie@LHE Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 Hello there!I know this is my first post, so allow me to introduce myself. I'm working for a high-end hair extensions company and have been tasked with finding a new eCommerce platform for our online business activities. I'm a big fan of opensource software and want to get away from freelance webdesign agencies who tend to hold your site hostage or not be able to deliver for what you pay for.I've had a good look around and think that PrestaShop is the platform for this company, but in order to get my managers on board with the idea I have a list of necessary capabilities that they would like from their new eCommerce platform - I can't easily find if PrestaShop is capable of doing these, so I figured I'd jump in here and ask some more experienced users if they are familiar with PrestaShop being able to perform these following tasks, easily or with modules etc:1) Customer Reviews (like Amazon) - I know PrestaShop does commenting, and a review module is on the way... is this module nearly ready and something I can tell my managers "Yes, this functionality will be available very soon!" ? Also, can it be moderated?2) Distinguish between types of logged in customer, such that some will pay VAT, while others won't, because they are businesses, trade or wholesale customers; or some pay international shipping rates, while others pay national/european rates etc. What about extra signing up fields, for registered VAT numbers, business names (for business to business customers) etc.?3) How good is the order monitoring? - Can customers log in and check on the delivery status of their goods? Is there a function for the seller to notify the customer about the status of their goods via e-mail etc.?4) What kind of 'clearance items' funcitonality does PrestaShop offer?5) How easy is it to create drop-down menus? I assume this is just a case of some deep code alteration on the page templates/css etc.?6) I know products can have unlimited variations, but how do these interact? If I have some colours available only in some lengths, and some lengths only available in some grades... what happens if the customer selects the grade first? Do the other options 'grey out' the unavailable selections accordingly?Also, can the variant selector be a pop-out colour selector containing little pictures of the colours?And can selecting variations change one, or many, of the thumbnail previews of the product and even the copy surrounding the product?7) Bulk buying - how narrow or wide can you tailor the requirements for bulk buying? By quantity, size, style, or any combination of variations/prices etc.? - - - -I know I may have asked some questions that may seem like they have an obvious answer in the 'All Features' page, but giving me the benefit of the doubt, try to explain to me why such and such a feature is what I'm looking for because it functions in such and such a way or is customizable thus.I really hope I've not asked too many questions and hope even more that many of you can help answer some or all of these burning questions.I sincerely hope I can shift this company onto the PrestaShop platform and look forward to integrating myself into the community here! (First as an annoying n00b, but hopefully as a helpful future memeber )Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Truemedia Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 2) Yeh prestashop handles everything you need for that3) All order status can be checked on an orderes page and automatically emailed.4) Yeh prestashop calls this feature "specials"5) I do a drop down menu (as soon as the newest version get approved on prestashop addons) which can all be configured through the back office, no coding required.6) PrestaShop works as you suggested already.7) You decide whatever attributes or quanities effect what product and prices. All configurableYou should try the demo to get a better idea of how prestashop works. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted February 25, 2011 Author Share Posted February 25, 2011 Thank you for replying!I see that some of my troubles are because of differing terms for the functions i'm looking for.Generally I've found it difficult to determine what PrestaShop does based on the single sentence description of each function.I tried both the front and back end demos and found them to be useful for a general feel of how great the system could be, and i answered some of my own specific questions through this method - such as finding a Worldpay module. However, it would have been very time consuming to set up and test a lot of the functionality i was looking for, if i had even known where to look in the first place, so in the name of convenience i decided i'd done a sufficient amount of my own research (including setting up a VNC on my laptop, running an Apache & xampplite server and successfully installing and running an instance of PrestaShop, just to see how easy it was and thought i'd ask people who would know better Thank you for taking the time to read my post and answer my questions. Hopefully if I get a few more responses I'll be more confident to go ahead with my decisions in regards to my managers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted February 28, 2011 Author Share Posted February 28, 2011 Ok, double post - bump? - trying not to be forgotten... plus:How do I change the topic to 'Solved'? And is there any one else who would care to post here and confirm or deny the answers I have received in relation to the questions I have asked? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrBaseball34 Posted February 28, 2011 Share Posted February 28, 2011 Edit the subject of your first post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted March 2, 2011 Author Share Posted March 2, 2011 Ok, I have a few more questions from my managers if someone could kindly answer them:1) Can we track different kinds of customers without having them log in or register until they reach the checkout, such that different content is displayed for customers who have entered the site from different places - some sort of URL tracking key? Further to this, once they log in/register, the validity of the goods in their basket are confirmed or denied?2) In addition to the first question, can usage statistics, landing page etc., be broken down to the individual level - the 'customer journey'? Further to this, how detailed is the 'Sales and Orders' data? Can all data be analyzed over variable lengths of time, or a comparison of different product ranges etc?3) What does the search results page look like? - Can it return a result that is a product you can add to your basket? Or does it just return a link to the product page that you must first click on to get to the product you want to add?4) I've asked this before but we want to be absolutely sure... this is probably the most important must have feature - can product variations change the attrributes of the product you're looking at? For instance, can we create a product that changes main and thumbnail pictures, price, copy and other page elements all by the customer selecting it's variation menus etc.? Can the variations even affect which other variations are available?Sorry to keep going on, but my managers don't want me to get started on this project only to find that we can't do what we want to do many weeks down the line.Thanks for your patience! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrBaseball34 Posted March 2, 2011 Share Posted March 2, 2011 1. yes, using the smarty->logged variable or $cookie->isLogged(), which checks the user's cookie.2. I don't know about stats, I don't use them.3. The search results all have the Add To Cart button.4. Not without programming the functionality. I mean it is not in the box, so to speak. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted March 4, 2011 Author Share Posted March 4, 2011 1. So I'm probably going to need some PHP, JQuery and/or Ajax knowledge for a lot of the functions my managers are requesting.2. Anyone?3. Great!4. Ouch. Any idea what kind of language i'll be needing to programme this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrBaseball34 Posted March 4, 2011 Share Posted March 4, 2011 1. Don't forget Smarty.4. DUH, Prestashop is written in a combination of PHP and Smarty.Say, it's not as bad as you expect. Learning PHP is fairly easy if you have any programming knowledge at all. The hardest parrt will be learning the architecture.And don't expect to be getting timely answers here on this forum because the developers of the product stay away from these forums like it has the plague. At lease this English forum. I can't speak about the French forum, since they are all French.There are three or four guys that help out a lot here. johnstcks, rocky, and I are the ones that do the most English help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted March 4, 2011 Author Share Posted March 4, 2011 Less than 2 hours is pretty prompt for the internet - i'm used to communicating through blogs and forums Although I see what you mean in those other regards... not many other people are going to respond because we're all asking for help.You're going a good job! I guess the situation here is something I sort of expected when I read that PrestaShop was predominantly a French community. Still... it should be a global community I'll have to concentrate my efforts on Smarty and PHP then. I'm basically a one-man IT department that joined a company without an IT department about 6 months ago. I now have so many different projects going on at once I'm beginning to wonder how i'm going to cope when all of these 2-3 month deadlines roll around... heh.From what I gather, every other eCommerce platform will require the same sorts of custom coding to get the specific and pretty high-tier features that my managers have their hearts set on. I'll just have to carve out a budget for either freelance programmers or programming courses Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrBaseball34 Posted March 4, 2011 Share Posted March 4, 2011 Your best bet would be to download some free e-books on PHP and Smarty. PM me and I'll give you some links. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted March 7, 2011 Author Share Posted March 7, 2011 Hello there! (Second time I'm writing this... i'll copy it before pressing 'submit' this time I spoke with my immediate manager this morning and in response to my findings and recommendations we have slightly changed our proposed layout/functionality for the site. provides no means to add “extra customer fields” In response to this, and the discovery that some of our professional clients do not have VAT numbers, we are dropping this requirement. (Hooray!)However, they have only slightly changed the requirement to track people until checkout, at which point we verify their identity and the validity of the contents of their basket based on their self-proposed identity.Now they wish the whole site to be 'visibile' to all clients. We want professional clients to enter through the left hand side of a portal page, and everyone else through the right. If they enter through the right they will be able to see all of the menu tabs, but when they click on some of them they are told to either log-in (under a professional account) or they can not see the content.Happily, they no longer require the basket to be verified - anyone can buy anything - and so they should.why try to force ALL that functionality into a single ... “product page”? I’m wondering “what’s left to tell the customer?” when they finally click thru to the “product page” for a given SKU? Accessibility. Ease of use. We're aiming for 3 clicks until checkout - we don't want customers drilling down to 'finally' get to the product page, you know? It should all be there in front of them. Also, we're predominantly business-to-business... we're selling to professionals... there's not a lot they need to know beyond a good description of what they're buying. The variations in our products are really the key selling point - and is a little more complex than t-shirts, underwear/bras or jewellery.I've already discussed this with my immediate manager and we are prepared to sacrifice a little in design and useability if needs be, but they are also aware that there is perhaps a need for a programmer to get on board - freelance or small contract.Instead, you would create combo AC, BC, etc in advance, and refrain from setting up an AB. Are you describing separate products here, with their own pages? Or can I create combinations AC and BC to appear on the same product page, selectable by two variant selectors, and in failing to create AB it does not appear as a validly selectable combination of the two selectors?I've looked at the Stats page in the back-end and think I need to make a summary presentation for my managers - they don't have the time to sit with me and see for themselves, it's my job to interpret everything Digital for them and preferably present it in a neat little table Thank you for taking the time to engage with me, it is very much appreciated! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrBaseball34 Posted March 7, 2011 Share Posted March 7, 2011 We’re aiming for 3 clicks until checkout The Add-To-Cart button is clearly on any page that shows a product. I think you can set it up to go to cart when adding a product, then you are just 2 clicks away from purchasing, if you are logged in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie@LHE Posted March 8, 2011 Author Share Posted March 8, 2011 Please don’t attempt to handle this requirement via a PHP shopping cart This approach would thwart one’s ability to present ... restricted, access to specific products. I was trying to describe a simple tracking system... more like a flag... that allows restricted access to specific products without logging in. Then using the logging in process to verify the authenticity of the baskets contents in relation to the users real access rights, as it were.But from what you're saying, and from using logic and common sense, this would be impossible if not incredibly difficult to accomplish.Thankfully, though, my managers no longer care who buys which items - which makes more sense from a sales point of view.Personally, I wouldn’t advocate attempting to change this presentation. Unfortunately, it is very much a requirement... I think i'm going to have fun though Watch this space My deadline is 1st of May... so no pressure :| Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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