DPD-Cart Plugin Updated

  • Jason@DPD
  • October 12, 2009
  • No Comments

We’ve updated the DPD-Cart plugin with a couple fixes and tweaks:

  • Full IE6 compatibility
  • Corrected a double-slash “//” in some generated URLs.
  • Corrected an API SSL issue some users were having when their host’s server was missing some root certificates.

This is a recommended update for all DPD-Cart plugin users.

To update simply overwrite the dpd-wpcart plugin folder with the new version in the ZIP file. No configuration or template changes are needed.

Get the updated DPD-Cart v1.1 from the DPD-Cart Plugin Page

Smashing Magazine: 15 Common Mistakes in E-Commerce Design

  • Jason@DPD
  • October 8, 2009
  • No Comments

Smashing Magazine has a great post on common mistakes made in ecommerce design.

Some key mistakes that people who sell downloads in particular might suffer from:

  • Hiding contact information
  • Long and confusing checkout process
  • Requiring an account to order
  • A poor shopping cart design
  • Confusing navigation
  • Not including store and shipping policies

Luckily DPD addresses many of these points- checkout using the DPD storefront system is quick and easy with only 3 pages- cart, payment, and delivery. No account is required to order using the DPD system, and the DPD shopping cart follows Smashing’s recommendation to load an item in the cart right on the product page without taking the customer to another site or page.

In the course of supporting vendors we look at a lot of sales sites. The most common problems we see amongst DPD vendors are lack of contact information and store / shipping policies.

Lack of Contact Information

Just because you don’t need the address and contact information of your customers to “ship” their download doesn’t mean they don’t want to know who it is they’re giving their money to. Making your contact information visible will go a long way to increasing buyer trust. We understand that you might be working out of your home (probably 80% of DPD vendors are home based with no actual store or business address) but that doesn’t mean you have to share your home address and phone number. There are always web based PO Boxes and web based phone services that can be had for as little as $9.99 a month. At the very least you should give an email address or web based contact form.

Store and Shipping Policies

DPD provides for instant delivery to paying customers. This is one of the strongest selling points for download products and one not enough vendors exploit- they buy it now they get it now! This is something that can be made in to a key selling point and benefit of buying from you- not some boring policy left off your site.

Check out the full article at Smashing Magazine and see if any of these points apply to you: Smashing Magazine: 15 Common Mistakes in E-Commerce Design

New DPD-Cart WordPress Plugin

  • Jason@DPD
  • October 8, 2009
  • 1 Comment

We’ve just released the DPD-Cart plugin for WordPress.

The DPD-Cart plugin allows you to easily integrate a DPD Storefront with your WordPress blog. It features a View Cart / Checkout sidebar Widget and easy product insertion in to posts and pages with no copying and pasting of button code.

Get the plugin and more details from the download page: DPD-Cart Plugin

Our friends at Inspired Mag have also created a tutorial with step-by-step instructions and screenshots showing how to get up and running with the DPD-Cart plugin.

Check out: Start Selling Downloads from your WordPress Blog in 5 Minutes

How-To: PDF Buyer Tracking

  • Jason@DPD
  • September 23, 2009
  • 1 Comment

DPD offers a PDF buyer tracking feature that automatically marks PDF products with the buyer Name, Email, and Transaction ID.

This helps to prevent sharing sharing of your file because people have an aversion to mass distribution of their personally identifiable information. Well, everyone except for that LifeLock Guy and it didn’t turn out too well for him.

The best part about PDF Buyer Tracking? It’s turned on with a single checkbox during product setup!

There are only a few conditions to using the PDF Buyer Tracking feature:

  • You must have a DPD Paid account plan- this is a premium feature not available to free accounts!
  • Your product file must be a single PDF upload and not contained in a ZIP, RAR, ISO, or any other archive file.
  • Your PDF must be a Acrobat 5 compatible file.
  • Your PDF must not have an edit password set in the PDF file.
  • Your PDF file size must be less than 30 MB.

For more information on these conditions and the reasons behind them please refer to the DPD Knowledgebase documentation.

Enabling PDF Buyer tracking is ridiculously easy:

For Storefront Products:

  1. Create a new Storefront Product
  2. Check the “Enable PDF Buyer Tracking” checkbox on the first setup page
  3. Upload your product file as normal (be sure its a .pdf file)

For Standalone Products:

  1. Create a new Storefront Product
  2. Upload your product file as normal (be sure its a .pdf file)
  3. Check the “Enable PDF Buyer Tracking” checkbox on the Delivery options page after upload.

Thats it!

To test that it is working properly with your PDF you can send yourself a free delivery of the product- it will have your email address and transaction ID added to the bottom of the PDF.

Note: If the product is free for whatever reason (through a storefront coupon or a “free” standalone product) then only the transaction ID will be printed on the PDF. If you send a free delivery to a specific email address then the email you sent it to and the transaction ID will be supplied. The name is not provided for these types of transactions because we pull the buyer’s real name from their PayPal account as an added security measure, so if there is no checkout we can’t capture a real name.

New DPD Storefront Affiliate System- Affiliate Enable your entire store!

  • Jason@DPD
  • September 22, 2009
  • 1 Comment

Now entire storefronts can be affiliate enabled! Unlike standalone product affiliate programs that can be used for individual “buy now” products, the new DPD Storefront Affiliate System allows for all products sold through an affiliate enabled storefront to be tracked through the DPD affiliate system. No more individual signup links, and no changes to your current DPD “add to cart” or “checkout” button code! The new DPD Storefront Affiliate system can be enabled for any storefront by setting a few simple options for the storefront- affiliate enable your entire website in just minutes!

The storefront affiliate system is a full featured affiliate program manager for your store- Once affiliates sign up to promote your products they are given a special tracking hoplink that credits them with any sales generated by the traffic they refer.

And, because the DPD system allows for multiple storefronts on a single DPD account vendors can now run multiple affiliate enabled websites from one account!

For more information including a complete introduction to the DPD Storefront affiliate program please review the following knowledgebase article: Setting up and Managing a Storefront Affiliate Program

As always, we value your feedback- Suggestions are always welcome! Leave a comment here or send us a support ticket and we’ll respond ASAP.

New Customer and Transaction Tools and Navigation Improvements

  • Jason@DPD
  • September 14, 2009
  • No Comments

Today we have released an update to DPD that provides for several new features:

  • Customer Center with searchable customer list of all product purchases
  • Transaction Center with searchable list of all transactions made through the DPD system
  • Site Navigation Tweaks – All DPD options are available through menus from the top blue bar!
  • Bugfix: Some vendors were having their store logos disapper- this has been fixed

For more information, please read the full release notes.