This Thursday, October 13 at around 9PM Eastern (UTC -5) we’ll be migrating DPD to new production web and database servers.
Periodically we upgrade the server hardware that the DPD service runs on to provide better capabilities to our users and increase capacity. This upgrade is also in direct response to the data center related network issues we experienced one day last month- we’re working to make sure something like that never interrupts service for our vendors again!
What this means for you:
Well, first of all once the upgrade is complete your customers will experience even faster, more reliable downloads than ever before. However, there are going to be some limited DPD services during the move as well as a short period of downtime while everything is redirected to the new location.
We Expect:
Around 10-15 minutes of downtime where all DPD services, including buy buttons and product delivery, will be unavailable.
We’re sorry about the downtime, but it’s required to migrate the DPD product and purchase database without transactions getting lost in between.
Followed by 5 minutes to 4 hours that you will not be able to create new products, but purchases and downloads will work.
During this time DPD will work for your customers, but you will not be able to create new products. Once the database is migrated we will disable creating new products on the old servers- once your computer’s DNS records update to point to the new server you’ll be able to create products again and DPD will be back to normal. This time frame is wholly dependent on your ISP’s DNS update policies and we expect the majority of our vendors to fall in the 5-60 minutes area before full services are restored.
So to recap- We’re upgrading! We’ll have a few minutes of downtime on Thursday night, followed by a couple hours weirdness on the admin side of DPD, but customer’s will be able to buy and download products. Then, everything will be more awesome! That is when the DPD guy’s will probably start drinking beer to celebrate.
Today we’re happy to announce the release of the Campaign Monitor integration for DPD.
Integrating DPD with Campaign Monitor
Integration takes a few steps but it’s all straightforward. Campaign Monitor requires that you collect your API key in order to integrate with DPD.
Your Campaign Monitor API key
You can find your API key by logging into your Campaign Monitor account and clicking on the Account Settings link in the top left of your screen. If you haven’t already done so, you’ll need to click the Generate your API key link on the right side of the page. After that, click the big Generate my API key button.
Enter your API key and click on next step. Choose the list you wish to use and click on save.
That’s it! Now all sales for the selected store will pass their customer information to your Campaign Monitor list.
We’re still working down the list of requested integrations. If anyone has any questions or comments please feel free to send us a support ticket or comment on this post and we’ll do our best to get you squared away.
Also In This Update
Fixed the pulldown builder to work with the lightbox cart. Existing pulldowns will need to be recreated to enable the lightbox.
Fixed the beta cart’s continue shopping button not working correctly in some cases.
Today we’re happy to announce the release of the iContact integration for DPD.
iContact provides a robust array of tools to create, send and track your email marketing campaigns. We’re fans of iContact- from our testing they were easy to use and integrate with DPD. They also have a 30 day free trial.
Integrating DPD with iContact
Integration takes a few steps due to iContact’s security, but its all straightforward. iContact requires that you authorize DPD to add subscribers to your account and create a new username and password to use with the API.
Enter a password. Note: For security reasons, we recommend that this password be different than your iContact password.
Click Save.
Log in to DPD and visit the integrations page in the left menu
Click the Add button to activate the iContact integration and enter your username and password created step 4 above.
Click save
That’s it! Now all sales for the selected store will pass their customer information to your iContact list.
We’ve got a couple more integrations we’re working on as we move down our list of requests. If anyone has any questions or comments please feel free to send us a support ticket or comment on this post and we’ll do our best to get you squared away.
We’ve added Imnica Mail to our growing list of supported integrations. This is hot on the heels of [intlink id=”1133″ type=”post”]GetResponse yesterday[/intlink]. Click on Integrations in the left nav menu to get started.
There is one gotcha with Imnica: It’s vitally important that you have completed the welcome wizard and your list is set up correctly, otherwise the Imnica API will not be able to send the opt-in emails for the emails that DPD sends to your list.
Also in This Update
Added additional validation to the MailChimp and GetResponse API keys.
Integrations no longer use autocomplete in the configuration forms.
Starting today, everyone will see an Integrations link appear in their left navigation menu. Integrations replace the notify url and notify email feature we’ve been using to work with AWeber and MailChimp. Today’s release includes five integrations: MailChimp, AWeber, GetResponse, URL Notify, and Email Notify.
You can enable as many integrations at once as you want.
New! GetResponse Integration
We’ve added a GetResponse integration. Enter your API key, choose which campaign to subscribe your customer to, and you’re done. Easy. (We love easy.)
Upgraded MailChimp Integration
The MailChimp integration has been upgraded. You can now select which list to subscribe your customers to and you no longer need to setup anything in your MailChimp account. If you’ve already setup DPD to work with MailChimp don’t worry–everything will continue to work.
And More!?
We’re not done with adding integrations just yet. We have at least three more planned to be released over the next week in the order they’ve been requested.
Also in This Update
Affiliate links no longer use the affiliate’s username (which is sometimes an email address). We now generate a completely random affiliate ID instead. Existing affiliate links will continue to work indefinitely so you don’t need to rush out and update them, but all future links will use the new random ID.
We’ve fixed the MP3 preview feature for those of you running on a secure (HTTPS) web site. Thanks for the feedback!
Over the past few months we’ve been working on a new and improved DPD checkout experience for buyers. We went in to the project with a few key goals in mind:
To allow for greater customization and integration of the DPD checkout and delivery process with vendor sites
Lay the groundwork for more processors, including merchant accounts
To build a system where we could add more advanced features that vendors were asking for
Today we’ve published an update that includes the new and improved DPD Cart. This is a total cart rewrite and includes every ecommerce best practice we could cram in to it. Taking information from industry reports, case studies of global ecommerce sites, and more we’ve done our best to make this the best converting checkout experience possible for your stores.
New DPD Cart - Default StyleYou can preview the default theme for the new cart here:
Add to Cart:
Demo Product ($0.00)
Demo Product w/ Key ($0.99)
Customization
The new DPD cart features a theme system that is 100% customizable by you to completely match the look and feel of your website. No longer do you have to load the cart in a lightbox or take your customers to a page that looks like its from a different website- checkout and delivery can be seamlessly integrated in to your website.
To show you the level of customization now possible, here is an Add to Cart button that will add a demo product to a customized template:
Customized New CartDemo Product ($0.00)
To accomplish this, the new theme system uses a Layout Template that serves as a “wrapper” for all checkout and delivery pages. Most vendors will only need to edit this layout to match the DPD cart to their site’s design. For those who want to do more in depth customization, we’ve also provided individual page templates that you can edit to your heart’s content.
The DPD checkout and delivery process is secured by SSL as always, and the all new asset manager allows you to upload your images, stylesheets, and javascript files to DPD so that SSL errors are not thrown by files hosted elsewhere.
DPD Theme EditorThe new theme system uses the popular TWIG template language and the DPD Template Reference clearly documents all available variables and options.
Your own Sub-Domain
The new cart and checkout system is hosted on a custom, seperate sub-domain for each store. Your checkout and delivery will now take place on YOURNAME.dpdcart.com, adding another level of integration and professionalism to your store.
Hosted Product Pages
For those selling without a website, through ads, mobile apps, or just want DPD to host the product pages the new cart also includes hosted product detail pages and index view that include the product description, image, and add-to-cart button. This product detail page and index view is wrapped in the Layout Template and styled by your own custom css / images to match the rest of your checkout process. There is no requirement to use the hosted product pages- they’re completely optional and you can continue to sell with add-to-cart and buy now buttons. You can opt out of displaying your products on the cart view by deselecting the option when creating or editing your product.
We’ll be adding more features to the hosted product pages as well as other DPD generated page in the future.
Coming Features
The new cart checkout and delivery system will allow for many new features in the coming months. Our old cart, while effective, was based on older technology and limiting on the space we had to work with. With the new cart we’ll be able to add additional pages, provide for a PCI compliant checkout experience for Merchant Accounts (with Authorize.net coming soon, more later) and have more room to offer value added services, cross sales, upsales, and more.
This new cart is the groundwork for hundreds of new features that vendors have been asking for in the future.
Upgrading to the New Cart and Checkout
While we’ve thoroughly tested the new cart and checkout we’re going to require that vendors contact support to upgrade their current cart to the new system, at least for the time being. We want to work with early adopters to make sure their theme editing needs are met and get feedback for improvements before releasing the new cart to everyone.
Both the layout and theme page editors have a preview option to see your changes in real time before making them active for your buyers so there is absolutely no risk in diving in and customizing your new cart before switching it to your active checkout. If you make a mistake you can always add a new, clean version of the DPD Standard cart to your theme manager.
If you’d like to use the new and improved cart and checkout for your store, please log in to DPD and contact Support for 1-on-1 setup and assistance.
We’re happy to announce that today we’ve published an update to DPD that gives vendors the ability to create an embedded MP3 track preview player in their site for MP3 audio products sold and delivered through DPD. The only prerequisite to using the track preview feature is that the product file must be an MP3 audio file that is not contained in a zip or other container.
The MP3 preview player is based on the popular and easy to customize AudioPlayer flash based player. Vendors can select any segment of their MP3 product file to play in the preview player, up to 30 seconds in length. Both the player and music sample clip are delivered from DPD servers so you can use this feature on free web hosts and other limited space websites. The mp3 preview uses its own resampled mp3 track and not the actual product file so it is impossible to exploit the player to download your paid mp3.
To create a MP3 preview for your audio product in DPD, simply go to the product’s details page from your product list.
Product Details Page- Music Sample
From there you’ll see the Music Sample section where you can set the start and end points (in seconds) to create your preview track.
Edit Music Clip Page
Once you’ve saved your preview track you can grab the embed code from your details page and insert it in to your web page.
Here is an example player with no customization done:
Loading Music Player…
Full details and all the available configuration options are covered in the article Creating MP3 Samples in the DPD Knowledgebase.
We’ve published an update to the live servers that brings several new features and improvements to the vendor admin-
Alertpay Upgraded to a Cart Processor
Vendors can now use Alertpay for both instant checkout and multi-item cart checkout. Alertpay can be used alongside Google Checkout or PayPal or replace them as the cart processor.
New Payment Method Configuration
DPD has an all new payment method configuration page that allows vendors to select any combination of compatible cart processors. This will also allow us to add many more payment processors in the future, including merchant accounts like Authorize.net (Coming Soon™).
New Store Wizard
When creating a new store vendors are now guided by an easy setup wizard that will collect the minimum information required to create and activate a store. After activation, advanced options like notification URL setup and download security control tweaks are available. We hope this will end the confusion some vendors were experiencing when being faced with every store option all at once.
Sandbox Modes for Google Checkout and PayPal
Updated Purchase Detail PageWhen configuring a processor you now have the ability to place it in sandbox mode to make test transactions. You must have sandbox accounts and all processor sandbox rules apply- this feature is for the more technical DPD users. You can find the sandbox setting on each processors setup page under Payment Methods.
UI Upgrades
We’ve upgraded the user interface on a few pages within the DPD admin- The Purchase Detail and Product Detail pages have been overhauled to be more readable and organized and we’ve updated the button styles throughout the admin to be more user friendly.
We’ve just published a release that includes a number of new features and Interface Improvements:
1. Download Tracking
We’ve added real-time tracking of customer downloads for all new purchases made through DPD. In addition to showing the Buyer IP, DPD now displays the download IP, download date/time, the amount of data transfered/downloaded, the user-agent of the downloader (Browser / OS version) and if the download is complete to the best of our ability to determine.
Many vendors have asked us for a way to create a dropdown menu from multiple products. We’ve added this in to our Button Creator page- Click on the small Pulldown Builder link, select your products and button, drag them around to whatever order you like, and copy and paste the code to create easy pulldowns.
Refined Product List3. Interface Improvements
We’ve been moving DPD toward a 100% store based site for some time now and in this update we’ve taken a big step toward our goal. We’ve moved the store selector up to the header of the site so its out of the way for the vast majority of DPD users who only have one store of their account and made all nav menu options based on the currently selected store. Of course, if you have more than one store its just as quick and easy to switch between them or add more, but we think this cleans up the interface for the everyone and makes DPD easier to use.
We’ve also cleaned up the product list, moved a number of options to the left nav menu, and move the various create product buttons over on to the product list page. Every now and then we make a change on the development version that makes things so much easier to use that when we have to go on Production to help vendors it makes us angry that the feature is missing- these new interface tweaks are one of those features.
The Future of DPD
We have big plans for DPD in 2011 and this update is just the beginning. Our success in 2010 has allowed us to more than double development resources dedicated to to DPD. Look for a blog post soon with information on what’s coming!
Update April 12, 2011 We’ve just received word that PayPal has fixed this problem.
This is not a DPD error and there is nothing we can do to fix it from our end. PayPal currently displays the following error when trying to return customers who checkout using a credit card without a PayPal account to the DPD download page:
Sorry — your last action could not be completed
If you were making a purchase or sending money, we recommend that you check both your PayPal account and your email for a transaction confirmation after 30 minutes.
If you came to this page from another website, please return to that site (don’t use your browser’s Back button) and restart your activity.
This PayPal bug does not pertain only to DPD- it is a system-wide PayPal bug and is affecting all checkouts using a credit card for every shopping cart, delivery service like DPD, and even simple PayPal buttons created in your PayPal account.
PayPal knows about the issue but they have not provided an ETA on when checkout might be back to normal. You can read up on the issue on the official PayPal developer forums and DPD has filed a ticket with PayPal so we can be notified when this is fixed, but for now there is no resolution.
PayPal’s last reply to our ticket:
Thanks for contacting PayPal today. We are currently working on the return URL errors issue. I am creating this ticket to communicate with you about the issue and notify you when it is resolved. Please note that we cannot provide a timeline for resolution at this time. Please stand by for additional updates. Again, thank you for contacting us, and if you have additional questions or updates to your ticket, please reply to this message.
We highly suggest that everyone affected by this bug file a support ticket with PayPal so they understand how serious of an issue this is- You can file a ticket with Merchant Technical Support here: https://ppmts.custhelp.com/
This is not a DPD error and there is nothing we can do to fix it from our end. You will still get paid, DPD purchases activate normally, and DPD sends the download link to your customers via email like any other transaction. However, until PayPal fixes this bug your buyers will not be automatically sent to the download page at DPD and will instead see the above error message if they check out using a credit card and not a PayPal account.
We understand that seeing an error right after checkout can be distressing at the least, but until PayPal fixes the bug on their site there is nothing we can do but wait with you. Please be reassured that DPD is working normally and sending download links via email and hopefully PayPal will get their act together soon!
DPD is an all-in-one shopping cart and digital fulfillment service for downloadable products. Serving thousands of stores, DPD processes and delivers millions worth of downloads each year.
