While we wait on the Ellis Lab / EE ecommerce, there are many of us who desperately need a solution in the interim.  I’ve literally researched and fiddled around with 20+ packages.  As many of you know, there really isn’t an easy route to integrating these packages with EE.

So, I’m making this post to see if anyone has any experience with ClickCartPro?  This past weekend, I spent much of my time messing around with the demo, reading through their forums, docs and website.  Like many good pieces of software, their admin area and terminology takes some understanding before taking advantage of the hidden power.  So far, I’m impressed with ClickCartPro (CCP) for the following reasons:

- Full featured ecommerce in it’s sixth release (6th release?  how’d we miss it?)
- Order management, reports and integration with Quickbooks and/or Peachtree
- Embedded support for full-blown PHP allow you to include program variables and even code routines in your XHTML
- The site layout is skin based and 100% valid markup
- You can match the layout to the look and feel of the rest of your site without Smarty. (Reminds me of modifying the EE Membership templates.)
- Change the text of all system messages.
- Change the different email templates (text and XHTML) used by the program.

...and lastly, and possibly the most interesting idea is the Remote Product API.

Remote Product API allows you to make POSTs into the ecommerce shopping cart outside of the CCP system.  In other words, you can set up your own forms with product options and allow users to submit their orders straight to the CCP shopping cart…

Because we all love EE so much for our content management, it seems like a viable (and dare I say elegant) possibility to set up a site utilizing EE to manage all of your content, including product pages, and using the Remote Product API of CCP to accept the POSTs to the shopping cart where the user could checkout or continue shopping.  Am I thinking correctly?

CCP has the ability to allow guests to checkout, so there isn’t a need for login.  Although this is not perfect, if your EE based site requires a login, it seems to me that this could still work without the need for a complex bridge between the two applications.

Anyway, I’m in desperate need for an ecommerce solution, so I’d really like to hear your thoughts?  And if anyone has experience with CCP, I’d love to hear about it?

Not sure I’ve heard of this cart. Interesting thought to be able to use an API with regular EE content.
I’ve never heard of any integrations, but googling ecommerce api or maybe shopping cart api would bring up some interesting things I bet.
Google checkout, Amazon (new API functions in the works not many samples yet though).
http://www.amazon.com/E-Commerce-Service-AWS-home-page/b?ie=UTF8&node=12738641—link to the Amazon Api, others have been wondering about this one, haven’t seen any solid mash-ups yet.

Sorry I can’t offer anything substantial, wanted to subscribe to the thread though.

I’m not completely following the technical logic of this, but I think what you’re describing can also be done with Squirrelcart - the problem is that you still have to enter the products into two places - your EE weblogs and your cart database tables.  Is that the case here?

Yes, that would be the case.  Keep in mind, this isn’t a silverbullet solution by any stretch of the imagination.  I’m wondering if it’s a viable option because I personally can live with plugging the price in two places.  Also, I think it’s easily explainable to a client.

I hear good things about SquirrelCart.  I wish they’d work on making it look better.

It’s very customizable - but the process is much like EE membership templates - only with better commenting.  I’m in the middle of doing something with it right now.  Ironically, a key functionality feature that we need that it doesn’t provide is writing in your own donation amount for a non-profit.  I’m also not sure how actively it’s being developed, but the support has been good.

Hi RuralDreams,

To clarify, you are speaking about CCP as opposed to SquirrelCart?  Sorry for my confused brain.

nope - I’m just talking about squirrelcart - your brain is fine, I should keep my posts on-topic

I’ve used CubeCart for a site recently and nearly had to integrate with EE but thankfully the client said he didn’t need that. I found CubeCart very good except I had to tear the templates apart to get them the way I wanted.

It is fairy standards based which most if the Carts aren’t. And I found support to be super which is a huge factor. It’s also cheap!

a few more developed in the uk to add to the list..

http://www.tradingeye.com
http://www.viart.com
http://jshop.co.uk

I like the look of Trading Eye. Looks nice and simple compared to the others and standards based. I think you can tell by their websites whether they are user friendly and easy to skin. I never like when they have models selling the products.

Just looking through the code. Very well put together compared to what I was using, Cube Cart. Will give ago for next time.

Cheers for the heads up.

I just downloaded a free copy of Avactis (http://www.avactis.com). It is awesome. I really like the control panel. And I was able to modify the code in the php files quite quickly to make it integrate into the site.

I think I remember looking at that sometime ago. It doesn’t look like it has a feature for dealing with returns, which for us along with keeping an accurate inventory is becoming crucial.

Kenny2,

Which package are you referring to?

sts

Hi Stephen, as far as I can see (i did look honest!) most of the solutions in this bracket deal only with the sale, none of them deal effectively with the problems of an order life cycle. Did you go with ClickCartPro in the end?

Yes, the reason I asked is because I was concerned I over looked something.  SO much to consider:)

I’m currently in the very early stages with ClickCartPro.  I’ve got the site designed, working on HTML/CSS and getting my head around CCP.  We purchased it and have it installed.  During the next three weeks, it will be my main focus.  Now, I’m concerned because I learned yesterday our client wants to offer a 30 day money back guarantee… which means returns. 

sts

http://www.jshop.co.uk/ is worth a look.

kenny2 - 23 October 2007 07:19 AM

I think I remember looking at that sometime ago. It doesn’t look like it has a feature for dealing with returns, which for us along with keeping an accurate inventory is becoming crucial.

Curious if you would like the system to “payout” and credit the customer in some fashion, along with keeping track of the inventory.
The cart being able to payout seems a little scary to me, although even paypal has refunds.
I guess on a large site manual inventory adjustment could be a problem.

I reviewed quite a few shopping carts and I dont remember seeing a return feature in most of them. I was just looking for a more robust way of handling digital downloads for an upcoming project. I would think a 1-800 number would be better at handling returns than a website. Returns are subject to abuse if not policed properly. Anyway, Avactis does have the ability to track inventory and add “add-ons” to the products. My biggest thing was the ability to get a full script from them for free as a developer and 50% off from there on out. And the idea that I can create a full-on CSS site and have a somewhat accessible site (their code still uses tables).

M.

I guess it depends on what type of products you sell. We sell physical products which can and do go wrong, customers can also return products simply because they ordered the wrong size or they don’t like the colour. As you increase your volume this can quickly become a headache if there is not a slick way to return these items to stock, create new paper work and somehow reconcile all this with your accounts.