BV Commerce Blog by Blue Creek Web

$2,000 in free Advertising coupons

2010-01-26T00:13:00.000-05:00

Ok, I know this post is a little out of sorts, but, I do work on the side making money. A lot of times it's making money by doing more programming. Sometimes I wonder if it will ever end. More hours equals more money, but I would like to take a break sometime.

Anyway, I've been doing affiliate marketing on the side to get some residual. After all, I've been building sites for everyone else to make some money, I might as well make some for me.

Well, I just signed up for the new ShoeMoney system (Yes, the guy with the $130,000 Adsense check from Google.) He's got this new video tutorial system that trains you how to make money. Granted it hasn't been long, but after following his blog, I've made $60. I'm looking for the training videos to make me a little more :) He's got a teacher on there that took the class and she's already banking a little extra cash.

Anyway, the system comes with $2,000 in Advertising coupons from Google, AOL, Facebook and many others. Essentially, the program pays for itself. Even if you're just looking to get free ad time, it's worth it. To check it out, go here to take him up on the offer!

Paypal Express setup

2009-10-05T22:40:00.001-05:00

Don't forget, setting up Paypal express is not always cut and dry. Check out these instructions on how you can set up your Paypal express checkout. It will take about 5 minutes, but will save you an enormous amount of time trying to guess.

An error has occurred while establishing a connection to the server. When connecting to SQL Server 2005, this failure may be caused by the fact that u

2009-02-23T22:00:00.002-05:00

If you're having any issues doing an install on Vista and you encounter the error:
An error has occurred while establishing a connection to the server. When connecting to SQL Server 2005, this failure may be caused by the fact that under the default settings SQL Server does not allow remote connections. (provider: Named Pipes Provider, error: 40 - Could not open a connection to SQL Server) (Microsoft SQL Server, Error: 2)

Try the link below to resolve that issue.

http://littletalk.wordpress.com/2008/03/21/an-error-has-occurred-while-establishing-a-connection-to-the-server-when-connecting-to-sql-server-2005-this-failure-may-be-caused-by-the-fact-that-under-the-default-settings-sql-server-does-not-all/

How to beat adwords

2009-02-05T21:20:00.005-05:00

A lot of clients ask how they can make sales but not spend a ton of money on adwords. We've used this product to gain some insight on how to market your pay-per-click campaigns. The main focus is based on eliminating generic keywords and better yet focusing on purchasing clicks rather than browsing clicks.

Don't forget, you know your clients the best. Also, you don't have to send people to your home page. The best marketing is specific and product based. Learn more!

Click here to get

How to add a category

2008-08-12T19:27:00.002-05:00

How to add a category

Log in to the administrator
Click on the category tab
Click on the categories sub tab
To add a standard category, look to the left of the page, make sure the Static category radio button is selected and click on the new button.
Voila, you have a new category.
When filling out the information for a category, fill out all of the general options for the best SEO results. These options include Page title, Meta description, Meta Keywords, and keywords.

To add a subcategory

Browse to see your category on the category page. For instructions, follow those above.
Click on the option to View Sub Categories
Add your category

System.OutOfMemory

2008-03-10T07:28:00.002-05:00

It's never a good sign when you wake up in the morning and your site says System.OutOfMemory. No one changed anything on the site, so why is this happening?

Quick answer... All of the other sites on the same server running BV Commerce were running fine. No one had made any changes to the site, so why was this happening. We're going to track it to see if it happens again.

Solution: To fix it, we simply refreshed the web.config. I couldn't tell you why, but for some reason, I knew that was the answer.

Testing email blasts

2008-03-06T07:27:00.003-05:00

So, you've put a beautiful email together and hit the send button in BVCommerce. Whew, time to start counting the sales. Then, what, the page shows an error message. Now what, did the emails go out? Who received the emails and who didn't?

The answers to these questions depend on how much information hosting will give you. We had some issues within BV2004 and here's how we answered some of them.

BVCommerce sends out emails in alphabetical order. So, we simply set up email addresses for aaa@[yourcompany.com] and zzz@[yourcompany.com]. This still doesn't give you all of the answers, but it will give you some insight.

So, with the emails set up above, you will know if the email went to everyone. Next step. If your page is timing out, this is a setting that hosting can help with. What's happening is your page is timing out and there is a limit. I'm not sure about most hosting companies, but Randy at Globalweb has helped us. I'd give him a call.

The combination of those two solutions has resolved our problem.

Free Shipping - BV5

2008-02-15T08:32:00.004-05:00

Common question, how can I allow free shipping on an option.Here goes:

First, create or open your method of shipping that you would like to be free.

Next, Go to the bottom of the shipping option details screen.
Look for the "Adjustements" Section.
In there, you will see a text box titled "Adjust price by:" Change this to say -100. Next, change the drop down to state "Percentage." Now, click on the Save Changes button. That's it.

Please remember to always double check this by running through a sample order. Happy holidays!

Common HTML for everyone

2007-12-05T07:51:00.000-05:00

Every once in a while I'm asked how to do some simple changes in HTML. Not all administrative areas allow you to use that nice WYSIWYG editor. So, here are the most common requests:

Text Color - red, green, white, black, etc common colors
enter text here

Line break
 

Hyperlink
<a href="http://www.bluecreekweb.com">www.bluecreekweb.com</a>

Paragraph


Bold
enter text here 

What to do if you want to unbold something?

Well there are a couple of situations.
If the text looks like this: hello joe, how are you
Then the code would look like this hello joe, how are you 

OR the code can look like this:
hello joe, how are you
hello joe how are you

BVCommerce 5 Paypal expres error

2007-11-19T09:06:00.000-05:00

For anyone that has encountered this error, it was fixed in one of the newer patches. The message on screen is stated below:

Since the site has changed and some forum information has been archived, the link has changed. Here is the new link to the fix:
http://forums.bvcommerce.com/default.aspx?f=81&m=43087

Page.IsValid cannot be called before validation has taken place. It should be queried in the event handler for a control that has CausesValidation=True and initiated the postback, or after a call to Page.Validate.[ at System.Web.UI.Page.get_IsValid() at BVModules_Controls_PaypalExpressCheckoutButton.PaypalImageButton_Click(Object sender, ImageClickEventArgs e) at System.Web.UI.WebControls.ImageButton.OnClick(ImageClickEventArgs e) at System.Web.UI.WebControls.ImageButton.RaisePostBackEvent(String eventArgument) at System.Web.UI.WebControls.ImageButton.System.Web.UI.IPostBackEventHandler.RaisePostBackEvent(String eventArgument) at System.Web.UI.Page.RaisePostBackEvent(IPostBackEventHandler sourceControl, String eventArgument) at System.Web.UI.Page.RaisePostBackEvent(NameValueCollection postData) at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint) ]

How to offer Free Shipping in BV2004

2007-08-14T11:58:00.000-05:00

Log into the admin
Click the catalog tab
In the left hand navigation, click on "Discounts"
Click on the New button in the upper right
On the new page that appears, use the drop down for "Discount" and select "Shipping Method" and the page will refresh.
Now that you have the new screen, you can select between which shipping methods you would like to offer the discount and, you can choose to give a 100% discount.

Meta Tags (BV2004)

2007-05-22T13:37:00.000-05:00

For search engine optimization, one key component is Meta Tags. Below you will find ways and techniques on how you can edit those.

Product Detail pages

Log in as an administrator
Click on the Catalog tab
Do a find all or search to show a listing of the products
Put a check in the box next to the product you want to edit
Click on the yellow edit button on the right
Towards the bottom, under other properties, you will see some bolded options. Click on the option that states Meta tags.
Here you can edit the meta title, keywords and description.

Category pages

Log in as the administrator
Click on the Catalog tab
In the left hand navigation, click on "Categories"
Search for the category you want to edit, then highlight it. (The page will refresh)
Click on the yellow edit button above the list.
Now, you will be on the category edit page.
Look to the bottom and you will see some bolded options in gray. Click on the meta tags option.
Here you can edit the meta title, keywords, and description for this category.

Editing the genral store's meta tags

Log in as the administrator
Click on the Content tab
On the left hand navigation, click on the option Store Meta tags
Here you can edit the keywords and description. You can not edit the store title here. BV Commerce assumes that most of your titles will come from the individual pages on each category and product detail page.

Custom pages

Log in as the administrator
Click on the content tab
On the left hand side navigation, click on Custom pages
Click on the yellow edit button next to the custom page you want to edit
This screen is a little different. Whatever information you put in for the "Page Title" will display as the pages meta title. There is no option to edit the store meta description as this is prefilled from the store meta tags mentioned above.

General Note on Meta tags and Titles

Unless it's mentioned above, there are no other ways to edit the meta tags except through code.

How do I enter an email address if I place an order through the back end/admin

2007-05-08T08:16:00.000-05:00

Original question:
Can you make it to where I make a new order on the backend there is a place for their e-mail address and then that e-mail address is automatically added to our mailing list? Right now there is not a place for their e-mail (only their website) and that is where I have been putting it.

This is a good question because it's not obvious. You can actually do this now in BVCommerce 5.

Here's how to do it.

Log in as the administrator
Click on the Orders tab
Click on New Order in the sub navigation.
The key to placing an order and capturing the email address is on the right hand side. On the right, you will see the options with the username and a blank box, as well as Browse and New buttons.
As a default, always check to see if the customer exists by typing in their name and hitting the Arrow button. This will prevent any possibilities of duplications or mixed accounts. You may also want to choose browse. If you find the right person, their information will prefill in the address information.
If you have a new person, simply click on the New button. This will allow you to add their name and email address.
That's it.

For those of you that have our updated system which automatically adds customers to your mailing list, each time you place an order, their name will be added to your mailing list.

Integrating Google Analytics

2007-04-29T15:19:00.000-05:00

To see the full discussion on Google Analytics into BVCommerce 5 and to receive the files, please visit: http://forums.bvcommerce.com/default.aspx?f=79&m=42170&g=46508#m46508

After installing the code, we were recieving security messages during the checkout. This occurs because the Google Analytics code uses a standard http connection instead of https. The simplest fix we found was introduced by Promotion Sickness. Instead of using the standard http://www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js to connect to Google, simply change this link to https://ssl.google-analytics.com/urchin.js in your themes Default.master page.

My product modifiers aren't recalculating the total

2007-04-26T20:34:00.000-05:00

Ok, this was probably my fault. We had added several product modifiers. We wanted to add items to this product that were options. These options added extra costs, and weight. When we went to test it on the site, the calculations weren't showing up. Thanks to Justin at BV Commerce we figured it out.

Our specific find was found because the Your price did not change on the product detail page.

We had upgraded from BV5 sp1 to sp2 V3. When we did this for some reason, the new anthem.dll did not pass through. If this happens to you, simply copy the new anthem.dll to your bin directory and all will work.

How come I can't remove product upsells

2007-04-26T20:24:00.000-05:00

Here's some background. I went to my website and looked at one of my products. I saw "Customers who purchased this item also purchased these items:" Ok, I thought, this doesn't belong here. So, I went in to the administrator, and looked at this product. I went to look at product upsells and cross sells. Guess what I found, nothing. Don't be alarmed.

Here's what's happening. BV Commerce 5 implements something called suggested items. Suggested items are items that are ordered more often. You don't have control over this, as it's automatic.

If you don't want it to show up, here's what you do.

Log into the admin
Click on the Options tab
On the left hand navigation, click on Performance
Set "Suggested Items Maximum Results" to 0
Click Save Changes

How do I change my shipping options

2007-04-25T17:00:00.000-05:00

Ths shipping options are very important. Make sure you check these before you launch. Make sure you're not losing any money.

Log in as the administrator
Click on the options tab
Then click on Shipping

I can't save my product

2007-04-25T16:59:00.000-05:00

Saving a product depends on what information you have entered. The most common problem we have found is because of the SKU. Make sure the SKU does not have any special characters or spaces. Make this quick change and you should be fine. But, don't forget to make your SKU search engine friendly!

When I click on a link to my product, the page crashes

2007-04-25T16:57:00.000-05:00

This happens every once in a while. The problem here is probably the name of the product. Check for any special characters that are in the name. It is also possible that your product name is too long.

BV Commerce 5 Website Launch

2007-04-23T20:36:00.000-05:00

TheSmartFarmer.com launched their new BV Commerce 5 website. We're proud to be one of the first to launch.

TheSmartFarmer.com was originally built with effortlesse software. As theSmartFarmer.com grew, they needed a more robust solution. If you're looking to switch hosting from another ecommerce solution, BV Commerce may be your solution.

How to test your newsletter before you send it (BV5)

2007-04-18T14:11:00.000-05:00

(Revised for BV Commerce 5)
I'm not sure about you, but before I send an email to several thousand people, I'm a little nervous. So, I always double and triple check. Here is a quick way to test it out.

Overview

We are going to create a test email list and send an email.

Creating a new list

Log in to the administrator
Click on the People tab
Click on Mailing Lists in the sub navigation
Here you will see the page with all of your email campaigns.
At the top you can add new lists. In the bottom section, you can click to edit or send your existing emails.
Since we are creating a testing account, let's set up a new account.
Click on the New button on the right. This will open up the details page for your email list.
In the name box, enter something easy like Test Email List.
Put a check in the box labled "Private". This will prevent any customers from seeing the list.
Now, we have to add a member to the list. Click on the "New" button and enter your first name, last name, and email on the next screen
Hit the "Save Changes" button, this will take you back to the Mailing list page.
Next we'll see how to test.

Sending the Email

On this screen, you should now see your new mailing list.
Click on the "Send Email" link
Choose your template.
Click the "Preview" button just to make sure you have the correct email.
Click the "Ok" button to send your email to your new test account.

That's it.

How to create an email template for your email campaigns

2007-04-17T07:30:00.000-05:00

Now that we know how to find the email campaigns (see post http://bvcommerce.blogspot.com/2007/04/how-to-edit-your-emails.html) we can create an email template for any emails, newsletters, etc.

Here, we're going to take the simple route. A lot of clients do not have the ability to put together custom code. So, what I'm suggesting here is to use Microsoft Word. It's not the best solution, but for almost everyone out there it is a quick solution.

We'll take this in 2 steps, namely:

Creating your email
Adding an email template

Creating your email

Open Microsoft Word
Create your email in your new word document. Don't use graphics for now.
Click File Save As Web Page
A new window will pop up.
Name your new file.
In the box below the file name is the Save As box. Choose "Web Page (*.htm, *.html)
Click on the Save button.
If you receive a message that says something to the order of, "This will remove Microsoft Word tags" click ok.
Now, you have created an HTML page. This is how you can send your email.
Ok, to get the code, click on View HTML Source. This may open up a new window.
Copy all of the code in the window. We will use this to copy into our email.

How to create an email template

Log into the administrator account.
Click on Content Email Templates
Click the "New" button
Type in a Name (how you will refer to the template), From (your email address), and Subject (What this email is about)
Copy all of the code from our Word document into the top box titled "HTML Body"
Click the Save button.

That's it. Now, this only creates a simple email template. But, you're well on your way. If you want to add images, I would suggest some type of HTML tool such as Dreamweaver or FrontPage. Otherwise, you will have to learn a little code.

How to edit your emails

2007-04-17T07:24:00.000-05:00

BV Commerce allows you to create as many email templates as you wish. So, if you are going to use BV Commerce to send out your newsletters, updates, etc. it's a good solution.

How to see your email templates

Log in to the site as the administrator
Click on the "Content" tab
Click on "Email Templates"
Here you will see a list of all your email templates
To edit an email template, simply click on the "Edit" link beside your email

Making money while cruising the internet

2007-04-15T15:40:00.000-05:00

Ok, I've seen this before. A couple of years back, All Advantage did this and we all received small checks in the mail. Another company has started doing it again Agolco. Agolco has set up the same scenario. What you do is sign up, download a toolbar, and then go to work as normal. Each time you view pages, etc, click on advertisements through the toolbar, you receive money. It won't be a lot, but, hey it's free. I'm trying it out. I mean after all, my entire day is on the internet. If you are curious and want to try it out, please visit Agolco here.

Personalized themes for customers

2007-04-11T21:08:00.000-05:00

A lot of time is spent making sure your site looks good. Sometimes, there are so many changes that all of the themes may not work. So, you don't want your customer to see your site the wrong way.

All customers can change their themes in the My Account area. If you want to make sure your clients can't change the theme, please follow these steps.

Log into the administrator
Click on the Options tab
Click on the General option found in the left hand navigation.
Look for the option at the bottom stating "Allow Personalized Themes". Uncheck this box and click the save button.

PDF Downloads

2007-04-04T15:29:00.000-05:00

For those of you that sell pdf's online, BVCommerce is an exellent solution. We did run into one issue in that when we tried to view the pdf's online, it was showing a document error, specifically: There was a problem reading this document (14)

BVCommerce helped us work through this. This was a custom fix, I'm not sure when the rest of the users will have this information. If you are in need of help please let us know.

We ran into the situation because a client actually didn't sell pdf's. But, they wanted to allow their customer to download pdfs with product specifications. So, we took the same look and feel and added it for every product.

Paypal Websites Payment Pro

2007-04-04T15:20:00.000-05:00

Paypal Websites Payment Pro integrates seamlessly with BV Commerce 5. We just launched TheSmartFarmer.com using the system.

When you are integrating it, follow the instructions here:
http://www.bvsoftware.com/bvcommerce5manual/How%20To's/PayPalExpress.aspx

We also ran into one other issue before launching. We were seeing the following error:
Authorize Error: Paypal Express Payment Authorization Failed.10002:Security header is not valid

We found out this was because we did not have SSL turned on. Also, there must be an SSL certificate installed for this to work.

How to test your email newsletter before you send it (BV2004)

2007-03-30T13:47:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure about you, but before I send an email to several thousand people, I'm a little nervous. So, I always double and triple check. Here is a quick way to test it out.

Overview
We are going to create a test email list and send an email.

Creating a new list

Log in to the administrator
Click on the People tab
Click on Mailing Lists in the left hand navigation
Here you will see the page with all of your email campaigns.
At the top you can add new lists. In the bottom section, you can click to edit or send your existing emails.
Since we are creating a testing account, let's set up a new account.
In the top box labeled "List Name" type in the name of your list. Example: Testing
Place a check in the box labeled "Private". This will make sure all of your customers will not see your testing area.
Click on the New button. This will save the list and refresh the page. You will now see your new email mailing list below with an asterisk beside it. The asterisk notes that it's private.
Click on the Edit button next to your list.
In the right hand section of the page, look for the section titled "Select Users to Add"
Make sure the drop down says email.
Type in your email address in the box to the right and click on the "Find" button.
When your email address shows, put a check in the box next to it.
Just to the right, click on the "add">
Click on the "Save Changes" button towards the top.
Next we'll see how to test.

Sending the Email

You should be on the Mailing list page now
Find your testing email list
Click on the yellow "Email" button. This will take you to a new page.
If you are sending an HTML email, click on the radio button titled "HTML"
Type in your from address
Type in your subject
Now, simply copy in your text or HTML.
Now, click on the Email button to send the email. You should receive an email within a minute or two.
After testing several times, follow these same steps to send your email to your entire mailing list of customers.

How to view your orders

2007-03-28T15:06:00.000-05:00

One of the most common tasks is viewing your orders. There are 2 general ways to view your orders. You can see your latest orders on your dashboard OR, you can go to the orders page to view all other orders.

Dashboard:
This is my favorite. To view your dashboard, please do the following:

Login as the administrator
The first page that shows up is your Dashboard
You will see the Unpaid orders in the middle of the page. To view any order, simply click on the order number.

Note: BVCommerce allows you to configure your dashboard easily. The default view allows you to see all unpaid orders. If you would like to see the most recent orders, please follow these steps:

Login as the administrator
While on the Dashboard, look below your "Unpaid Orders" section
Click on the "Edit" button
You will now be taken to the screen where you can edit what shows in the middle column of your dashboard.
In the drop down box, choose "Order Activity". Then click on the "New" button
The page will refresh. The new section is at the bottom. You will see it in yellow, with the text "Please configure control" underneath.
Click on the "Edit" button in the yellow section
Make the following settings:
Select a new status: Payment (keep this, it's the default)
Browse the radio buttons for "Paid" click on the circle to choose "Paid"
Keep everything else the same. Click "Ok" This will take you back to the page to add blocks like this.
Click "Ok" again to save your changes.
You will be taken to the Content Columns page.
To see your changes, click on the "Dashboard" tab on the top left.
If you want to change the display, feel free to follow these steps again to edit the display.

Order Manager:

To see more detailed reports and information, please follow these instructions:

Login as administrator
Click on the tab at the top labeled "Orders"
To view the details of any order, click on the order number to take you to the details.

How to add a downloadable file to your product

2007-03-19T10:03:00.000-05:00

Let's say you want to sell something that a customer can download, follow these instructions. Examples of downloadable things to sell would be pdf books, software executables, graphics, etc.

Here's how to do it:

Log into the administrative section of your website
Click on the main tab "Catalog"
Browse for your product and click the "Edit" button.
On the left hand navigation, click on "File Downloads"
Upload a new file to the site: If you are uploading a file, click on the "Browse" button to select your file. Once selected, it will show up in the window.
Use a file that has already been uploaded: If you have just uploaded a file, make sure it says "File Above". But, if you are selecting a file that's already uploaded, use the drop down box to select your file.
Short description: This puts a user friendly name with the file.
Available for (leave blank for unlimited): Use this if you want to limit how long this file is available.
Number of times file can be downloaded: Use this if they can only download it a fixed number of times. Otherwise, leave it blank so the customer can download it as much as they want.

Showing your pdf's to everyone

2007-03-19T08:15:00.000-05:00

Within BV Commerce, you have the ability to add documents to your products. Typically, this is used for selling items like online books that you can download. Some clients will never do this, but would like to have the ability to show clients their pdfs. Well, now you can.

We have put together some custom code to allow you to do this. If you are in need of this service, please feel free to call 866.630.9876

How do I add a link to a custom page in my product description

2007-03-16T13:31:00.000-05:00

Ok, let's say you are in a situation where you want to show more detail about your products, but don't want to clutter up your page too much. For example, if your product has a warranty, you many not want to put the entire text of the warranty on your product page. Our suggestion is to make a custom page. It's a little tricky, but you'll get the hang of it pretty quick.

This set of instructions will guide you through adding a custom page, getting the link to the custom page, then updating your product description.

IMPORTANT:
The standard WYWIWYG looks like this:

We can change your editor to look like this:

The current settings for the FreeTextBox editor do not allow you to create links. If you want to change it, please do the following:

Open the file BVModules\Editors\Free Text Box\editor.ascx
Remove the line that states ToolBarLayout
Click Save
Contact us at 866.630.9876 if this sounds like Greek to you.

Adding a custom page

Click on the Content tab
Click on the Custom pages sub navigation
This new screen will show you all of your custom pages. We are going to add a page, so click on the new button over on the right.
Type in a page name. This could be Warranty Information
Type in a name for the Name in Menu. We will use this temporarily.
Check the box "Show in bottom menu"
Type in all of your text.
Click Save changes.

Getting the link to your new page

Go to your website.
Look in the bottom menu. You will now see your new page. Click on your new page.
Look in your browser address window and copy the url to your new page. Ex: http://www.bluecreekweb.com/ecommerce/bvcommerce/
Now you have your link.

Placing the link into your custom description

Log in to the admin
Click on the Catalog tab
Find your product and click on the Edit button to take you to your product details.
Now, paste your link into your product description. If you are using the FreeTextEditor, this will automatically change into a link.

Make a user friendly link (optional)

As of right now, the link will show to your clients. If you want to make it more user friendly, follow these steps.
While still on the product detail page, look to the bottom of your description. You will see two tabs, one for Design, the other for HTML.
Click on the HTML tab.
Find your link in the code. This is the link you just pasted in.
The code will follow the format of destinationlink
You will see two references to your link. The first one defines where the link will go. It will be in a tab like this . Leave this one alone.
Find the next one. It will come right after the first and will show up before the tag.
Type over your link to make the friendly text appear.
Click on the Update button.

Clean Up (optional)

Follow this set of instructions if you want to remove the link in the footer.
Login to the admin
Click on the Content tab
Click on the Custom pages sub navigation
This new screen will show you all of your custom pages.
Find your new custom page and click on the edit button.
Uncheck the box "Show in bottom menu"
Click Save changes.

How can I put my change the order of my products

2007-03-15T14:21:00.000-05:00

Yes, you can change the display order of products.

Let's say you are selling DVD Publishers like NobleHouseCD.com. They have a category already set up for DVD Publishers. Their bestseller may be the GX-1 and they don't want it to be down the list in alphabetical order. They want it to be number 1.

Here's how to do it.

Log in as the administrator
Click on the "Category" tab
Click on the sub navigation item "Categories"
Find the category with your product
Click on the "Edit" button. This will bring up the category detail page
Look on the right hand side. You will see the area titled "Product Selection." Click on the "Select" button in this area.
Now, you should see a page with all of the products in that category showing on the left.
To change the display order, simply click on the up or down arrow buttons to move your product.
That's it!

For more information on BV Commerce, please feel free to contact us at 866.630.9876.

All inclusive BV Commerce package

2007-03-14T13:25:00.000-05:00

Ok, I hate to advertise but, here goes.

This month, we are offering a BV Commerce 5 package that includes the following:

BV Commerce license (standard)
Installation
Training
Design
All for only $4,750

If you are interested, please call 866.630.9876!

How do you add special instructions for payment options?

2007-03-08T15:28:00.000-05:00

This question comes up in about 50% of projects. Some example situations may and include instructions for purchase orders, faxing orders, and snail mail orders. When entering instructions, you can not enter HTML tags. This will cause the page to crash. So, if you want special instructions to show up on the payment screen please do the following:

Log into the administrator.
Click on the green tab at the top labeled options.
In the left hand column, click on the payment link.
From here, you'll see a listing of all the different payment options. Click the edit button next to the payment option you would like to edit.
In this example, we will use the purchase orders option.
So, click on the edit button next to purchase orders.
On the screen, you'll see two different text boxes.
In the top text box, you'll see purchase orders . Change this if necessary.
The second box called description, is a great place to put any special comments. place any special comments here, Then click The green save changes button.
That's it.

Please note, this option is only available for the following purchase options. All other changes will require custom code.

Purchase order
Check
Telephone
COD

If you would like to change the text for the other options, you will have to do a little coding. In order to do so, please edit the payment.ascx found in BVModules\Controls\

BV Commerce 5 Hosting

2007-03-04T21:48:00.000-05:00

So, how much do you pay for BV Commerce 5 hosting? We charge our clients $65 per month which includes a leased SSL Certificate through GeoTrust. If you're paying more than this, you may want to think again. Of course, we would always want you to host with us.

Also, we still host BV Commerce 2004. So, if you need hosting for BV Commerce 2004 we can still help you.

Sorry for the ad. We have heard lately that some BV Commerce clients are paying up to $200 a month for hosting.

How to automatically add buyers to your mailing list

2007-03-03T21:52:00.000-05:00

Nick from theSmartFarmer.com recently asked us the simple question. "How come someone checks out, they aren't added to my mailing list?" Well, we're not sure why, so we went to figure it out.

After some digging we have developed custom code to allow this to happen. If you are interested in adding this functionality to your BV Commerce 5 website, feel free to contact us.

How can I see all of the people in my mailing list?

2007-02-27T16:08:00.000-05:00

Your mailing list is one of the most important marketing tools you can use to resell to your clients. BV Commerce 5 is so big and is a learning experience, and some have difficulty finding where this is located. So, here is a step by step on how to see where your mailing list is located and how to see who is on your list.

Log into your admin
In the top navigation, click on the "People" tab.
In the top navigation you will see some other options right under the tabs, one of these is "Mailing Lists". Click on that link.
Here you will see a list of all your mailing lists.
The Store Mailing List is the default mailing list. Please note, when someone purchases, they are not automatically added to this list.
You will also see the type of mailing list, whether private or public. A private mailing list is just for you. For example, you may want to make a private mailing list for your vendors or manufacturers.
If you click on the "Edit" link next to your mailing list, it will bring up a new page.
The mailing list detail page will show you all of the people on your mailing list. NOTE: here you can import a mailing list!

Cross Sells and Upsells

2007-02-26T13:55:00.000-05:00

Ok, so what are these things.

Cross-sells: Think of cross sells as a potentially competitive product. Maybe even a similar product with more features. We recommend choosing a similar product which is slightly more expensive. As an example, if you were selling an an HP printer, you could have the HP printer deluxe as your cross sell. This will show up on your product detail page.

Up-sells: Think of up sells as something you want to sell to your customer that they may need when they purchase this product. For example, in following with the HP Printer example, an upsell may be printer cartridges. Retail companies are famous for this. A lot of times, they will reduce the cost of the main product (printer) to sell you an overpriced upsell. This is done a lot of times with printers and printer connection cables. This does not show on your product detail page.

One BIG note, the upsell will show up (if configured correctly) right after you click on "Add to Cart." So, if you add it and don't see it on your product detail page, click on the "Add to Cart" button to see your results.

Another BIG note, don't forget, you can add customer choices to your products instead of doing an up-sell or cross-sell!

Here is BV's definition: http://www.bvsoftware.com/BVCommerce5Manual/BVAdministratorGuide/Catalog/Product/Up%20Sells%20Cross%20Sells.aspx

Up Sells and Cross Sells offer the ability to market other products in your store to a customer while they’re viewing a product or attempting to add a product to their cart. Up Sells/Cross Sells can be added from the “Up Sells/Cross Sells” menu on the edit product page.

Upsells:
You can configure how the Up Sells are displayed to the customer under the Options > Orders menu. Depending on these settings, the Up Sells will either be displayed in an intermediary screen between the product and cart page or on the cart page itself. If a customer chooses an Up Sell product, the chosen product will replace the original product the customer was adding to the cart.

Cross Sells:
Cross Sells are very similar to Up Sells; however these products will not replace the product being added to the cart. These are normally “recommended” products or products that a customer may want to add to their cart in addition to the product they’re purchasing.

How come "Peers" shows in my left hand navigation?

2007-02-22T09:18:00.000-05:00

BVCommerce 5

When creating your new BV Commerce website, you may browse through your site and notice "Peers" shows up on the top of your left hand navigation. Here's how to find out why and change it.

BV Commerce allows you to customize many areas of your site. The most common place to make changes is on the left hand side of your site, where your left hand navigation appears. In the case of navigation and display, it can be different for many sections of your site, pretty nice. For example, you can display different navigation on the home page, category pages, and the product pages.

So, why does "Peers" display? Peers is displaying because that is the default navigation header for the home page, categories page, and products pages. Here's how to change it.

Log in as the administrator
Click on the "Content" tab
Click on the sub navigation at the top labeled "Columns"
If you review the columns options, you will see several options. I would suggest walking through them just to find out what possibilities you have.
To fix the Peers, we'll use the "System Product Page." So, click on the "Edit" link in the row labeled "System Product Page."
Here you will see what objects you will display whenever you look at an individual product.
You may see it already, your navigation is in one of the blocks. You will see "Peers" as the header for your subcategories.
To change this, click on the "Edit" button in that block.
Now, simply change the "Menu Title" to whatever you want. Then click the "Save Changes" button.
Repeat this process for the "System Category Page", and the "System Home Page" to fix the normal areas where this will appear.

Having troubles with the price display? BV Commerce 5

2007-02-19T13:30:00.000-05:00

In the new BV Commerce 5 system, there are 4 different prices as follows:

MSRP - Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price that will appear on the site.
Cost - The stores cost of the product. The cost will not appear on the site.
Price - The price of the product is the amount the customer will pay if purchasing the product. The price will appear on the site.
Text - Text entered into this field will replace the price shown on the store. This feature helps compliment minimum advertised pricing policies. Example text may include “Add to Cart for Price” or “Too low to show”.

Initially, a lot of customers started adding the price to this field... Don't do it. When shown with the other prices, it adds a lot of confusion, especially if there are customer choices which include a price. Therefore, don't put your price in the text field. Instead, use standard text as mentioned above.

Also, double check to make sure your Cost is lower than your price or MSRP.

Saving, Updating and BVCommerce 5

2007-02-19T13:18:00.000-05:00

Have you ever noticed that sometimes you may click the save button or the update button and it causes your site to crash? If it's sporadic, don't worry.

We've found that unless you let the page completely load before hitting a save button the page will crash. For those of you that are pretty fast, no worries, just give it a second, try again and you will see success.

Creating new products

2007-02-19T12:42:00.000-05:00

When creating new products, don't forget to put in meta tags. It may seem like a pain now, but all of that effort will pay off in search engines. If you can't think of what to say, simply copy your product descriptions to the appropriate areas.

One tip, on meta tags and names in general. Always put the name first. We also try to keep detailed or temporary information toward the end of the product name. For example, if you're selling item 1234 Big shirt, name it Big Shirt - 1234 instead. Also, instead of On Sale Now - Big Shirt 1234, try Big Shirt 1234 - On Sale now.

Just those simple changes will help with SEO.

If I have 1 product that weighs 1 pound will shipping adjust the weight if I have 10?

2007-02-16T12:38:00.000-05:00

The shipping calculator will add up the weight based on the number of items. It simply multiplies it out. Before launching, always run a price check with your shipping provider to make sure you don't lose money on shipping.

Here are some other tips:

You can add to the weight if you are not getting the correct weight
Keep in mind that you can add to the cost of rate quotes from FedEx and UPS
Don't forget to put in dimensions for air freight options.

Can volume pricing be a shared product choice

2007-02-16T12:13:00.000-05:00

Question: We will be having several products that are this simple volume does it make sense to have it as a "shared"

Answer: Volume pricing is specific to the product, yes, it may be used very often. But, it can not be a shared product choice. Therefore, we recommend cloning this product.

How to change your BV Commerce Theme bv2004

2007-02-15T08:49:00.000-05:00

These are the instructions on how to change your theme in BV Commerce. Changing your theme will reflect a new look on your entire website. Don't forget, if you have customized your theme, those customizations won't be reflected in other themes.

If you would like to make small adjustments to your theme, for seasonal changes (Christmas), then we recommend copying your existing theme, and changing the new one. This way, you can use it each year. A discussion on that is in here too.

How to change your theme

Log in to the administrator
Click on the settings tab
Click Themes in the left hand navigation. This will list all of your themes. Note, the theme names are the same as the theme directory names in your BVThemes directory located on your server.
Click the select button next to the theme you wish to use.

If you want to create a new theme and have it list here, here's how to do it. Note, you will need FTP access to your site to complete this task.

First step is to obtain a copy of a theme you would like to use.
Using your FTP software, log into your site.
Browse to the directory labeled BVThemes
Here, you will see all of your themes you are using.
Download one of the directories.
On your local machine, change the name of the directory.
Make any edits you wish whether it's stylesheet changes or graphic changes. The stylesheet is called styles.css and will be found in the directory you just downloaded.
To allow your new theme to show up on the website, upload your newly named directory.
When you go back into the administrator as described above, you will now see your new theme.
If you would like to use your new theme, simply click the select button next to your new theme. Instructions were given above.

Google Analytics and BV Commerce

2007-02-14T22:01:00.000-05:00

Yes, you can implement Google Analytics into BVCommerce 2004 and 5. We can help you with the details and integrating Google Analytics into your site. For specific instructions, please visit the BVCommerce Forums found here: http://www.bvsoftware.com/Forums

Google Analytics has proven to be successful for clients such as Cornerstone Cookie. Contact us to help you implement it.

How do I access my website statistics?

2007-02-14T21:51:00.000-05:00

Each Blue Creek Web receives free website statistics using LiveStats.XSP.

To access your statistics, type in your web address and add /webstats to the end. For example, www.bluecreekweb.com/webstats. this will bring up your login page. From here, all you should have to do is type in your ftp password. This should have been provided to you, if not, please let us know and we'll send it to you immediately.

Where is the manual for BVCommerce 5

2007-02-14T21:37:00.000-05:00

The manual can be found here: http://www.bvsoftware.com/BVCommerce5Manual/Default.aspx