Checkout step 5 - what's it for?

[dollpage]

Hi all,

When placing an ad the seller goes through several steps, including describing the item, uploading pictures, etc.

Step 5 shows the seller personal information and asks the seller to verify it.

I was wondering what the reason for this step is? We were thinking of eliminating this step in the checkout process, but I wouldn't want to go through all the work required only to find out later that this is the most important step because of....... eh?

Thanks!

[Eric Barnes]

That step is there for a few reasons.

1. It gives them a chance to verify any thing that is sent to the gateway. Depending on your gateway this may or may not be relevant.

2. It creates the select option for them to select a payment provider at the bottom. This has to be done before the final step. It also can't be added to step 4 because some packages may not allow images.

[dollpage]

Thanks Eric,

In our case, we're offering everything for free, so there is no gateway.

Members can list unlimited number of items, and even the stores will be free but only given to select sellers (as a sort of reward for doing good business).

(We've already been doing this for 5 years using a photo sharing script (photopost TheDollPage.com Show & Sell Site - Main Index - Powered by PhotoPost ), so it's not an experimental idea or anything like that.)

We're even limiting categories to 2...for sale, and wanted-to-buy, because after years of servicing the doll community we've discovered that everybody complains about not having enough categories but then they don't use them when listing. (Sellers put things like doll jewelry into the 'action figures' category...things like that)

So, many of the steps would be confusing to users when the program is configured to offer all services for free.

I don't suppose you have some plugin or module available that converts the program to a free service and eliminates payment gateway steps and package selection do ya?

Thanks again!

[Eric Barnes]

I do have a module that I have been experimenting with a module that will be a free checkout system and cut the steps down a lot. But this is not ready yet and probably a few weeks before I can get something ready.

But if you are offering free classifieds then it could be skipped. You just need to pass the correct data between the steps. In your case pass the payment gateway id for the check option to the last step.

[dollpage]

Thanks Eric!

I'll let you know how our mods work out. Maybe you'll be able to use one or two things we come up with.

Thanks again

[seymourjames]

I have managed to simplify the steps quite a bit - one and two are now together and greatly simplified. No price information or listing package is shown anywhere. It is not to easy to explain how it is done on the forum. Basically you can usually add actions onto a submit button in certain cases. You also need to change the text which is displayed and suppress information you do not wish to display.

[dollpage]

Thanks! that's good info!

We'll be taking our shot at it this weekend and will report what we come up with.

Thanks for helping out!

[free2take]

Interested to hear how you got on.

I am very keen to simplify the checkout process too as users are complaining they have 7 screens to go through for placing a free ad which takes 1 or 2 in equivalent classified ad systems like gumtree. For paying ads its not so much of an issue.

I can see their point to be honest, should be a quick and easy mechanism for posting free ads as most of the sites using the script seem to offer them.

[seymourjames]

I got it down to 5 if paying or 4 if not. It depends if you want multiple users on one account or not for example.

[wcadmin]

Yes, I hope on the upgrade, free should be 2 or max 3 steps only, I think most of the classifieds that have free submissions, only have 1 or 2 steps only...