Categories and Products
I have lots of products or categories to set up. How can I do this quickly?
Uber CSV,
CSV Import Pro, and
Total Import Pro allow you to set up your products and categories using a CSV file uploaded to your admin panel. This lets you create or update products in your store quckly, and can save significant time if you have a feed already provided for you, such as a dropshipper feed or another database to synchronize with.
I need to modify many products with similar data. How can I do this in bulk?
Bulk Product Editing and
Bulk Product Editing Pro allows you to choose products, categories, or manufacturers to edit in bulk, so you can set their data all at once. It supports relative numbers (such as increasing or decreasing a value by a certain percentage), as well as creating Special and Discount prices for products.
My store sells car parts. Is there something I can use to let my customers filter by make, model, and year?
Yes, the
Vehicle YMM extension lets you add unlimted year, make, and model combinations to your products. It then lets your customers filter on these values to narrow down their search results and product listings. You can also do this with the
Dynamic Categories Module if you set up your categories right.
Fees and Discounts
I need to do a 2-for-1 or other promotion. What can I use for this?
How can I give customers the choice to add optional insurance or gift wrap to their order during checkout?
The
Optional Fee/Discount extension lets you set up optional fees or discounts, selectable by the customer during checkout. You can set up checkboxes or radio buttons, each associated with its own additional price, to give customers the option for insurance, gift wrap, rush charges, or anything else you want.
Payments
How can I charge my customers every month for a subscription?
You can use the
Stripe Payment Gateway or
Braintree Payment Gateway to set up subscription products, which map to plans that you set up in Stripe or Braintree. When a customer purchases that product, they'll be subscribed to the plan, and then be charged regularly at whatever interval the plan is set for.
I want a better checkout experience for my customers. What's the best option for this?
Uber Checkout works with all shipping and payment methods, is compatible with Joomla integrations, and can be ported to work with any theme. Unlike other simplified checkout systems, Uber Checkout works with all payment extensions dynamically, and follows OpenCart's classes to allow for blending naturally with custom themes.
Shipping
How can I give different shipping rates to my different products or categories?
Try
Category & Product-Based Shipping or
Ultimate Shipping. Both can set rates based on postcode, quantity, total, weight, and volume (as well as other criteria) and associate these rates with products or categories. You can then combine these rates together into a single shipping cost presented to the customer.
I need to pad my shipping costs without the customer knowing. How can I do this?
Take a look at
Hidden Shipping Adjustments or
Hidden Shipping Adjustments Pro. They both let you pad the weight of the cart before requesting a quote, and let you adjust the cost after retrieving that quote. It is also rolled into the cost of shipping presented to the customer, so they won't see an additional line item on their order for the increase.
I use UPS or USPS and package my items individually. How can I get a quote for the total cost when shipping each item in its own box?
The
UPS Deluxe and
USPS Pro extensions let you retrieve a quote based on each item rated on its own individual weight and dimensions. Each has additional features which let you have more control over the quote and rates presented to the customer for UPS or USPS.
My products all fit into the USPS Flat Rate boxes. How do I charge for the appropriate box that is needed?
Website
How can I add fields to my contact form, and add multiple different contact forms?
Rather than modify the built-in contact form, which would require editing core OpenCart files, try the
Form Builder Pro extension. It lets you create any kind of form you want for your store, record responses to those forms, e-mail the results to the administrator and/or the customer, and display the recorded responses in a report. You can use it for contact forms, quote request pages, reservation forms, surveys, or any other type of form you can think of.
I have old links to my site that no longer work. How can I redirect these to valid pages?
You can do that with the
Redirect Manager extension. It will let you set up a redirect for any URL in your store, and redirect the customer to whatever page you want when that URL is visited. You can use it for old product and category URLs, commonly mistyped URLs, aliases for your pages, and any other redirects you need for your store.
I want better analytics for my site and tracking my order statistics. What can I use for this?
You can get professional and full-featured analytics for your store using the
Google Analytics Expert extension. It features event tracking, search tracking, multi-store compatibility, support for Google Adwords, and more.
My site is running too slowly. How can I speed it up?
Page caching is often a good way to speed up how quickly your site's pages load. Take a look at the
Page Cache extension to see how it works and how it might help your site.
The search function in OpenCart does not return relevant results for my store. How can I improve this?
Try
Smart Search. It always returns the most relevant results, by performing a search of the selected product fields in four phases. You can also set which fields are searched in the product data, how you want them ranked for relevance, and how much of a misspelling tolerance you want to have. It includes an ajax search dropdown which works like an autocomplete feature for your search.