Looking to use ShopSite as a Catalog Only program

[Dale Gorham]

We are looking to setup ShopSite as a Catalog Only program and not use most
of the e-commerce features.

For example, we have a car dealership that wants to display their used car
inventory online and allow visitors to select which cars they want more info
on. This 'wish list' is then e-mailed back to the dealer when the visitor
'checks-out' so to speak.

We are just now considering ShopSite and we are wondering if this program is
customizeable enough to let us do this. We've tried doing this with Miva,
but it takes considerable programming to take out the e-commerce part of the
cart.

This is my first visit to the forum and I'm impressed with the quality of
the responses. Thanks for any advice you may offer.

Dale Gorham
Net-to-Net, Inc
http://www.n2ninc.com

[Karen Boyle]

"Dale Gorham" <shopsiteforum@n2ninc.com> wrote:

We are looking to setup ShopSite as a Catalog Only program and not use
most
of the e-commerce features.

For example, we have a car dealership that wants to display their used car
inventory online and allow visitors to select which cars they want more
info
on. This 'wish list' is then e-mailed back to the dealer when the visitor
'checks-out' so to speak.

It sounds as though you need a robust database with an admin interface
instead of a shopping cart program. Your project would be much easier to
complete when using a suitable program for the task. It would be difficult
to "remove" the cart from a shopping cart program so as to use the database
for another purpose.

~ Karen

[loren_d_c]

A custom prouct template would do this, just don't include the order
buttons in the template and they won't be generated. Then on the More
Info Page part of the product template, include a FORM that will submit
the name of the car, stock number, to FormMail (a free 3rd-party perl
script that will send emails from your web forms) as hidden variables,
then have text fields for the customer to enter their name and email
address. I know of at least one car dealership using a ShopSite custom
template like this.

You can apply this template to products like cars, and then for
accessories and other things that you want to sell on the web, use the
normal ShopSite Product templates.

-Loren



Dale Gorham wrote:

We are looking to setup ShopSite as a Catalog Only program and not use most
of the e-commerce features.

For example, we have a car dealership that wants to display their used car
inventory online and allow visitors to select which cars they want more info
on. This 'wish list' is then e-mailed back to the dealer when the visitor
'checks-out' so to speak.

We are just now considering ShopSite and we are wondering if this program is
customizeable enough to let us do this. We've tried doing this with Miva,
but it takes considerable programming to take out the e-commerce part of the
cart.

This is my first visit to the forum and I'm impressed with the quality of
the responses. Thanks for any advice you may offer.

Dale Gorham
Net-to-Net, Inc
http://www.n2ninc.com

[loren_d_c]

It's true that ShopSite is not for everything and everyone, but I have
heard of it being used for some very interesting purposes. There is a
car dealership already using it for just a catalog as Dale described,
there is also a company using ShopSite to manage press releases and
articles.

It is fairly easy to remove the 'add to cart' and 'view cart' buttons
from the product, just select the Text field for the buttons and remove
the text. In Manager, you can only do this for all products, though, and
you would do that in Preferences -> Store Text -> Store Pages, while in
Pro you can do it in the Product Info section per-product and the
defaults for new products are in the Store Text area.

And of course with custom templates, you can format the page and/or
product information on the generated pages pretty much however you would
like.

-Loren


Karen Boyle wrote:

"Dale Gorham" <shopsiteforum@n2ninc.com> wrote:
We are looking to setup ShopSite as a Catalog Only program and not use
most
of the e-commerce features.

For example, we have a car dealership that wants to display their used car
inventory online and allow visitors to select which cars they want more
info
on. This 'wish list' is then e-mailed back to the dealer when the visitor
'checks-out' so to speak.


It sounds as though you need a robust database with an admin interface
instead of a shopping cart program. Your project would be much easier to
complete when using a suitable program for the task. It would be difficult
to "remove" the cart from a shopping cart program so as to use the database
for another purpose.

~ Karen

[Karen Boyle]

"Loren" wrote:

It's true that ShopSite is not for everything and everyone, but I have
heard of it being used for some very interesting purposes. There is a
car dealership already using it for just a catalog as Dale described,
there is also a company using ShopSite to manage press releases and
articles.

That's really interesting Loren. With ShopSite's "ease of use" as a cart, it
is interesting to realize people are using the program for other purposes.
Thanks!

~ Karen

[Fred Holliss]

In article <3C826E59.102F6394@yahoo.com>, Loren <loren_d_c@yahoo.com>
wrote:

It's true that ShopSite is not for everything and everyone, but I have
heard of it being used for some very interesting purposes. There is a
car dealership already using it for just a catalog as Dale described,
there is also a company using ShopSite to manage press releases and
articles.

If you don't mind, what is the URL for the company that manages their
press releases with ShopSite? That's something that's becoming more
important for us.

--
Fred Holliss, webmaster, Fitter International Inc.
"Balance and Fitness for Life"
Toll Free: 1-800-FITTER-1 | Int'l: +1-403-243-6830
http://www.fitter1.com | mailto:webmaster@fitter1.com

[Brandon]

I love ShopSite, but it's not for everyone. If you decide you need a
database-driven solution...

Check out the database at www.billjohnsonmotors.com - it's a website we
developed for a client but we have the backend system if it's something
you're interested in. All database driven and it has a nice interface in the
backend that allows upload, editing and deletion of automobiles.

It was designed specifically for the automotive industry so it doesn't have
a lot of features you don't need. You can give me a call at 877-668-0540 or
email me at brandon@creativedrive.net if you're interested.

Thanks,

Brandon Eley
Creative Drive

"Dale Gorham" <shopsiteforum@n2ninc.com> wrote in message
news:a5tgn7$jrp$1@support.shopsite.com...

We are looking to setup ShopSite as a Catalog Only program and not use
most
of the e-commerce features.

For example, we have a car dealership that wants to display their used car
inventory online and allow visitors to select which cars they want more
info
on. This 'wish list' is then e-mailed back to the dealer when the visitor
'checks-out' so to speak.

We are just now considering ShopSite and we are wondering if this program
is
customizeable enough to let us do this. We've tried doing this with Miva,
but it takes considerable programming to take out the e-commerce part of
the
cart.

This is my first visit to the forum and I'm impressed with the quality of
the responses. Thanks for any advice you may offer.

Dale Gorham
Net-to-Net, Inc
http://www.n2ninc.com

[Brent Doud]

Fred,

I have a few sites right now that use ShopSite as a content manager in
addition to a shopping cart.
I just launched a complete informational site using ShopSite Professional. I
figure since I develop sites everyday that use ShopSite I should run my own
site on the software.
My site uses only 1 custom page template and 2 custom product templates and
I can edit any of the content using the ShopSite backend.
www.SD360.com

The other sites that I have done that use ShopSite Pro to manage content
are:
www.LaJollaClub.com
www.VillageHatShop.com

It works especially well for Press Releases and Small News Articles.

Brent Doud
SD360.com
619-972-7550





"Fred Holliss" <webmaster@fitter1.com> wrote in message
news:webmaster-DA298C.17021306032002@news.shopsite.com...

In article <3C826E59.102F6394@yahoo.com>, Loren <loren_d_c@yahoo.com
wrote:

It's true that ShopSite is not for everything and everyone, but I have
heard of it being used for some very interesting purposes. There is a
car dealership already using it for just a catalog as Dale described,
there is also a company using ShopSite to manage press releases and
articles.

If you don't mind, what is the URL for the company that manages their
press releases with ShopSite? That's something that's becoming more
important for us.

--
Fred Holliss, webmaster, Fitter International Inc.
"Balance and Fitness for Life"
Toll Free: 1-800-FITTER-1 | Int'l: +1-403-243-6830
http://www.fitter1.com | mailto:webmaster@fitter1.com

[Fred Holliss]

In article <a6iutp$f0f$1@support.shopsite.com>,
"Brent Doud" <Brent@SDinet.net> wrote:

I have a few sites right now that use ShopSite as a content manager in
addition to a shopping cart.
I just launched a complete informational site using ShopSite Professional. I
figure since I develop sites everyday that use ShopSite I should run my own
site on the software.
My site uses only 1 custom page template and 2 custom product templates and
I can edit any of the content using the ShopSite backend.
www.SD360.com

Hmm. I guess I didn't realise what was meant by the phrase "using
ShopSite to manage press releases." We are already doing that. In fact,
_all_ our pages are maintained in ShopSite. Everything in the "About"
section of the website - bios, media contacts, downloadable images,
news, archives, UPS tracking, feedback forms, warranty registration,
instructions, exercises, FAQs, etc. - all of it is in ShopSite. I made
that decision because we were having problems maintaining headers,
footers, links, etc. Now, one change to e.g. the Footer code in ShopSite
and the entire site reflects the new information without having to
synchronize between various different WYSIWYG HTML programs. I'd guess
there are over 30 pages with no products on them in our site, just
social engineering.

--
Fred Holliss, webmaster, Fitter International Inc.
"Balance and Fitness for Life"
Toll Free: 1-800-FITTER-1 | Int'l: +1-403-243-6830
http://www.fitter1.com | mailto:webmaster@fitter1.com