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WooCommerce

How to setup and customize your store.

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Joshua Copeland

E-mail: Josh@LVPHP.org

- Father, Husband, Code Craftsman, and self proclaimed Computer.

@PsycodeDotOrg

LV PHP UG

Organizer

Architect@

Selling Source

Lover of all things tech

Proud Father of 2

+Requirements

PHP 5.2.4 or greater

MySQL 5.0 or greater

The mod_rewrite Apache module (for permalinks)

fsockopen support (for payment gateway IPN access)

(optional) An SSL certificate if you wish to install direct payment gateways

(optional) Some plugins for WooCommerce require cURL

(optional) Some plugins for WooCommerce require SOAP

You should also check WordPress minimum requirements.

WC 2.0+ requires WordPress 3.8 minimum. Please see our post here on how to best prepare your site.

+Installation

To install WooCommerce:

Log in to your WordPress Admin panel

Go to: Plugins > Add New

Type ‘WooCommerce’ into the Search Plugins field and hit Enter. Once found, you can view details such as the the point release, rating and description.

Click Install Now. After clicking the link, you’ll be asked if you’re sure you want to install the plugin.

Click Yes, and WordPress completes the installation.

+Uninstalling

There are two things to understand when uninstalling WooCommerce.

If you deactivate and delete the plugin from the WordPress Admin, you are deleting WooCommerce settings and database tables, and trashing the pages created when first installed.

If you need to remove ALL WooCommerce data, including products, order data, etc., go to: WooCommerce > System Status > Tools, and enable the Remove post types on uninstall. Doing this deletes all WooCommerce data when you deactivate and delete the plugin from the WordPress Admin.

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+Upgrading

Automatic Upgrade (Recommended)

After you backup your site go to Plugins > Installed Plugins within WordPress to view a list of plugins you’ve previously installed. If an upgrade to WooCommerce is available you will see a notice beneath the plugin listing which states the point release which is now available as well as links to view the details of that version and to upgrade automatically.

To upgrade simply click the ‘Upgrade Automatically’ link. You may be asked for your webservers FTP details, if that’s the case fill them in to complete the upgrade.

Manual Upgrade

To manually upgrade WooCommerce: First, backup your site then download the latest version of the plugin from our WordPress plugin page and uploade it to the wp-content/plugins directory on your web server overwriting the old files.

+Choosing a theme

Themes must be compatible with woocommerce in order for your web store to work correctly.

WooThemes has a bunch to choose from and one called Canvas which can be pretty much molded to whatever you want.

Choose a responsive theme to support mobile devices.

Go for a lightweight theme and add functionality with plugins.

Check all woocommerce pages when installing a theme that claims to be compatible. My-account, cart, checkout…

Consider your audience when choosing your theme, it should resonate your business without being too distracting.

+Custom post types

Product (product) product_cat product_tag

Product variation (product_variation – hidden from the UI)

Shop order (shop_order) shop_order_status

Shop coupon (shop_coupon)

+Web Hooks

Used for integrating 3rd party APIs with WooCommerce.

Most actions are available as triggers such as: Add/Edit/Delete Customers Add/Edit/Delete Coupons Add/Edit/Delete Orders Add/Edit/Delete Products Any Action Event Custom Topics

Great for additional automated tasks you wish to build.

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+General Settings

90% of what your going to need to configure for WooCommerce is in the settings area.

Think of this as an admin area for your store, your going to manage higher level things like taxes, currency, payment gateways, display options, and more.

Some WooCommerce plugins are also configured from the WooCommerce settings page.

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+Product Settings

+Product Settings

+Product Settings

+Product type

The Simple product type covers the vast majority of any products you may sell. Simple products are shipped and have no options. For example, a can of drink.

A Grouped product is a collection of related products which can be purchased individually and can only consist of simple products. For example, a sofa set with recliners and loveseats could be sold as a group or individually.

An External or Affiliate product is one that you list and describe on your website, but is sold elsewhere.

A Variable product is a product that has different variations, each of which may have a different SKU, price, stock options etc. For example, a t-shirt available in several different colors and/or sizes. This is arguably the most complex of product types.

http://docs.woothemes.com/document/variable-product/

+Order Management

Pending payment – Order received (unpaid)

Failed – Payment failed or was declined (unpaid). Note that this status may not show immediately and instead show as pending until verified (i.e., PayPal).

Processing – Payment received and stock has been reduced- the order is awaiting fulfillment

Completed – Order fulfilled and complete – requires no further action

On-Hold – Awaiting payment – stock is reduced, but you need to confirm payment

Cancelled – Cancelled by an admin or the customer – no further action required

Refunded – Refunded by an admin – no further action required

+Reports

+Inventory Settings

+Downloadable Products

+Tax Settings

+Checkout Options

+Checkout Process

Coupons Select to enable the use of coupons – Coupons can be

applied from the cart and checkout pages.

Checkout Options include:

Enable guest checkout – Allows customers to checkout without creating an account.

Force secure checkout – Force SSL (HTTPS) on the checkout pages (an SSL Certificate is required).

Force HTTP when leaving the checkout – Forces pages to load over HTTP instead of (SSL) HTTPS like the checkout pages. Useful for certain gateways that may require this.

+Checkout Pages

+Checkout Endpoints

Endpoints are routes for woocommerce to trigger events and pages.

+Payment Gateways

+Shipping Options

+Shipping Methods

+User Account Settings

+Registration Options

+Email Settings

+Roles & Capabilities

If you wish to modify roles and capabilities, you should use a third-party plugin such as Capability manager or Capability Manager Enhanced.

Shop Manager is a role you can give someone you want to manage the shop but don’t want to make admin. They’re granted the following capabilities:

manage_woocommerceview_woocommerce_reports

A customer has read access only, which is used if a user registers via the checkout process. This is equivalent status to a normal blog subscriber.

+Permalinks

Whether to prepend shop categories/tags with shop base page (e.g., yourdomain.com/shop/product or yourdomain.com/product)

The product category base slug (default is: /product-category/)

The product tag base slug (default is /product-tag/)

Product attribute base slug will optionally use a custom base before /attribute-name/attribute/ (ex: /size/medium or /color/blue)

If you are having issues with some endpoints/pages, try and flush your permalinks. That option is available in the permalinks option settings area.

+Included Widgets WooCommerce Cart

Displays the shopping cart contents and links to the cart / checkout

WooCommerce Layered Nav Allows the user to refine products based on

attributes

WooCommerce Layered Nav Filters Shows active layered nav filters so users can see and

deactivate them.

WooCommerce Price Filter Allow the user to refine products based on price on

product category pages

WooCommerce Product Categories Display product categories in list format

+More Widgets WooCommerce Products

This includes view for All Products, Featured Products, and On-Sale Products.

WooCommerce Product Search Search products only

WooCommerce Product Tags Display product tags in tag cloud format

WooCommerce Recently Viewed Display a list of products the customer has recently

viewed

WooCommerce Recent Reviews List recent customer reviewed products with ratings

WooCommerce Top Rated Products Display a list of top rated products

+ShortcodesCan be placed in posts or pages to access WooCommerce.

[woocommerce_cart] shows the cart page

[woocommerce_checkout] shows the checkout page

[woocommerce_order_tracking] shows the order tracking form

[woocommerce_my_account] shows the user account page

+Caching Optimizations

W3 Total Cache

Ensure you add ‘mfunc’ to the ‘Ignored comment stems’ option in the Minify settings.

http://docs.woothemes.com/document/configuring-caching-plugins/

+Benchmark your site

Use something like siege before and after optimizations to see if it made a difference.

The faster your site is, the better ranking you will get on the search engines.

Use Google Analytics to find areas where your customers fall off your site to optimize those pages.

Create a funnel so you can find out what your conversion rate is for any ad placements or just organic traffic.

Look at competitors sites and see if there are areas you need to optimize to make your site stand above the rest.