Request a Quote -> Order
Printed From: ProductCart E-Commerce Solutions
Category: ProductCart Build To Order
Forum Name: Using BTO
Forum Description: Exchange message with other users of ProductCart Build To Order
URL: https://forum.productcart.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=2196
Printed Date: 21-November-2024 at 7:24pm
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.04 - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: Request a Quote -> Order
Posted By: cmason
Subject: Request a Quote -> Order
Date Posted: 29-November-2008 at 6:00pm
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Request for Quote's become a big differentiator for a proposal I'm creating.
I see a lot of questions on the forums about why only BTO products can have a Request for Quote feature with recommendations of work-arounds that are too much to consider for thousands of products. I'd like to understand why this is restricted to just BTO products? Are there any plans to allow admins to easily change a quote into an order? Christie Mason |
Replies:
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 01-December-2008 at 7:33am
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One part of the answer could be to dump all product views to configurePrd.asp (see redirect at top of viewprd.asp for BTO products and change to redirect for all hits). It doesn't have as much descriptive info as viewPrd.asp for standard pages, which is something that's previously bothered me, but that's easy to add.
Also interesting is that the client side of managing quotes does include a "Review and Order" function. If that could just be added to the admin side, that w/b good. Meanwhile, if anyone else is wondering where to find the manage Quotes area in the Admin panel. In V3.5 it's under "REPORTS". I don't know why, but that's where I found it. |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 01-December-2008 at 8:06am
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I should have held off on the comment about it being easy to make configurePrd.asp be as descriptive (brands, weight etc) and have functions like reviews and addt'l images similar to viewPrd.asp. It was easy to align the two pages in V2.76 but in V3.5 it looks like configurePrd.asp has been somewhat orphanized from changes to viewPrd.asp. Now I'm completely flummoxed in determining if it w/b better to add viewprd code to configurePrd or vice versa and not happy about either choice.
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Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 19-December-2008 at 11:49am
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I've spent more time on this and all the snazzy display in viewPrd.asp is definitely missing in the BTO/configurePrd.asp page. To my way of thinking configurePrd.asp is the money page, it's the reason for paying the extra for BTO version and the added complexity of managing products. To have it be significantly less rich than the standard viewprd.asp page isn't good.
My final resolution was to go back to the V2.76 way. Comment out the auto redirect to configurePrd.asp for BTO produts, add a link to configurePrd.asp from viewPrd.asp for "Request A Quote". I'm disappointed that I had to go backwards to go forwards and hope the next version will have the same display features, along with "Add a Quote" function for standard products. As far as changing a quote request to an order, I'm just hoping I can reuse the code in the client's login area within the CP/admin area. |
Posted By: ProductCart
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 4:45am
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If you are referring to the new zoom feature, this will be addressed in the next release (or you can open a support ticket and request the updated files). What other information that is not displayed on the configuration page you believe should be displayed there? Please post a list here and we will certainly review it and keep it in mind for the next release. ------------- The ProductCart Team Home of ProductCart http://www.productcart.com" rel="nofollow - shopping cart software |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 10:05am
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I've pretty much figured out the problem, still haven't figured out a resolution. If I redirect a standard product (viewProd.asp) to the BTO page (configurePrd.asp) to get the quote feature then it has no Weight, Brand, SKU, other images, zoom, custom search, save product, send a link, previous/next links (don't know if reward points or cross sell displays) because PC figures that's been displayed on viewPrd.asp with a "Customize" link if it's BTO.
I get the same naked display as http://www.earlyimpact.com/productcart/build_to_order/productcart/pc/configurePrd.asp?idProduct=412. (congrats to EI for making the BTO demo V3.5) That link also shows how little is displayed for a totally customizable product vs a BTO with Standard Features. Since this is to be a quote only system I'm in a hard place between dumping all products to configurePrd.asp with very limited display vs making every product BTO. I don't like either choice, but until quoting is offered for both standard and BTO products I don't see a third way. Then there's the issue of how to turn a quote into an order in the CP. A customer that's logged on can do it, seems like the admins should have equal capability. I just thought of another possible approach. I'm going to try custom adding a link to viewPrd.asp called "Request a Quote" that will dump to configurePrd.asp. If that works it would mean no additional display needed in configurePrd.asp and end customers can still request a quote. We'll also make sure that there's no BTO products that are completely customized with no default items. |
Posted By: Greg Dinger
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 10:58am
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 1:12pm
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I did something similar in V2.76 (added addt'l display info to configurePrd.asp and added "Request A Quote" to standard products) but after going through the pain of upgrading a heavily customized V2.76 to V3.12 I'm trying to keep it as clean of customizations as possible in the move to V3.5. Plus, this issue of allowing quotes for all types of products is something I've repeatedly requested, and have noticed others requesting, for years.
I'm also wondering why standard products on the site link you supplied have very little info? http://www.dinopc.com/shop/pc/Keyboard-mouse-and-speakers-17p70.htm I just noticed something interesting. If I take http://www.dinopc.com/shop/pc/configurePrd.asp?idproduct=461 and change it to http://www.dinopc.com/shop/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=461, I like that full display of info much better. I'm assuming sku, save a link, etc, etc are turned off by design? |
Posted By: Greg Dinger
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 2:47pm
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 3:07pm
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I understand what you're saying about referencing external pages and that's probably what should have been done with viewPrd.asp. Do configurePrd.asp as an include, not an entirely separate page.
On the issue of includes ... in viewCategories.asp there's already 24 included pages (there may be more that are includes of includes). I see 27 for viewPrd.asp (not counting css and I don't remember that including the spry js and css files and I'm probably missing some more includes with includes. Plus PC has different category and product displays depending on display settings, custom search etc. so you'd probably have to customize multiple includes. Regarding that other site, it looks like a V2.76 site to me - which was easier to customize. I think the new features in V3.12 and V3.5 are very nice BUT they do add layers of complexity. Plus, once I saw a similar tabbed approach being used in the CP, I had expectations it would be used in the product pages. I may be in dumb bunny mode but I don't see any way to customize a tabbed section within either of the product pages w/o embedding customizations. |
Posted By: ProductCart
Date Posted: 20-December-2008 at 6:59pm
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We agree that if the "Skip Products Details Page" option is checked, then the BTO configuration page - which by definition becomes the main product page shown to the customer for that particular product - should display more information. On the other hand, if the configuration page is shown after the customer clicks on the "Configure" button on the product details page (viewprd.asp), then we should probably leave things "as is" in order to minimize the display of redundant information on consecutive pages. This certainly makes sense, it's not difficult to implement, and will be added in a future release. As soon as we have a BETA of the edited file we will post it here. Thanks to all for your feedback, as always! ------------- The ProductCart Team Home of ProductCart http://www.productcart.com" rel="nofollow - shopping cart software |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 21-December-2008 at 9:10am
| Thank you very much for that helpful response. Will "Request A Quote" also be available for standard products? |
Posted By: ProductCart
Date Posted: 22-December-2008 at 6:49am
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The way the feature is designed today, "Request a Quote" and a product being a BTO product are closely tied together. What you are describing sounds like a slightly different "Wish List" where the customer can "Send" the Wish List to the store to receive pricing on the items added to it (assuming pricing is turned off for those products). Is this correct?
------------- The ProductCart Team Home of ProductCart http://www.productcart.com" rel="nofollow - shopping cart software |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 22-December-2008 at 8:19am
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Not exactly. I don't think the end user should be offered different functions dependent on if a product is a standard product or a BTO product. A product is a product. Site clients shouldn't notice any difference. They should be able to "Save", "Send A Link" etc for BTO products and they should be able to "Request A Quote" for standard products. Simple example where a "Request A Quote" w/b handy for standard products w/b a quantity request. Yes, quantity discounts can be set up for every product but not every quantity scenario can be covered with simple quantity discount rules. "No Price" is also another good example.
The site client shouldn't have to care, ie receive different functionality, depending on what type of product it is. I customized this on V2.76 so I know it's possible but the task of customizing V3.5 with a minimum of 5 different files involved (viewProd, viewProdCode, viewPrdX or configurePrd, configurePrdCode, ) is a bit daunting. Which brings me to wondering "Why are there now so many different files now? I don't see where the use of the XXPrdCode has any benefits, it's stuck back together when the page is run so there's no page size savings server side and it makes tracing functions/variables a real bear. As far as different include files just to switch image placement (appears it only works on viewPrd not configurePrd)...let those that really want a left image switch the column contents, those that want a single column learn html enough to use "td colspan="2"" and remove the second td. I'd rather see the complexity spent on having configurePrd be an include of viewPrd. That way there doesn't need to be functions repeated in both pages and functionality w/b the same for all product types. There's already some BTO code in viewPrd to show standard features (exp http://www.earlyimpact.com/productcart/build_to_order/productcart/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=515&idcategory=118), seems to me it wouldn't be a big deal to expand that to show required or other customize options. |
Posted By: ProductCart
Date Posted: 22-December-2008 at 8:59am
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Christie, I can assure you that there are pretty good technical reasons behind every change you have seen between the 2.x code structure and the v3.x one. "viewprdcode.asp" is used in the Control Panel too, among other reasons why the code was separated out into that file (and related files). BTO products are indeed very different from standard products and should be treated differently in the code. Just one example: product bundles don't make absolutely any sense with BTO products, since the bundled items would be an integral part of the product configuration (selectable items on the product configuration page). Having one page do it all would increase, not reduce, complexity. Anyway, back to the beginning: it's still unclear what you are ultimately trying to do. If there are feature changes that we can apply that could help your scenario, we will consider them, as long as they don't assume a complete re-write of the whole storefront structure  So, forget ProductCart and provide an explanation of what it is that your client is expecting customers to be able to do. Are customers saving products (Standard and BTO products) to a "Request an Estimate" document for which they would like to receive an estimate, so that it can then be turned into an actual purchase order? ------------- The ProductCart Team Home of ProductCart http://www.productcart.com" rel="nofollow - shopping cart software |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 22-December-2008 at 9:44am
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Thanks for the explanation of why the code was separated, that wasn't making sense to me.
Ultimately what the site client needs to be able to do is "Send A Link", "Save" and "Request A Quote" no matter what type of product, what type of product configuration, is used. If it is a totally customized product then it should display the additional images, next/previous, save, send a link, etc just like it is a standard product or BTO with optional configuration. |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 27-December-2008 at 9:49am
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Just noticed that settings for configurePrd.asp do not reflect the product display choices made in the CP for image left/right. Cross sell doesn't display, at least I don't think it does I've posted a separate issue for BTO not displaying cross sells.
Plus, it would make life simpler if all columns with prices were aligned right. |
Posted By: DTyler
Date Posted: 27-December-2008 at 2:06pm
By design, cross sells that have customization options attached do not display.
The reason for that would be - if you had two bundled products with required options, there wouldn't be an easy way to set the options on the first item and then redirect you to the second item to the set the options.
Worse would be if you had a bundle of three or four products with required options and had to code PC to set the options for all four of the products.
On the bright side, you can add a simile of standard product options on a BTO page using custom CSS classes on the code for drop down menus in the configureprdcode.asp file and use absolute positioning in your CSS file to place the drop down menus wherever you like (including at the top of the page in your product summary).
The one downside would be that you'd lose the ability to add drop down menus to the rest of the build sheet. ------------- Las Vegas Photographers of DTyler Photography -http://www.dtyler-photography.com |
cmason wrote:Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 27-December-2008 at 3:27pm
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Cross sells - accessory and bundle with standard products also do not display.
If a product is a configure only/totally customized then currently you are dumped directly to configureprd.asp which is a very thin display with no "Save Product", Send A link, addt'l images, cross sells etc. For standard products you can't "Request A Quote". Totally customized products need richer displays, not lesser displays of information. Standard products should be allowed to have quote requests, especially if the cart is turned off. Currently I'm recommending that all BTO products have at least one Standard Feature so that all products will benefit from landing on viewPrd.asp before being redirected to configurePrd.asp. I also changed the routine for pcs_Wishlist to allow saving a BTO product Public Sub pcs_WishList if scWL=-1 then 'CW show even if BTO 'if pserviceSpec=0 then If 1=1 Then It works to "Save" a BTO product to the customer's wishlist. I've done it with my test customer account and all works well. |
Posted By: cmason
Date Posted: 27-December-2008 at 3:28pm
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Scratch that comment about aligning price columns right, it's that darned input field. Just add "text-align:right;" to the class "transparentField" in pcStoreFront.css. While you're doing that you may also want to add "font-size:115%;" to make the price in the total large and "font-weight:bold;" just to make sure.
Also tr after " pcs_BTOPurchasing '~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ' END: Disallow purchasing. Quote Submission only " is either missing a td or a column span (I also changed the alignment) Result: <tr> <td> </td> <td align="right"> <% pcv_strFuntionCall = "cdDynamic" puts the "Quote" icon under "Add to Cart" which I've also aligned right to be under the totals. |