Setting Up an E-commerce Store Using OnlineGiving.org’s Products Feature
Setting up an e-commerce store can feel a little intimidating at first, but OnlineGiving.org’s Products Feature is designed to make things simple for church administrators. Whether you’re selling physical items like books and t-shirts, or digital resources like Bible studies or e-books, this tool streamlines the entire process.
The Product Builder: Your Starting Point
The key tool here is the Product Builder. It’s the starting point when creating products for your store. With just a few clicks, you can add new products, track inventory, and even manage shipping and sales tax—basically everything you need for a fully functioning online shop. Imagine setting up a church store where your community can buy everything from event tickets to digital downloads, all in one place.
Adding Product Variants and Managing Inventory
One of the most flexible aspects of this tool is the ability to add different variants to each product—like multiple sizes, colors, or styles. If you’re selling a t-shirt, for instance, you can set up different size options, offer it in several colors, and track the inventory for each one individually. The system will even calculate the sales tax and shipping for you, making it perfect if you’re managing a variety of products.
For example, you could sell a Bible study that includes both a physical workbook and a digital download. The system will handle the shipping details and provide a download link for the digital part right after checkout.
Shipping Made Simple with Shippo
Speaking of shipping, OnlineGiving.org integrates with Shippo, giving you access to the best shipping rates and options. You can track everything—from the weight of the package to real-time shipping quotes for your customers. This allows people to choose their preferred shipping option at checkout, removing the logistics burden from your plate.
Smooth Digital Product Management
For those offering digital products like e-books or sermon series downloads, the process is just as smooth. You can create a product, mark it as digital, and then add a download link that’s sent out after someone completes their purchase. The system even lets you track how many times a digital product has been downloaded, which is a great feature if you’re offering limited-access resources.
Efficiency with Product Variants
Managing multiple product variants is also a breeze. If you’re selling a t-shirt that comes in different colors and sizes, the Product Builder allows you to bulk copy settings across all variants. This means instead of entering the same info for each version of your product, you can copy the details and then tweak differences like color or price. This is a huge time-saver when you’re managing multiple options.
User-Friendly Interface
Don’t worry if you’re not a tech expert. The interface is intuitive, making it easy to update products, change their status, or hide items that are no longer available with just a few clicks. Even if you need to change a product’s details after someone has already purchased it, the system keeps those records for audit purposes while letting you create a new product to reflect any changes.
Empowering Churches with E-commerce
The Products Feature from OnlineGiving.org empowers churches to step into the world of online sales, whether you’re selling merchandise, event tickets, or digital resources. It’s all about providing a seamless experience for both administrators and users. If you’re ready to boost your church’s outreach or fundraising through an online store, this tool could be a game changer.
In this article, we'll overview the OnlineGiving.org Payment Products feature.
Products Overview:
The payment products feature is an excellent tool for church administrators to create an e-commerce store and make products available for purchase. It is the foundation of any online store and is easy to set up using the Product Builder feature in the OnlineGiving.org control panel. With this feature, administrators can easily add new products and track inventory. The products can be customized with multiple variants, such as color, size, type, etc., and can be configured with unlimited product variants. Each variant can have its own inventory quantity tracking, sales tax, shipping information, and other details, making it easier to manage and sell products.
The products feature allows for the addition of both shipped and digital products, and a private download URL can be provided to the user after purchase. The product can also have both a shipping and a digital aspect, allowing for scenarios such as purchasing a Bible study that includes a shipped item and a digital download package. Overall, the product's feature is a powerful tool that can help church administrators create an online store that is easy to manage and provides a great user experience.
User Guide Sections:
Overview of the Product Builder
With the OnlineGiving.org Products feature, you have access to the Product Builder—an intuitive and helpful tool for creating new products. To begin, click on the "Create New Product" button. For existing products, you can use the product builder by clicking on the gear icon and selecting the edit option from the dropdown menu. We are excited to provide you with all the necessary details about the Product Builder in this section so you can confidently create and enhance your products.
In the "General Information" section of the builder, you can enter the product title and description, which are displayed on the shopping cart website.
In the example, we'll be creating a coffee mug product:
In the "Product Status" section of the builder, you can control the product's publication status on your shopping cart website.
In the "Organization" section of the builder, you can input the type of product and information about the manufacturer or vendor of the product. You can also include the product in a collection and use tags to help the users find the product while searching on your shopping cart website. Please refer to the Payments Product Collections knowledge base article for detailed information on Product Collections.
In the "Media" section of the builder, you can add the main product images. These images will be used as the primary images for the product. If your product has no variants, these images will be the primary ones. However, if your product has different variants, you can assign unique images to each variant. The images in the "Media" section will be used as the default images when the user has not selected a specific product variant. Including one or more product images in this section is always recommended when creating a product.
In the "Variants" section, an optional checkbox says, "This product has variants such as sizes, colors, or different options." You should check this checkbox if your product has multiple variants such as color, size, seating section, style, etc.. However, if your product comes in only one type, you should leave this checkbox unchecked. For instance, in the case of our coffee mug, it is unique and only comes in a single color and style. Therefore, we will leave the checkbox unchecked.
Our coffee mug is a great product, but if you're looking to create a product with multiple variations, you can use our Product Builder to create one. For instance, if you want to design a t-shirt with different sizes and colors, you can select the "This product has variants such as sizes, colors, or different options" checkbox and start building your product. Our builder is designed to accommodate one or more variants with unlimited combinations.
Creating these variants is easy; you just need to specify the variant name and its options after selecting the checkbox. In the t-shirt example below, we have two variants - "Size" and "Color" - each with multiple options. Our builder allows you to have as many variants as you want, and it supports zero to an infinite number of variant combinations, giving you complete freedom to create your product.
Pricing & Inventory Section(s):
The "Variants" feature in the Product Builder is linked to the "Pricing & Inventory" section. If a product has no variations, a single "Pricing & Inventory" section is displayed by default. But if the product has different options in the "Variants" section, the builder will generate all the other product combinations, each with its own "Pricing & Inventory" section.
The Product Builder auto-populates all the details of the "Pricing & Inventory" sections with a single click, so you don't need to manually enter them. However, it's important to pay attention to the "Pricing & Inventory" section as it contains crucial details required for the shopping cart to display and facilitate payment for the product, such as shipping, inventory, and more.
To set the price of our t-shirt, we need to enter the "Price," which is the user's purchase price. We can then add an optional "Compare at a price" value, which is displayed next to the "Price" to the user for comparison purposes. This feature is useful for helping users set a value on your product when browsing.
We can also enter the "Cost per Item," which is optional but helpful in keeping a record of the actual cost of the t-shirt for internal purposes. After entering the "Cost per item," the Product Builder will automatically calculate the "Margin" and "Profit" for the product and display those under the "Cost per Item" input. This can be useful for quick reference into how much profit the product will make at the entered price compared to the cost.
Pricing & Inventory Inventory (QTY):
Moving on to inventory options, we enter the total quantity of the product item, which is the total quantity in stock for that specific product item when working with variants. The "Quantity" number is used for inventory tracking purposes when the "Track quantity" checkbox is checked. The shopping cart will stop allowing the product item to be added to a user's shopping cart when the "Quantity" reaches zero unless the "Sell when out of stock" checkbox is checked. After a user completes a checkout (order), the "Quantity" is decreased by the total purchased by the user.
When a product has zero quantity and "Track quantity" is enabled, it will show as "Out of stock" to the user. If the same scenario exists but the "Sell when out of stock" checkbox is checked, the user will see "Backordered" on the product detail page but still be allowed to purchase the item. The "Quantity" tracking works for both shipped and digital products, allowing you to enforce limits on what is purchased.
However, if you don't need to track the quantity and your product is always available, enter any positive number into the "Quantity" input and leave "Track Quantity" unchecked. An amount is still required, but the software will not show any "In stock" or "Out of stock," and the product can always be purchased. For example, a digital product that can be sold unlimited times would not need quantity tracking.
In the "Quantity" area, we can also optionally set the "Max qty per checkout" to limit the user to a maximum quantity they can purchase at a time. This feature may be helpful for limited items, such as setting the maximum number of tickets they can buy for a specific product item per checkout or similar. When a number is present in the "Max qty per checkout" input, the shopping cart will ensure the max quantity when the user attempts to add the product to their shopping cart or adjust an existing item in their shopping cart.
Pricing & Inventory Sales Tax:
If you are required to collect sales tax on your product, check the "Collect Sales Tax" checkbox. Our IT Staff will set up the sales tax for you when you first set up your shopping cart. However, if you haven't already contacted our support team about setting up Sales Tax or Shipping integration, please email us at support@onlinegiving.org. These items are required for the shopping cart to function.
If you're not sure whether you need to collect sales tax, we recommend consulting with a local accountant to confirm whether your state requires your product to collect sales tax. You can configure each product to "Collect Sales Tax" as an optional feature through our Product Builder. When a user proceeds to checkout on the shopping cart, the e-commerce system automatically calculates the required sales tax based on the items with "Collect Sales Tax" enabled.
Please note that when sales tax is required to be collected, the shopping cart will calculate it based on the user's shipping or mailing address and will include sales tax on shipping and the optional cover-the-fee. For more detailed information on sales tax, please refer to our Sales Tax User Guide.
The inputs for the optional product "SKU" and "Barcode" (ISBN, UPC, etc.) may be necessary and valuable for inventory tracking and user searches.
We understand that you may feel overwhelmed by the available options, but they are essential for effectively selling products on an e-commerce website. This information enables you to automate various backend processes such as sales tax, shipping, inventory tracking, and more.
Speaking of shipping, let's use our t-shirt example. Shipping is required since the user wants to receive the purchased product online. If your product requires shipping, check the "Requires shipping" checkbox to display the shipping options. Our shopping cart at OnlineGiving.org is fully integrated with Shippo (https://goshippo.com/), which provides scalable shipping tools, the best rates, and world-class support. Our integration with Shippo allows for detailed order information to be automatically entered into Shippo, including product weights and user-selected shipping options.
Additionally, real-time quotes allow users to select their preferred shipping service while checking out. You have complete control over which shipping services are allowed. For more information, please refer to our Shipping User Guide.
When you select the "Requires Shipping" checkbox, you will see the "Weight for shipping," "Height," "Width," and "Length" fields. These fields are mandatory as they provide real-time shipping rates for the customer at checkout and to Shippo with order information. You can check the packaging label if you are unsure of the product's weight or dimensions. However, it's best to measure and weigh the product if uncertain.
Pricing & Inventory Digital Product:
Suppose you have a digital product, like an e-book or a digital companion PDF for a bible study package. In that case, you can indicate that it is a digital product by checking the "Digital Product" checkbox. Once you check the box, an input field will appear where you can enter the download URL for the digital product. This URL will be provided to the user after they complete the checkout process from the order detail page.
Pricing & Inventory Variant Images:
Suppose your product has multiple variants, and you want a unique image for each. In that case, you can use the "Add Variant Image" feature to upload images in the "Pricing & Inventory" section. When specific images are present for a product item (variant), the user has displayed the specific image when they select that product option. For our t-shirt, we offer different colors, so we upload a unique color "gray" image of the t-shirt since we are working under the "Size: L, Color: Gray" pricing section.
Pricing & Inventory Bulk Copy of Settings to Variants:
You may have noticed separate "Pricing & Inventory" sections for each combination if your product has multiple variants, such as different colors or sizes. For example, a t-shirt with 7 sizing options and 3 color options would have 21 variant "Pricing & Inventory" sections. But don't worry; we have an easy and fast method to auto-populate all the sections and make entering multiple variants a breeze.
To get started, fill out the top (first) "Pricing & Inventory" section, and then click the "copy pricing & inventory to all" link at the bottom of the section. A confirmation prompt will appear, and you should click "OK" to copy all the information in that section to every other "Pricing & Inventory" section in the product builder. Congratulations! You have now easily added quality, pricing, and shipping information for all your variants.
However, you may wonder if you have different pricing for different variants or something similar. In that case, follow the above steps to first copy all the information into the "Pricing & Inventory" sections and then go into each section individually to change the information as needed. This lets you auto-populate the bulk information and then focus on updating the differences. For example, in our t-shirt example, all shirts have the exact pricing and shipping information. Still, we need to change the variant images to reflect the color differences and ensure our quantities are correct.
Finally, when you are done entering information into the Product Builder, click the "Save" button to commit your changes. Congratulations! Your first product is now set up!
General Product Directions & FAQs
How to Access Products in the Control Panel
- Log in to the control panel
- Under the "Payments" section in the left navigation menu, click "Products"
- Log in to the control panel
- Under the "Payments" section in the left navigation menu, click "Products"
- Click the "Create new Product" button on the top right of page
- Complete the Product Builder form fields (see overview of Product Builder above)
- Click the Save button to commit changes
How to Update an Existing Product
- Log in to the control panel
- Under the "Payments" section in the left navigation menu, click "Products"
- Search and locate the product, then click the "Gear" icon and click the "Edit" dropdown menu option
- Edit the Product Builder form fields (see overview of Product Builder above)
- Click the Save button to commit changes
How to Search for an Existing Product
- Log in to the control panel
- Under the "Payments" section in the left navigation menu, click "Products"
- Search click the Search Icon and then complete your search
Can I change product variant options after creating the product?
Once a product has one or more completed checkout orders, it must stay in the system along with the specific product variants for audit purposes. You can edit the existing product and change the variant settings under the "Pricing & Inventory" section at any time. However, if you need to change the actual variants under the "Variants" section and an order has been completed, you'll have to change the publication status of the product to "Hidden" and create a new product. Please note that this design is in place to ensure that detailed records of product items associated with paid checkout orders are kept.