Auctiva Pricing Plans
As you have most likely heard, Auctiva will be transitioning to a paid service effective July 1, 2009. All Auctiva users – including users with only an Auctiva Commerce store – will need to select an Auctiva pricing plan during the month of June.
Why Select a Plan
Billing for Auctiva Commerce is handled by Auctiva – therefore we need an active Auctiva account with valid contact and billing information on file.
Free Tools
If you do not use Auctiva’s listing services, but would like to maintain your Auctiva Commerce store you may want to choose the Free Tools plan for your Auctiva account. An overview of the plans and a pricing calculator to help you choose the best plan for you can be found
here. Note that if you do not actively select an Auctiva plan by the end of June, your Auctiva account will automatically be assigned to the Free Tools plan. Also note that several of the Auctiva pricing plan options offer discounted or free Auctiva Commerce stores. If you select one of these plans you will see the changes to your Auctiva Commerce monthly Store fee reflected on your monthly invoice.
An important note about images – Images in your Auctiva Commerce account are entirely separate and distinct from any images you may have stored with Auctiva. Image hosting for your Auctiva Commerce Store is included as part of your Auctiva Commerce monthly store fee.
Finally, don’t forget, we are going to provide a pro-rated credit to cover your June monthly Store fee for Auctiva Commerce. You will still be responsible for any applicable transaction fees during the month, but remember, your first $200 in sales is free of transaction fees! These charges will appear on your July 1 invoice.
Providing a good buyer experience is key for every Store. It will mean the difference between completing or missing a sale. That’s why it’s important to test your checkout process from a customer’s perspective to ensure you’re Store is set-up to handle the transactions. We’ve come up with guidelines to help you do just that.
To read the complete article, check out our Auctiva Education Section.
- Read your description – Double-check that descriptions are accurate, catchy and don’t have any glaring spelling mistakes—a sign of a less-than-serious seller.
- Test your shipping calculator – Not only will the calculator provide estimated shipping costs; it will also identify if you have a shipping method associated with the product you’re trying to buy. Try the calculator a few times, using different zip codes, to make sure all of your customers can order your goods, or at least those in the shipping zones where you wish to do business.
- Make a payment – If you offer more than one payment option, test all of them to make sure the methods are integrated properly. Most customers will expect you to accept credit cards, so you may want to offer that payment option and test it first.
- Capture the cash – When a customer places an order, you have to go through a process known as ‘payment capture’ in order to actually receive the funds. To do this go into the order’s Summary tab. Become familiar with this page. It tells you how much customers owe, their shipping and mailing addresses as well as the contents of their shipments and their preferred shipping method.
- Deliver goods – Shipping items is essential to good business. Be sure to use Auctiva Commerce’s automated e-mail feature to keep your customers informed about the status of their orders when you ship products. It’s important to test those messages to fully understand your buyers’ experience.
- Refund, cancel and void – After making sure payments work properly, you’ll want to give yourself a refund and cancel and void your order(s). A refund is straightforward: It’s simply the act of returning part or all of your buyer’s money after a transaction has been completed. Canceling, on the other hand, marks an order as having been called off. But it doesn’t prevent payment from being captured on that order. A voided order cancels the order and prevents a payment from being captured.
As a final confirmation, it’s helpful to go through the complete purchasing process a few times to test out every aspect and ensure you don’t miss anything that would leave customers in the lurch. If you don’t have any problems, neither should your buyers. The combination of quality products paired with a wholly functioning site will create a positive customer experience; driving sales and fostering long-term customer relationships and repeat business.
