Magento is one of the most popular ecommerce platforms for businesses of all sizes. If you need to open an online store or transition an existing store to a new platform, using Magento will simplify the process by providing you with the tools you need to build and manage a store. However, while using Magento is easier than building a store from scratch, the platform has multiple customization options that impact how your store performs and how you manage it.
Using these options to create a better online store is often self-explanatory. However, there are also customization options that are less intuitive — or not as well known — as others. To help you make the most of your Magento experience, let’s explore some of the lesser known customization options. You will probably be able to use some of the options on your own; utilizing others may require the help of a Magento partner, such as Coalition Technologies.
Administration Session Lifetime
If you spend hours editing product descriptions only to find that your administration session has timed out when you try to save the changes, you need to increase the number of seconds before administration sessions automatically shut down. You can do this on your own by following the commands: System > Config > Admin > Security > Session Lifetime. Customizing the time of administration sessions makes it easier to spend time fine tuning your store’s copy.
Nesting Static Blocks
If you have lots of data in your website’s CMS > static blocks, you can divide the content in each block by using Widgets to combine several blocks into a single block that is displayed on a category page or a product page. Nesting static blocks makes the information in the blocks more digestible for end users, which can help reduce the bounce rate for your website. If you need help customizing your store’s static blocks, Coalition Technologies will help.
Ratings Management
Because people tend to trust the opinion of their peers more than they trust the opinion of businesses that are trying to sell them something, customer ratings are some of the most powerful pieces of marketing content you can have. To add more rating criteria for what you sell, just use the following commands: Catalog > Reviews & Ratings > Manage Rating. Then enable star rating criteria. The ratings management function can be managed at the store view level.
Tier Pricing
A helpful Magento customization option for sales promotions, tier pricing lets you price items by quantity. For example, you can run a promotion where a single item sells at regular price but five of the item sell for a discounted price. You can do this by using the commands: Admin > Catalog > Managed Products. Then select the item you want to discount. Go to Prices > Add Tier. Enter the quantity of the item (“qty”) to enable tier pricing. Enter the “price per item” and click save.
Customized Landing Pages
Hundreds of Magento design templates are available from third party designers that target the shopping cart software market. However, these templates typically score low on the originality scale; unless you buy an exclusive license to a template, you probably won’t be the only one using it. Pre-designed templates’ lack of originality combined with a $2,500+ fee for acquiring an exclusive license is why many companies opt for custom templates.
If you want your Magento store to stand out from the crowd, designing custom landing pages is the way to go. If your business doesn’t have a web design department, partnering with a web design firm that understands the Magento platform, such as Coalition Technologies, is the best option. We’ve helped hundreds of companies with Magento customization projects that entailed designing unique landing pages for Magento Enterprise and Community editions.
Product Alerts Notification
This is a Magento customization option that notifies customers when a product goes on sale or arrives back in stock. You can allow customers to sign up for an alert notification by going to the Product Alerts section and setting the “Allow Alert When Product Price Changes” to “Yes” and setting the “Allow Alert When Product Comes Back in Stock” to “Yes.” Product alerts notification is a dynamic feature that can truly help your store sell more products.
Contact Us Today
Magento powers the online stores of some of the most successful retailers, such as Fiji Water, Vizio, and Paul Smith. Whether your company is large, medium size, or small, Magento will help it successfully compete in its market space, especially when the right customization measures are used. If you need assistance with Magento customization, call Coalition Technologies today at (888) 993-7639 to schedule a free consultation, or click here to use our contact form.
