Bysoft China's Blog > Your e-commerce partner

One of many key features of eZ publish is flexibility. You can customize almost anything from content structure to output presentation. In this short tutorial I will show how to specify a custom default root node class.
By default, eZ publish uses a root node ID 2 in content structure (“Content structure” tab) tree based on the folder class, and in many cases that is sufficient. However, sometimes we want to use our own custom class as the site’s front page. A custom class allows us to build a complex front page that uses a different layout than the rest of the site. Rather than extending the default folder class with attributes that are only used on the front page, creating a custom class gives us the flexibility to build a custom front page without impacting the rest of the site.
First we need to create new content class. You can define your new content class in the Administration Interface. Click the Setup tab, then select the Classes option from the left menu. I will not describe this process as it is very well explained in the eZ publish technical manual.
Note that your custom class must be marked as a ?container? in order to display content from within the content structure tree.
Once the content class is ready to use, create a new content object as an instance of your new class somewhere under the root node. Now we can swap the eZ publish root node with the newly created object. Click the left mouse button on the folder icon beside the root node folder name and select “Advanced->Swap with another node” from the context menu.

In browse mode choose the newly created object and click the “Select” button.

Done. Now you can edit your root node and populate the attributes of your custom class with content.
Next we need to configure the content structure tree.
Edit the file “settings/siteaccess/(your_admin_siteaccess)/contentstructuremenu.ini.append.php” and add your class to the list. Your configuration file should contain the following data:
[TreeMenu]
ShowClasses[]
ShowClasses[]=folder
ShowClasses[]=user_group
ShowClasses[]=custom_class
*/ ?>
Save your settings and clear the cache. After the page reloads, you should see your custom front page in the content structure, similar to the picture below:

Now you can assign a template to your custom class or make a node override for node ID 2 and make nice front page for your site.

To make a good B2C website that can stand out in China, we must to pay attention to two aspects: one is to make sure that your website uses correctly the basic technique for the web marketing, another is to choose an efficient supportive website platform for your business.

Maintain and change Key words, matching your website’s content, on time.
We all know that the higher ranking your e-commerce platform will have from a search engine, the more visitors your e-commerce platform will have. But the traffic is not our ultimate goal, our ultimate goal is to convert prospect into customer. If your key words and website’s content present a large difference, the prospects will be disappointed. They will visit your website without consuming, but you will still pay for a useless promotion.

Choose a good eCommerce (e-commerce) platform
Nowadays, we can find many types of online service development for your eCommerce platform. However, not all the methods can solve your problem. To ensure that your online business does the best exhibition of your products, the Magento platform is one of the most professional and most efficient solutions. Many successful entrepreneurs begin to use Magento platform to develop their online business, because Magento really brings them the advantages which cannot be ignored.
You can check the advantages of Magento in our blog of July 15th, 2010:

http://blogen.bysoftchina.com/technologies/magento/web-application-development-magento-ecommerce/161

Edit simply your website’s content to make it understandable
We may encounter such a situation: we chose to go to the one website and decided to buy something, but due to the website’s content structure, it was difficult to find out the payment procedure, so we gave it up. This loss of conversion is really regrettable. Therefore, make your website be attractive and simple. This is one of the most common drawbacks of Chinese websites. So, if your website in China did this point well, it will be fresh air.

Update in time your website
The update process is required to increase the dynamic of your website. This work can not only allow your customers to see your latest news, but also give you more chance for your search engines ranking.

Do not display excessive information
Sometimes we see some online shopping platform displaying some very attractive advertising, especially about prices, such as “From 10 rmb”. Then, the customers come in and discover later that only a few products are at that price. So they leave without purchasing. In China, the consumers like to buy things in promotion; they may be attracted by your promotion slogan. So if you give them wrong information, it will require a duplication of efforts without any results.

Have a good knowledge about the different characteristics of search engines
In China, both foreign and local search engines are used, such as Google and Baidu. Google has never given you a good ranking even if you have paid for, so check with Baidu since it’s not the same situation. So you should know more about this domain to ensure that your web advertising is enough efficient.

In today’s world, commercial transactions take place mainly online and an apt answer to these requirements are the e-commerce platforms that have become so common. There are still the challenge to develop bigger and better e-commerce applications that simplify the processes of web application development. Magento e-commerce and web application development platform have already offered solutions to these problems’. Here we can see some basic points about Magento e-commerce’s advantages.

Integration of content and new features

Magento integrates third-party vendor solutions easily, so a Magento website can save you a lot of time and resources.
The functions such as product labels, shipping address, or multi-product comparison system, are included in the existing Magento system, you can find out more.

Professional and Community Support

Unlike other open source solutions, Magento offers professional, reliable support, you can also ask the communities for assistance. They use all the feedback to improve its operation. The platform’s open system allows you to easily upgrade the service.

Better advertising

Raising your conversion rate and having more traffic, you can use a better search engine optimization advantages. Your customer’s feedback and recommendation is your biggest potential customers, so to have a platform to receive more opportunity for reach your target is important. And word of mouth advertising on the strength of the text is a free and effective way to sell products.

Complete scalability

After a time regardless of site or year of growth, you do not need to worry about you system having problems. Magento offers complete scalability. It allows customers to understand software engineering. With specific hosting plan, customers get more knowledge about the system, thereby enabling them to repair and add new features, as the case may require them.

Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction should be the top priority in e-commerce. Shopping cart through the provision of effective, comprehensive search and easy clearing functions, user-friendly web site can guarantee your customers’ satisfaction. Magento e-commerce payment and accept a wide range of international currencies to help your customers to purchase abroad easy.

To avoid the pitfalls of a site design that is too confusing, too ugly, or too experimental to be effective, the ecommerce site owner must strike a balance between leading-edge techniques and technologies, effectiveness, and aesthetics. So, in this article of “Web Design Tips” we will outline the laws for ecommerce site navigation design based on our projects experience to help any ecommerce business. Read more »

There is nothing to stop the popular pace of open-source solution. Once upon a time, open source is only a foundation framework and development tools, and now it has quickly infiltrated the enterprise environment in every corner. With the development of open source and the strong increase in user acceptance, it brings enterprise the advantages such as quality, reliability, transparency, low cost, as well as interoperability. Especially in today’s financial crisis, companies are careful calculation and strict budgeting, which in this field of e-commerce, entrepreneurs are more clearly selecting open source solutions to reduce in-house application development cost. Although IT budgets are shrinking anywhere between 5 to 25 percent, IT e-commerce organizations are expected to sharpen the online shopping experiences of their companies’ customers. Read more »

In 2003 online shopping market started to develop in China. The size of B2C and C2C shopping markets were over one billion RMB in 2003. During the initial period of market growth, compared with C2C, B2C transaction is free from credit and payment security, therefore, it is easy to be accepted by users. The turnover of B2C was larger than C2C in 2003 and 2004. When the third party payment platform emerged and credit evaluation system was established, more flexible and free shopping mode of C2C was accepted by more users. The market size of C2C increased rapidly then. By the end of 2006, the B2C and C2C market in China were 8.2 billion RMB and 23 billion RMB.(Source:iResearch)