Sophio manages its documentation in this knowledge base. We have found that a searchable FAQ aka Knowledge Base is an easier way to learn how to use our software rather than a long and possibly difficult to follow technical manual. You simply search for a keyword and you will discover answers to frequently asked questions.
After your site has been launched, you have a few things to consider. These include shipping rates, pricing, credit card processing, and order fulfillment. There are several documents in our knowledge base regarding shipping and pricing, so if that is what you are after, please do a search for those keywords.
Quick Start - Processing Orders
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If your web design is complete and you have adjusted your pricing and sent us your Authorize.NET credentials, and have adjusted your DNS so that your domain points to our servers, your site is ready to start accepting orders. Our support department builds test orders after we receive your credit card credentials then voids the orders after we are sure all is in working order.
Once an order comes in you will receive an email, just as the consumer does. This is your signal to return to your site's control panel and visit the Invoice Report. The Invoice Report is what you use to manage your orders.
The orders are sorted by the most recent one. Once you click the link you are presented with a page that allows you to filter the orders by a date range. You can simply click the 'create' button and you will see your orders for today only. If you want to see orders for month to date or the last seven days there is a scrollable menu you use to select the filter criteria.
Once the results are on the screen there are several links present. Your first step is to normally click the 'view' link and check the order out. Did the customer one brake disc, or one spark plug? If so, naturally you will need to contact the customer via phone or email and confirm that is in fact what they want. Assuming all looks good, you can click your back button on the 'view' invoice page and you will be returned to the order summary page.
There is a link labeled 'charge now'. Your next step is to click it and wait for the response from Authorize.net. If the page updates and says approved your ready to click the link next to it labeled 'send'. This will send the order to your supplier or your own system if it is in fact connected to your existing ordering system (some of our Wrenchead Customers for example). If the order was successful the supplier will update this screen with their order number. At this point the order has been processed. Your money will be deposited into your business checking account within a few days and the supplier will have a printed order in the appropriate warehouse. Sometimes the supplier's system may have a backorder or a split order. This can be seen directly in the suppliers order number. Additionally you can click the 'view invoice' again to see the details in the 'supplier notes' section.
Details
Credit Card Processing
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If you signed up with our recommended Credit Card Gateway (Authorize.NET), you will be able to take advantage of additional Sophio tools to enhance the management of cc payments. If you have not, click this link to get started (http://www.sophio.com/acceptcreditcards.asp). With that being said, we have two modes for credit card processing. These are manual and automatic. We are integrated with a dozen different companies, so you are not at all required to use Authorize.NET. We just happen to have a great rate with them.
- Manual - Manual mode simply means that all credit cards will be accepted by the system. This mode is useful if you do not want every order's payment status 'finalized' by the customer. Some stores call their clients after every order to confirm all is in order and or to upsell additional products. Maybe the client ordered a single brake disc, expecting to receive 2 in the box. Maybe they ordered a case of oil filters, with no gasket. You get the idea. The negative aspect to having the cc processing in manual mode is that if the consumer enters an incorrect card number or expiration date, you will have to contact them via phone or email to get the correct info. To switch the mode from manual to automatic, look for the link to 'Edit Authorize Settings', on the control page (aka admin.epc).
- Automatic - Automatic mode is exactly what it sounds like. Your customer clicks checkout, enters their billing info, and we pass the info along to the credit card processor in real time. If the card is declined, the customer is informed, and they can change it. The same thing goes for incorrect information entered, the consumer can edit this info as many times as it takes for them to get it right. To switch the mode from automatic to manual, look for the link to 'Edit Authorize Settings', on the control page (aka admin.epc).
- Refunds - Refunds with Authorize.net can be done via our returns module or they can be done via the 'Virtual Terminal' at the credit card gateways website.
- Declines are caused by one of a few things. Either the there is not enough money left in the consumer's account to process the order, the billing address entered by the consumer is incorrect, and if your site is configured to use the security code on the back of the card (aka CVV2), that value could be incorrect. Whatever the issue is, if your credit card processor has the detailed errors as part of their software, your invoice will show you why it was not approved. Ultimately you will need to contact your customer and get the right info. If you need to change the cc number, or expiration date, or cvv2 value on the card, you will do so by visiting the Invoice Report accessible from the control panel (admin.epc), and clicking edit invoice. You will see the field CC and CCEXP and you can make changes directly in this screen. If you need to change a billing address, you will need to click 'Edit Customer' from the Invoice Header screen and change the customers master details, then return back to the invoice summary and click the word DECLINED.
Order Fulfillment
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If you signed up with us via your parts supplier, you may already be aware that your orders can be sent electronically to them, and the products drop shipped directly to your customer. There are two modes for order fulfillment similarly to credit card processing. They are manual and automatic.
· Manual - Each order you receive will be sent to you via email. The document you receive is exactly the same as the one the consumer see's. This is done specifically so you know they are looking at. In this mode, the order merely sits in queue waiting for you to fulfill the order from your own stock, or by clicking the 'Send' link in the Sophio Invoice Report. The Invoice Report is accessible on your control panel page (admin.epc) in the Sales Section. You can filter this report by clicking the shortcut links labeled 'Today', 'Yesterday', 'Last seven days', etc... In the invoice summary (first page of search results), you will see a link that is called 'Send'. If your site is integrated with your supplierm, clicking this link will send the order to them electronically, and upon their acceptance and approval the page will update itself with the order number from the Supplier. This order number will appear on your monthly statement from the supplier for matching purposes. Lastly, your webstore will create an order number for each order it receives. This number is transmitted to the supplier as a 'po number' for reverse tracking purposes on their part.
- Automatic - Automatic Fulfillment is only available with some of our suppliers, so check with Sophio Support to confirm that your supplier supports this mode. If your site is set to automatic fulfillment, an APPROVED order (credit card) will be automatically transmitted to the supplier in real time direclty after we get an Approval from the credit card processor. This sounds great, but has several limitations. Orders sent to the supplier cannot be cancelled or edited. Therefore, if there is a ship to error, or qty error, or comment from the consumer you will have no time to modify this, which will result in additional unnecessary work and expense for all parties.
Email
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If your hosting your domain on our server, you then have access to our email server. All accounts are initially setup with the account sales@domain.com. To access your email settings, please visit http://webmail.sophio.com. You can obtain your user id and password from our support group if you visit the live chat or support help desk. This link will allow you to add edit and delete mailboxes.
Changing the way your site looks
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The first step is to download your site's web files and folders onto your pc. You do this by connecting to your website via ftp:
Location: yourdomainname.com
port: 21
user id: whatever we assigned to you
password: whatever we assigned to you
passive transfer: on
How it looks
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The site is made up of a few files primarily and they are stored in your template and root folder. They are:
templates/index.wws - home page
templates/default.wc - template page used on all other pages of your site and referred to as the master template
All of the pages are html files with special tags in them that communicate with our software. The main tag is: <%=pclist%>. This is a 'place holder' for the dynamic content that is generated by Sophio and is rendered with each click. You will see this tag inside your default.wc page. if you do not see it, your site would not be showing pages such as the shopping cart, search results, etc. Without the pclist tag your site will not generate any catalog, shopping cart, or checkout pages. Without the file default.wc your site will not work. If the file extension .wc bothers you, you can rename it to default.html but you must update the store configuration so that it knows to use it. That is done via this page mainteditstore.wws.
You will see a reference to a css file named style.css. The CSS file manages the colors, fonts, and text size throughout your store. If this is foreign to you, you should create a ticket in our design department and let us change it for you!
If you do not want to use ftp client software to access your files you can use our 'File Manager'. The File Manager is available from your control panel (admin.epc). The link is in the Administration section of your control panel.
For changing other pages you may access the 'template editor', which is also located in your control panel. Nearly every page that Sophio uses is a template which can be edited by you or our design team. The file manager and template editor will make an immediate backup of each file you touch 'just in case'.
Lastly, if you want Sophio to make changes to your website you can create a ticket in our 'design' department. Do so at http://support.sophio.com . Most changes are billable at the then current rate for webmastering/design. If the charge is notA billable the design team will inform you prior to starting the work.
Always assume you will receive an invoice for at least one hour's charge for all design changes.
