Overview

General Overview

QuadCommerce is e-commerce software developed in-house at Quadsimia. With QuadCommerce, you can sell products and services, process your store orders, strengthen relationships with your existing customers, and reach a world of new customers via the Internet.

QuadCommerce is designed to be simple and straightforward to use for both customers and your store managers. The goal is to make it as easy as possible to buy and sell using QuadCommerce. QuadCommerce requires no specialized software other than a standard web browser for a customer to place an order or for a store manager to configure any part of the online store.

QuadCommerce is designed to be powerful. It supports businesses looking to sell only a few products up to corporations that maintain inventories of tens of thousands of products. On-line stores can be configured quickly using only QuadCommerce’s web-based interface, ShopKeeper.

QuadCommerce is designed to be flexible. In addition to all the configuration controls that the ShopKeeper provides, QuadCommerce utilizes templates that are easily changed (with just a little HTML knowledge) to seamlessly integrate a store into an existing web site. Unlimited e-commerce store configurations are possible!

QuadCommerce is designed to be secure to protect confidential customer, order, and payment information. Information is encrypted and transmitted over the Internet using industry-standard Secure Socket Layers and encrypted a second time for storage in the store’s database. Finally, all accounts for both customers and store managers are password protected and user authenticated at login time. Additional security layers may also be implemented as needed.

QuadCommerce is a managed e-commerce solution. Quadsimia provides the underlying hardware and software services (computer servers, Internet connectivity, databases, security, hosting) and maintains it. This means you can concentrate on your business without all the worries of staffing an IT department.

Customer Overview

From a customer perspective, here is how QuadCommerce works. Customers need only a web browser (like Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer) to access your QuadCommerce store via the World Wide Web.

Customers browse through your categories of products or can search (both store-wide and category-specific) for products matching key words that they type in. Product summaries display to customers brief descriptions and thumbnail images of products. Customers can select any summary to get more detailed information and larger, more detailed, images of products.

When customers find a product they are interested in purchasing, they add the item to their shopping carts and continue to shop. Items can be updated or removed from the shopping carts any time prior to checking out of the store.

When customers are finished shopping, they proceed to checkout of the store and place their orders. As part of the checkout process, customers have a store account automatically created for them to allow them to track their orders and use "express checkout" on subsequent visits back to your store.

Customers connect to your QuadCommerce store via a secure data connection during checkout. If customers are uncomfortable with entering credit card information on the Internet, they may choose to place off-line orders. Off-line orders are still processed by QuadCommerce, but customers will need to provide their payment information to your store via a follow-up telephone call, FAX, or mailing.

When the order is submitted, the information is captured, encrypted, and stored in a database for you, the store manager, to process. If real-time credit card transactions are enabled, QuadCommerce automatically connects to a merchant service that captures and transfers funds from the customers' bank accounts to your bank account.

Customers are presented with a receipt page to print for their own records. An e-mail receipt is also automatically sent to customers immediately after placing orders. Customers will receive additional e-mails when you process their orders; keeping them informed of its status.

First-time customers will also get sent an e-mail with their new account login and password. This account allows customers to take advantage of express checkouts on future visits to your store. Customer accounts allow customers to track the status of their orders, so you will not be overwhelmed with customer e-mails wondering what is going on with their orders.

Store Manager (ShopKeeper) Overview

From a store manager’s perspective here is how QuadCommerce works. Store Managers need only a web browser (like Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer) to access your QuadCommerce store via the World Wide Web.

A store manager is someone who has administrative privileges for your QuadCommerce store. In most cases this may be you or several people at your business. Store managers can configure and design the look of the store, set and change the store’s policies, add/remove/update products and categories from the store catalog, and process customer orders. The store manager uses only a web browser to connect to the ShopKeeper, your store’s secure administrative interface. From the ShopKeeper, you can update all aspects of your store, process orders, and access your customer database.

Store managers can change the design (colors, images, …) of the shop through the ShopKeeper interface by selecting values from lists and forms on the various screens. If you have some basic HTML knowledge, you may also edit the shop templates to create a new and completely different look for your store.

Once the store is configured, the store managers can create categories and products for their on-line catalog. Products and categories can be updated and removed at anytime using the ShopKeeper. This gives store managers the ability to make instantaneous changes to your store (change price of a product, change the availability of a product, …).

One of the most powerful features, and most overlooked, of the catalog management module is that it allows store managers to add attributes to products. Attributes are properties, (like color and size) that describe the product and allow a customer to select variations of products. A product can have no attributes, a single attribute, or an unlimited number of attributes.

When a customer places an order in the on-line store, the store managers will receive an automatic e-mail notification of the order. This saves you time from unnecessarily having to check the ShopKeeper for new orders!

You then log into the ShopKeeper to retrieve the full details of the orders. If a real-time payment transaction has occurred, the order can be processed and approved. You have the ability to send an e-mail confirmation back to the customer that the order has been approved and is being shipped from your store. Or you may decline an order and send e-mail to the customer as to the reason why the order was not approved.

The ShopKeeper provides you with a review of the store’s customer accounts and order histories; providing you with a complete customer database.