StoreFronts

What is a StoreFront?

Think of your UltraCart StoreFront as the digital "front door" for your customers. It's the powerful engine, included with your account, that runs your online e-commerce presence, connecting seamlessly with the rest of your UltraCart setup.

It’s much more than just a product showcase! StoreFronts provide you with a comprehensive Content Management System (CMS) and website hosting. This means you can build and manage everything: your homepage, product catalog, informational pages (like "About Us" or "Contact"), blog posts, and, of course, the critical checkout process, all from within UltraCart.

What Can StoreFronts Do For You?

StoreFronts adapt to your specific needs, no matter your starting point.

• Your All-in-One Website: Want to run your entire online operation within UltraCart? You can! Host your complete website – pages, blog, products, checkout – right here. Forget juggling separate hosting or complex website integrations for your core business.

• Power Up Your Existing Site with UltraCart Checkout: Already have a marketing website (on WordPress, Squarespace, etc.) or use buy buttons elsewhere? You can use a StoreFront just for its robust, secure, and customizable checkout. Simply link your existing "buy" buttons to your UltraCart checkout pages for a streamlined sales process.

• The Best of Both Worlds (Hybrid): Need something in between? Maybe you want to manage your product catalog and item pages within UltraCart for easy integration, but keep your blog on another platform. StoreFronts make this hybrid approach easy to manage.

• Simplified Management: Imagine managing your products, inventory, orders, customer data, and your website content all from the familiar UltraCart interface. StoreFronts consolidate these tasks, saving you valuable time and reducing complexity.

Key Concepts to Know:

• StoreFront: Your e-commerce website, or the specific checkout portion, hosted and managed within your UltraCart account.

• CMS (Content Management System): The built-in tools that let you create, edit, and publish content (text, images, pages, blog posts) on your StoreFront.

• Theme: A design template that controls the overall look, feel, and layout of your StoreFront. You choose a theme and then customize it to perfectly match your brand.

• Checkout: The sequence of steps your customer takes to finalize their purchase after adding items to their cart.

Prerequisites:

• You need an active UltraCart account.

• If you are not the account owner, you will need an UltraCart user account with specific access enabled for StoreFronts. Access can be granularly controlled, so the options and screens you see may vary depending on the permissions granted to your user.

• Having a basic feel for navigating around your UltraCart dashboard will be helpful.

Quickstart / TL;DR

• Find "StoreFronts" in your main UltraCart navigation menu.

• Think about how you want to use it: full site, checkout only, or a mix?

• Select and personalize a theme to match your brand.

• Add your products (they link directly to your Items) and website content.

• Review your settings (payments, shipping, etc., are linked from your main Configuration).

• Preview and launch!

Getting Familiar with the StoreFronts Area

When you hover over "StoreFronts" in the main navigation, a menu will appear listing the available StoreFronts associated with your account. Each UltraCart account can have multiple distinct StoreFronts!

If you have a brand new UltraCart account, you'll likely see just one StoreFront listed, typically with a domain like [your Merchant ID].ultracartstore.com. Don't worry, you can easily change this domain later to your custom one (like www.mycoolstore.com)!

StoreFront Management Overview

Once you select a specific StoreFront from the hover menu, you'll land on its dedicated dashboard and see a detailed left-hand navigation menu. This is your command center for managing that specific storefront. Remember, each storefront within your UltraCart account has its own unique content, appearance, and settings. This allows you the flexibility to manage multiple businesses, run tests, or cater to different audiences all from one UltraCart account.

Here is a brief overview of the various sections within your selected StoreFront:

General

This section contains the core identity and foundational settings for your StoreFront.

• Setup the visibility of your storefront: Control the public access of your StoreFront. Options include making it live or password-protecting it.

• Duplicate your storefront: Create a copy of the current storefront, including its content and settings. Useful for creating development environments or new storefronts based on an existing one.

• Customize your domain: Configure your StoreFront to use a custom domain name (e.g., www.yourstore.com) instead of the default [merchant ID].ultracartstore.com domain. See also: StoreFront Domain Guide

• Add a StoreFront name, logo and general global information: Define the displayed name and upload the logo for your StoreFront. Configure global information used by your theme, typically appearing in headers and footers.

Appearance

The Appearance section controls the visual design and layout of your StoreFront.

• Manage your themes: Install, preview, and apply different design themes to your StoreFront. Themes control the overall look, feel, and layout. See also: Choosing a theme to customize your site

• Quickly view and manage templates: Access and manage the templates that define the structure and layout of various StoreFront pages, including product pages, checkout, user accounts, and more.

• Easily configure and customize custom CSS properties: Add custom CSS rules that apply globally across your StoreFront for advanced styling adjustments.

Content

This is where you create and manage the content displayed on your StoreFront.

• Pages: Create and organize essential website pages such as the homepage, about us, contact, and policy pages.

• Advertising: Manage advertising elements and promotional banners for display on your StoreFront.

• Blog Posts: Create, publish, and manage blog content for your StoreFront.

• Experiments: Set up and manage A/B tests and other experiments on StoreFront elements to optimize performance.

• Menus: Structure and manage the navigation menus used on your StoreFront.

• Search: Configure and manage the internal search functionality for your StoreFront.

• SEO: Manage search engine optimization settings for your StoreFront content, including meta tags and URL slugs.

• Social: Connect social media accounts and manage social sharing features.

• Store Locator: Configure and display physical store locations on your StoreFront.

• Upsells: Configure and manage upsell offers presented to customers during the shopping process.

• Languages: Manage language settings and translations for your StoreFront content.

Communication

Manage automated and campaign-based communication with your customers.

• Campaigns: Create and manage email marketing campaigns.

• Flows: Set up automated communication sequences triggered by customer actions (e.g., abandoned carts, welcome series).

• Library: Access a repository of pre-built and community-shared communication templates, including campaigns, flows, and transactional emails.

• Lists and Segments: Organize customers into lists and create dynamic segments based on specific criteria for targeted communication.

• Transactional Emails: Customize the content and templates for automated emails related to orders (confirmations, shipping notices, etc.).

• Customers: View and manage customer profiles associated with this StoreFront.

• Settings: Configure general settings for StoreFront communication features.

Recordings

Analyze customer behavior on your StoreFront through session replays and heatmaps.

• Sessions: View recordings of customer visits to your StoreFront to observe their navigation and interactions.

• Segments: Create segments of session recordings based on specific criteria for focused analysis.

• Heatmaps: Visualize user activity on pages, showing clicks, mouse movement, and scrolling patterns.

• Settings: Configure settings for session recording and heatmap tracking.

File Manager

Provides direct access to the underlying files of your StoreFront.

• File Manager: Access the file structure of your StoreFront. Allows for uploading assets, modifying code, and performing advanced customizations.

Privacy & Tracking

Configure privacy settings and integrate with analytics and tracking services.

• Privacy Settings: Manage data privacy options, including cookie consent banners, IP anonymization, and compliance settings (e.g., GDPR).

• Google: Integrate with Google services such as Google Ads, Google Analytics, and Google Tag Manager for tracking and measurement.

• Additional Tracking Services: Connect with various third-party marketing and tracking platforms (e.g., Facebook, Klaviyo, TikTok).

• Custom Scripts: Add custom tracking codes or scripts to the header or footer of your StoreFront pages.

• Affiliate Networks: Set up tracking and integration for affiliate marketing platforms.

• UTM Shortcodes: Manage custom shortcodes for UTM parameters to enhance server-side tracking accuracy.

• Advanced: Access additional privacy and tracking configurations, potentially including URL overrides and default currency settings.

Advanced

Contains more technical configurations for your StoreFront.

• URI Mapping: Set up and manage URL redirects and mapping rules.

• 404: Monitor 404 (page not found) errors and configure redirects to existing pages.

• PCI: Tools to help automatically detect checkout pages and monitor scripts for PCI compliance validation.

• reCaptcha: Integrate Google reCAPTCHA to protect forms from spam and bots. Requires obtaining keys from Google.

• Google Autocomplete: Integrate the Google Places Autocomplete API to enable address suggestions during checkout.

Server Logs

• Server Logs: Access logs generated by your StoreFront's server. Useful for diagnosing technical issues and monitoring performance.

Frequently Asked Questions