7 Ways to Optimize WooCommerce Conversion Rates

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Ways to Optimize WooCommerce Conversion RateseCommerce is a very competitive space. Brands are literally fighting it out to provide the best possible UX to their visitors in order to beat the competition. Combine that with the heightened expectations of modern consumers (50% won’t wait longer than 3 seconds before abandoning a poorly-designed e-commerce site) and you’ll understand why it’s vital […]

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Plugins to Customize WooCommerce Product Pages

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How to Customize WooCommerce Product PagesWooCommerce is one of the most popular e-commerce platforms, accounting for almost a third of all online stores. However, while this platform is undoubtedly intuitive, it’s fair to say that its popularity is driven by the sheer amount of plugins that help customize the platform to better meet store owners’ needs. One of the specific […]

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8+ Pre-Launch Checks for New WooCommerce Stores

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Pre-Launch Checks for New WooCommerce StoresLaunching an eCommerce store is a tedious task. There are so many things that need your attention, and there is very little that guarantees any success. From product imagery and website copy to store navigation and security certification — building an eCommerce store requires an eye-to-detail, and not to forget, immense effort and patience. Even […]

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How to Create a Private Store in WooCommerce

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How to Create a Private Store in WooCommerceRecognized as the leading eCommerce platform, WooCommerce is empowering 28.19% of all online stores worldwide. It allows users to easily turn your WordPress site into a fully-functional eCommerce shop without touching a bit of code. You’re able to add products, control customer data, manage the checkout process, and more. As a matter of fact, the […]

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Automattic Acquires MailPoet

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Automattic has acquired MailPoet, a popular email marketing solution for WordPress, to give WooCommerce store owners more integrated email management capabilities in the admin. The plugin is used by more than 300,000 websites for everything from building a mailing list to managing transaction and abandoned cart emails. The nine-year old company is now a team of 11 that will be joining Automattic.

MailPoet launched in 2011 under the name WYSIJA (“What you send is just awesome”), a branding misstep that founder and CEO Kim Gjerstad readily acknowledged as “a terrible idea.” The name was difficult to spell and remember. It was changed early on but the company was stuck with the “WYSIJA” slug in the WordPress plugins directory, a common issue for many plugins that have rebranded.

When MailPoet version 3 was released in 2017, the company was finally able to get the “mailpoet” slug in the plugin’s URL on WordPress.org. Version 2, which still has more than 100,000 users, has support for multisite and uses the old email designer, among other differences. MailPoet 2 has received security updates for the past three years and plans to continue these following the acquisition.

Gjerstad reported that nearly a quarter of MailPoet users are running WooCommerce stores. The plugin’s developers have been expanding its WooCommerce functionality over the past three years with features that help store owners catch customers’ emails at checkout, measure revenue per email, send automated emails using purchase data based on products purchased or product categories, customize store emails, and recover abandoned carts.

Earlier this year MailPoet introduced its own SMTP solution to ensure emails sent from the plugin land in recipients’ inboxes, instead of flagged as spam. This silent background feature includes store emails as well, bringing higher deliverability without users having to depend on separate SMTP plugins.

In WooCommerce’s acquisition announcement, CEO Paul Maiorana said adding MailPoet “helps accelerate our roadmap toward a fully-integrated commerce experience.” Last year Maiorana and Gjerstad met at WordCamp U.S. and exchanged ideas about a partnership.

“As our conversation progressed in the following months, we came to realize that we shared a common vision for stores; with store owners being able to access email right in their dashboard,” Gjerstad said.

Maiorana said Automattic’s initial focus of the acquisition is to work together on improving the experience for WooCommerce users, but the company plans to “evolve our collaboration in a way that can benefit the entire WordPress community.” MailPoet’s FAQ’s on the announcement reiterate that all WordPress users will continue to be able to use the plugin, even if they do not have a WooCommerce store. There are no immediate changes planned for the plugin’s features.

WooCommerce Patches Vulnerability that Allowed Spam Bots to Create Accounts at Checkout

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WooCommerce 4.6.2 was released yesterday with a fix for a vulnerability that allowed account creation at checkout, even when the “Allow customers to create an account during checkout” setting is disabled. The WooCommerce team discovered it after several dozen users reported their sites were receiving spam orders, or “failed orders” where the payment details were fake.

WooCommerce developer Rodrigo Primo described how the bot is attacking stores:

The gist of it is that the bot is able to create a user when placing an order exploiting the bug fixed by 4.6.2. After creating the user, the bot tries to find vulnerabilities in other plugins installed on the site that require an unprivileged authenticated account.

WooCommerce recommends users update to 4.6.2 to stop bots from creating users at checkout and then remove any accounts the bot previously created. This will not stop the bots from creating fake orders so store owners are advised to install additional spam protection from the WooCommerce Marketplace. Some users in the support forum are trying free plugins like Advanced noCaptcha & Invisible Captcha and Fraud Prevention Plugin for WooCommerce.

The first logged instance happened nine days before WooCommerce was able to issue a fix. In the meantime, some users reported having their site’s URL changed and other hacking attempts. Dave Green, WordPress engineer at Make Do, used log files to determine that the script relies on exploiting other vulnerabilities in order to gain access to the database.

“That script is creating the order, and is also likely to be exploiting whatever vulnerability is available to bypass customer account settings and create a new user; it may or may not be relying upon other exploits for this,” Green said.

“Assuming it has successfully gained access to the system, it then tries to update the DB. It either fails and leaves you with nuisance orders, or succeeds and points your site to the scam URL.”

The WooCommerce team has also fixed this same bug in WooCommerce Blocks 3.7.1, preventing checkout from creating accounts when the related setting is disabled.

WooCommerce did not publish the names of any of extensions that have vulnerabilities being exploited by this script. However, some one user reported an attack that coincided with the fake orders:

I had a failed order yesterday with similar info to the OP as well.

At the exact same time that failed order came in, my WAF blocked two attempted attacks from the same user/IP (bbbb bbbb) for “TI WooCommerce Wishlist < 1.21.12 – Authenticated WP Options Change”

The script may have been probing for a vulnerability in the TI WooCommerce Wishlist plugin, which was patched approximately two weeks ago. The plugin is active on more than 70,000 WordPress sites.

The WooCommerce team is still researching the origin and impact of this vulnerability and will publish more information as it becomes available.

Some Useful Features of WooCommerce

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WooCommerce is the favorite WordPress plugin, made to transform WordPress into a competent e-commerce platform. The plugin contains many excellent features and capacities, but also, there are lots of things online vendors should know before launching a WooCommerce powered shop. WooCommerce is a superb alternative for companies and those who wish to start their very […]

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How to Add Custom Navigation Menus in WordPress Themes

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Do you want to add custom navigation menus in your WordPress theme?

All themes have set locations where you can display a navigation menu. However, by default, you can’t add a menu anywhere else except these pre-defined locations.

In this article, we’ll show you how to add a custom navigation menu to any area of your WordPress theme.

How to add custom navigation menus in WordPress themes

Why Add Custom Navigation Menus in WordPress Themes?

A navigation menu is a list of links pointing to important areas of your website. They make it easy for visitors to find interesting content, which can increase pageviews and reduce bounce rate in WordPress.

The exact location of your menu will vary based on your WordPress theme. Most themes have several options, so you can create different menus and show them in different places.

To see where you can display menus in your current WordPress theme, simply head over to Appearance » Menus and then take a look at the ‘Display location’ section.

The following image shows the locations that are supported by the Astra WordPress Theme.

The menu locations in the popular Astra theme

However, sometimes you may want to show a menu in an area that isn’t listed as a ‘Display location’ in your theme.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at how to create WordPress navigation menus and then add them to your theme. Simply use the quick links below to jump to the method you prefer.

Method 1. Adding a Custom Navigation Menu in Full Site Editing

If you’re using a block theme, then you can add a custom navigation menu using Full Site Editing (FSE) and the block editor. For more details, you can see our article on the best WordPress full-site editing themes.

This method doesn’t work with every theme, and it doesn’t let you customize every part of the menu. If you want to add a completely custom menu to any WordPress theme, then we recommend using a page builder plugin.

If you are using a block-based theme, then head over to Appearance » Editor.

How to launch the FSE

This will launch the full site editor with one of your active theme’s templates already selected.

If you want to add a custom navigation menu to a different template, then click on the arrow in the toolbar and select ‘Browse all templates.’

Changing templates in the Full Site Editor

The site editor will now show all the different templates that are part of your theme.

Simply find the template that you want to edit, and give it a click.

Switching templates in the block-based FSE

The next step is adding a Navigation block to the area where you want to show your menu.

In the top-left corner, click on the blue ‘+’ button.

Adding blocks to your WordPress theme

Now, go ahead and type ‘Navigation’ into the search bar.

When the ‘Navigation’ block appears, simply drag and drop it onto your layout.

The WordPress Navigation block

Next, click to select the Navigation block.

If you’ve already created the menu that you want to display, then click ‘Select Menu’ and make your selection from the dropdown.

Adding a custom navigation menu using FSE

Another option is to click on ‘Create new menu,’ which allows you to build a navigation menu inside the full site editor.

To start with a blank menu, simply click on ‘Start empty.’

Building a menu in the WordPress full site editor

To add items to the new menu, just click on the ‘+’ icon.

This opens a popup where you add any post or page, and decide whether these links should open in a new tab.

How to build a new menu in the block editor

Simply repeat these steps to add more items to the menu.

When you’re happy with how the menu looks, simply click on the ‘Save’ button. Your site will now be using the new template, and visitors can interact with your custom navigation menu.

Method 2. Creating a Custom Navigation Menu in WordPress Using SeedProd (Works With All Themes)

The full site editor is a quick and easy way to add a basic custom menu to block-based themes. However, if you want to add an advanced, fully-customizable menu to any theme, then you’ll need a page builder plugin.

SeedProd is the best WordPress page builder plugin on the market and allows you to customize every part of your navigation menu.

SeedProd comes with over 180 professionally-designed templates that you can use as your starting point. After choosing a template, you can add a custom navigation menu to your site using simple drag and drop.

First, you need to install and activate the SeedProd plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Note: There’s also a free version of SeedProd that allows you to create custom navigation menus without writing code. However, in this guide, we’ll be using SeedProd Pro since it has lots more templates for you to choose from.

After activating the plugin, SeedProd will ask for your license key.

SeedProd license key

You can find this information under your account on the SeedProd website. After entering the key, click on the ‘Verify Key’ button.

Once you’ve done that, go to SeedProd » Landing Pages and click on the ‘Add New Landing Page’ button.

SeedProd's page design templates

You can now choose a template for your custom page.

To help you find the right design, all of SeedProd’s templates are organized into different campaign types such as coming soon and lead squeeze campaigns. You can even use SeedProd’s templates to improve your 404 page.

The SeedProd template library

To take a closer look at any design, simply hover your mouse over that template and then click on the magnifying glass icon.

When you find a design that you want to use, click on ‘Choose This Template.’

Choosing a SeedProd template for your WordPress website

We’re using the ‘Black Friday Sales Page’ template in all our images, but you can use any template you want.

After choosing a template, type in a name for that custom page. SeedProd will automatically create a URL based on the page’s title, but you can change this URL to anything you want.

After entering this information, click on the ‘Save and Start Editing the Page’ button.

Creating a new page using SeedProd

Most templates already contain some blocks, which are the core components of all SeedProd page layouts.

To customize a block, just click to select it in the page editor.

The left-hand toolbar will then show all the settings for that block. For example, in the image below, we’re changing the text inside a ‘Headline’ block.

Editing a headline in SeedProd

You can format the text, change its alignment, add links, and more using the settings in the left-hand menu.

To add new blocks to your design, simply find any block in the left-hand menu and then drag it onto your design. If you want to delete a block, then simply click to select that block and then click on the trash can icon.

Removing blocks from a custom layout

Since we want to create a custom navigation menu, drag a ‘Nav Menu’ block onto the page.

This creates a navigation menu with a single default ‘About’ item.

Adding a custom navigation menu to a WordPress layout

To customize this menu item, click to select it in the left-hand menu.

This opens some controls where you can change the text, as well as add the URL for the menu item to link to.

Adding a custom navigation menu to a landing page

By default, the menu item will be a ‘dofollow’ link and open in the same browser window. To change either of these settings, simply use the checkboxes in the ‘URL Link’ section.

In the following image, we’re creating a “nofollow” link that will open in a new window.

Marking a menu item as no-follow

To add more items to the menu, simply click on the ‘Add New Item’ button.

You can then customize each of these items by following the same process described above.

Adding items to a custom navigation menu

The left-hand menu also has settings that change the font size and text alignment.

You can even create a divider, which will appear between each item in the menu.

Creating a divider for your custom navigation menu

After that, go ahead and switch to the ‘Advanced’ tab. Here, you can change the menu’s colors, spacing, typography, and other advanced options.

As you make changes, the live preview will update automatically so you can try different settings to see what looks good in your design.

The SeedProd advanced customization settings

When you’re happy with how the custom menu looks, it’s time to publish it.

Simply click the dropdown arrow next to ‘Save’ and then select ‘Publish.’

How to publish a custom page layout

Your custom navigation menu and the page will now go live on your WordPress blog.

Method 3. Creating a Custom Navigation Menu in WordPress Using Code (Advanced)

If you don’t want to set up a page builder plugin, then you can add a custom navigation menu using code. Normally, you would need to add custom code snippets to your theme’s functions.php file.

However, we don’t recommend this method for anyone but advanced users, and even then, a small mistake in your code could cause a number of common WordPress errors, or break your site completely.

That’s why we recommend using WPCode. It is the easiest and safest way to add custom code in WordPress without having to edit any core WordPress files.

The first thing you need to do is install and activate the free WPCode plugin on your website. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, go to Code Snippets » Add Snippet in your WordPress dashboard.

Adding a code snippet using the WPCode WordPress plugin

Here, you’ll see all of the different ready-made snippets that you can add to your site.

Since we want to add our own snippet, hover your mouse over ‘Add Your Custom Code,’ and then click ‘Use snippet.’

Adding a custom snippet to your WordPress website

To start, enter a title for the custom code snippet. This can be anything that helps you identify the snippet.

After that, open the ‘Code Type’ dropdown and select ‘PHP Snippet.’

Adding a custom navigation menu using WPCode

Once you’ve done that, simply paste the following snippet into the code editor:

function wpb_custom_new_menu() {
  register_nav_menu('my-custom-menu',__( 'My Custom Menu' ));
}
add_action( 'init', 'wpb_custom_new_menu' );

This will add a new menu location to your theme, called ‘My Custom Menu.’ To use a different name, simply change the above code snippet.

If you want to add more than one new navigation menu to your theme, then simply add an extra line to your code snippet. For example, here we’re adding two new menu locations to our theme, called My Custom Menu and Extra Menu:

function wpb_custom_new_menu() {
  register_nav_menus(
    array(
      'my-custom-menu' => __( 'My Custom Menu' ),
      'extra-menu' => __( 'Extra Menu' )
    )
  );
}
add_action( 'init', 'wpb_custom_new_menu' );

Below the code box, you will see insertion options. If it isn’t already selected, then choose the ‘Auto Insert’ method so the snippet will be automatically inserted and executed on your site.

After that, open the ‘Location’ dropdown and click on ‘Run Everywhere.’

Running a custom code snippet

Then, you’re ready to scroll to the top of the screen and click on the ‘Inactive’ toggle so it changes to ‘Active.’

Finally, go ahead and click on ‘Save’ to make this snippet live.

Inserting a custom navigation menu using the WPCode WordPress plugin

After that, go to Appearance » Menus and look at the ‘Display location’ area.

You should now see a new ‘My Custom Menu’ option.

A custom navigation menu created using the WPCode plugin

You’re now ready to add some menu items to the new location. For more information, please see our step-by-step guide on how to add navigation menus for beginners.

When you’re happy with your menu, the next step is adding it to your WordPress theme.

Adding the custom navigation menu to your WordPress theme

Most website owners show their navigation menu directly under the header section just after the site logo or title. This means the navigation menu is the first thing visitors see.

However, you can display your custom navigation menu anywhere you want by adding some code to the theme’s template file.

In your WordPress dashboard, go to Appearance » Theme File Editor.

In the right-hand menu, select the template that you want to edit. For example, if you want to show the custom navigation menu in your website’s header, then you’ll typically want to select the header.php file.

The WordPress theme file editor

For help finding the right template file, please see our guide on how to find which files to edit in your WordPress theme.

After selecting the template file, you need to add a wp_nav_menu function and specify the name of your custom menu. For example, in the following code snippet we’re adding My Custom Menu to the theme’s header:

wp_nav_menu( array( 'theme_location'=>'my-custom-menu', 'container_class'=>'custom-menu-class' ) );

After adding the code, click on the ‘Update File’ button to save your changes.

Editing the WordPress theme files

Now if you visit your site, you’ll see the custom menu in action.

By default, your menu will appear as a plain bulleted list.

A custom WordPress menu created using code

You can style the custom navigation menu to better match your WordPress theme or company branding by adding custom CSS code to your site.

To do this, go to Appearance » Customize.

Customizing a WordPress theme

In the WordPress customizer, click on ‘Additional CSS.’

This opens a small code editor where you can type in some CSS.

Adding additional CSS to your WordPress theme

You can now style your menu using the CSS class that you added to your theme template. In our example, this is .custom_menu_class.

In the following code, we’re adding margins and padding, setting the text color to black, and arranging the menu items in a horizontal layout:

div.custom-menu-class ul {
    margin:20px 0px 20px 0px;
    list-style-type: none;
    list-style: none;
    list-style-image: none;
    text-align:right;
	display:inline-block;
}
div.custom-menu-class li {
    padding: 0px 20px 0px 0px;
    display: inline-block;
} 

div.custom-menu-class a {
    color:#000;
}

The WordPress customizer will update automatically to show how the menu will look with the new style.

Styling a custom navigation menu

If you’re happy with how the menu looks, then click on ‘Publish’ to make your changes live.

For more information, please see our guide on how to style WordPress navigation menus.

Do More With WordPress Navigation Menus

With WordPress, you can do much more than just show links in a menu. Here’s how to get even more out of your navigation menus:

We hope this ultimate guide helped you learn how to add a custom navigation menu in WordPress. You may also want to see the best ways to increase your blog traffic and how to track website visitors to your WordPress site.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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Google Shopping Is Now Open to Free Product Listings

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Google announced today that it is bringing free listings to the Shopping tab in the United States before the end of April and will expand globally by the end of the year. Previously, merchants were required to pay for ad placement and product listings, which led to major online retailers dominating the Shopping tab.

“Beginning next week, search results on the Google Shopping tab will consist primarily of free listings, helping merchants better connect with consumers, regardless of whether they advertise on Google,” Bill Ready, Google’s president of commerce, said. “With hundreds of millions of shopping searches on Google each day, we know that many retailers have the items people need in stock and ready to ship, but are less discoverable online.”

This change comes at a critical time when the retail industry has taken a significant hit due to shelter-in-place orders aimed at mitigating the spread of the coronavirus. Free listings make showing up in the Google Shopping tab more accessible for independent stores.

“For retailers, this change means free exposure to millions of people who come to Google every day for their shopping needs,” Ready said. “For shoppers, it means more products from more stores, discoverable through the Google Shopping tab.”  Existing Merchant Center users will retain their ads for specific products as promoted listings but will also now be able to list their full inventories for free.

Google also announced a new partnership with PayPal that will streamline the onboarding process for merchants who want to link their accounts. The announcement identified WooCommerce, Shopify, and BigCommerce as existing partners that offer platforms to help businesses sell online. In light of the current crisis, WooCommerce has ramped up its efforts to make e-commerce more approachable. The team recently hosted a free webinar on how to start selling online and produced a guide to adding a store to an existing WordPress website.

Although Google cites the coronavirus pandemic as a factor in advancing the company’s plans to make it free for merchants to sell on Google, the move is a strategic step towards wooing back the overwhelming amount of traffic it sends to Amazon. If Google’s Shopping tab can become a better source for price comparisons with a diversity of stores, consumers may return to searching Google first when intending to make a purchase.