The AJAX shopping cart

ProductCart includes Web 2.0 technology that takes our shopping carts a big step forward

ProductCart is now an "ajax shopping cart". What does that mean? It means that we have added to our shopping carts a number of features based on AJAX, a set of technologies that makes Web-based applications work in a way that resembles a cool desktop program.

AJAX: a better user experience

What does it mean to your customers that ProductCart is an AJAX shopping cart? For example: previewing a product before loading the product details page. ProductCart v4, the newest version of our shopping cart software, incorporates AJAX both in the storefront and in the Control Panel, its intuitive store management component. Let's look at some examples.

AJAX-powered product preview Use our shopping cart software for your store, and your customers will be able to get to what they want faster, with fewer clicks. For example, they can view product information without even having to visit the product details page. On the product details page, for instance, they can mouse over "Next" and "Previous" to instantly see information on the next and previous product in the category (see image on right). On a search results page, for example, they will just place their mouse over a product name and instantly get additional information. Check it out: mouse over products and category results on this page.

AJAX-driven search preview See how many results a store search will return before the search is run. Select a filter or enter a keyword on this advanced search page and see what happens.

AJAX: a better ecommerce store

In your desktop applications things happen without you necessarily having to click to make them happen. On the Web, this is not normally the case. Typically you click, wait, and then things happen. For example: you enter keywords in a search field, click on a "Search" button, and then results are returned to you. What if the search returns 0 results? Not a big deal, but you wasted some time.

AJAX turns things around. Information is presented to the customer without the "click & wait" that is normally part of every Web page. For example, the search preview feature mentioned above tells customers if their search criteria would leave to 0 results, so the search is never performed.

These features translate into a better looking, more professional ecommerce store. Your customers will be able to locate information faster, with fewer clicks, and in a visually appealing environment.

More examples of features that use AJAX in ProductCart

In ProductCart we used AJAX to improve our shopping cart software not only in the storefront, but also throughout the Control Panel, the Web-based administration area that store managers use to run their ProductCart-powered ecommerce store. So AJAX will help you manage your store in a more productive, less frustrating way. For example:

• Whenever you are looking for a product, an AJAX-enhanced search feature will allow you to quickly locate what you are looking for. No more browsing through pages of results to find the item you need to edit.
• Whenever you are looking for a customer, an AJAX-powered search tool will allow you to find him/her faster.
• This applies to many areas of the ProductCart Control Panel. For example: applying quantity discounts or cross selling relationships to selected products, or locating customers to add to a special "pricing category".

And what if you don't want these features active in your storefront? Our shopping carts allow you turn AJAX off with one click.

More links to test shopping cart features that use AJAX

All of our demos have the AJAX feature turned on. See AJAX at work in this demo ProductCart-powered storefront:

• Home page
  Mouse over the different products to see the product preview feature at work.
• Best Sellers page
  Mouse over the product names or thumbnail images. When products are shown in a list, this feature becomes a great time saver.
• Advanced search page
  Select a category, for instance, then enter a keyword. You will see the number of search results before you run the search.
• Search results page
  Mouse over the category results: ProductCart will tell you which products would be shown to you where you to click on that link. Then, mouse over any of the products: you can preview product information without visiting the product details page. This allows you to quickly browse through the search results until you find what you are really looking for.
• "Previous" and "Next" buttons
  Mouse over the "Previous" and "Next" buttons to see a previous of the previous and next product in the category. Another time saving feature that will increase customer satisfaction on your store.

See AJAX at work in the ProductCart Control Panel:

• Look for a product
  Similarly to the storefront, learn how many results the search will return, before running the search.
• Create a cross-selling relationship
  An example of how advanced product search can save you a great deal of time.

Other resources

• More about AJAX
  No point in reinventing the wheel: Wikipedia has a great section on AJAX. So we'll just send you there :-)
  Jesse James Garrett at Adaptive Path first used the word "AJAX".
• More about our shopping cart software
  ProductCart is used by thousands of businesses that sell products and services online all over the world. Check out our shopping carts today to see if they meet your ecommerce needs.