This guide explains how to set up a commerce product of type Advertisement in Commerce application of IPS. Commerce is an essential app to monetize your community. You should purchase it if your license does not include this application.
How to sell ad location in Commerce
First, set up at least one payment method. For testing, it would be enough to create manual payment. Later on we will see how to integrate PayPal.
In your AdminCP go to Commerce -> Payments -> Settings. Click on Create New and select Manual (check, bank wire, etc.). On the next screen enter name and instructions:
Manual payment method
Now you are ready to create a product of type Advertisement for the location Just below the page header. In your AdminCP got to Commerce -> Store -> Products. Create a new group Advertisements and click on plus sign to add new product into the group. Choose Advertisement as Type.
Product settings for advertisement
Enter the Product name, tick the ad location you would like to sell and limit the banner dimensions.
Click on the tab Pricing. In our example, the advertisement costs 30 USD for 3 days. Enter 30 USD as Price and enable the option Renews? Enter 30 USD for every 3 days.
Purchase price and duration
Save the product.
Test purchasing advertisement
Go to your AdminCP and create a new member. Use the feature Sign in as [MemberName] to log in. This member is now your test customer who makes purchase of the advertisement. Go to Store in the main navigation of your community and select the product you have just created. Enter the Target URL, upload and Image and click on Add to cart. Click on Review & Checkout to purchase. On the next screen, click on Checkout again, fill the Billing information and click on Continue to Order Review. To complete the order click on Place Order and Pay.
As we have only manual payment method, the order is set to status Waiting.
Order awaiting administrator's approval
As stated in the message above, the community administrator is now informed about the new order. The manual payment means that administrator must check if the order is paid. It can be cash, check, or any other method that cannot be tracked automatically. The community administrator must approve the order manually.
In your AdminCP go to Commerce -> Payments -> Transactions. There is a transaction with status Waiting. You can view the transaction and/or approve it automatically from the list.
Approve transaction in AdminCP
After you have approved the transaction, you will get another notification in AdminCP. The advertisement has been created now, but is held for approval. This double approval is because of the manual payment method. Normally you would set up PayPal and/or Stripe to get payments that are approved automatically. Here you would like to review the advertisement before you display it in the community.
So the last step would be to review and approve the advertisement. In your AdminCP go to System -> Site promotion -> Advertisements. The advertisement has Pending status and no title. Add Invoice ID as advertisement title and Save. Now approve the advertisement from the list.
Approve advertisement after purchase
The ad is now displayed in your community and will be automatically disabeld after 3 days. If you can live with manual payment, go and check all Commerce settings.
In the next step you can add a PayPal payment method and play in the sandbox with it.
By Sonya*
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