FAQ

Short Answer

Host your website with Host Gator.

Why We Recommend Host Gator

Hosting is a very important, especially for your ecommerce website so we have spent a lot of time searching for high quality hosting companies. We have signed up for and tested a very wide variety of hosting accounts from many different web hosting companies. The short answer is that we recommend Host Gator.

There are several important reasons why Host Gator rises to the top. First, they have a great setup for WordPress websites. Their servers are configured with suPHP which means that your WordPress site runs with the same user permissions as your FTP user. This means that when you upload files through WordPress they have the same permissions as they would if you uploaded them via FTP. This is something you want for a bunch of reasons including:

• No permission denied errors when uploading images
• Plugins can automatically be upgraded without having to enter FTP usernames and passwords
• WordPress itself can be automatically upgraded
• Very secure way to run a WordPress site. You don’t have to open up directory permissions to the world in order to upload files through the WordPress admin.

Host Gator Has Great Support

In addition to these technical reasons why Host Gator is the host we recommend, Host Gator also has very good and knowledgeable technical support. For example, most of the hosting companies we contacted didn’t even know what suPHP was and couldn’t even answer the question as to whether or not it was even an option for their hosting accounts. Host Gator support immediately knew what we were asking about.

Host Gator Has A Good Reputation

With any large hosting company you will always find a few folks that have had a bad experience, but our searches for Host Gator on Twitter, and Google turned up far more praise than any of the other hosting companies we reviewed. For example, we found a bunch of tweets from folks who have been Host Gator clients for 5+ years and find no reason to change.

Host Gator Has Good Prices

Ecommerce sites usually require the use of an SSL certificate and a hosting account with a dedicated IP address. The Host Gator Business Plan starts at just $12.95/month and is the best, most feature rich hosting account we’ve found for that price. If you plan to run multiple websites, you should consider getting a VPS or a dedicated server. Which Host Gator also offers.

Looking For A Dedicated Server?

If you are looking for a Dedicated server, we highly recommend RimuHosting. We have several dedicated servers with them and have hosted many of our client’s sites there for years. Their support is fantastic and their prices are very reasonable. RimuHosting doesn’t offer the low cost hosting accounts for folks just looking to run a single website like Host Gator does, but if you are serious about web hosting and need a fast, reliable solution, you should certainly consider RimuHosting.

CDG Commerce offers the Quantum Gateway which is a payment gateway like Authorize.net. We have spent the last 5 years developing ecommerce websites and have found that the Quantum Gateway offers more features and costs significantly less than Authorize.net.

For example, using the Quantum Gateway you save 5 to 10 cents per transaction because there is no per gateway transaction fee. Also, included free with your account are:

• Virtual terminal
• Detailed (per transaction) billing
• Fraud defense system
• Customer vault and recurring billing
• No set up fee
• No monthly minimum
• No month to month contract and no early termination fees

Visit CDG Commerce for a full description of what is included.

We have set up websites using PayPal, Authorize.net, and Quantum Gateway and the Quantum Gateway is by far the best value and will save you a significant amount of money – hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars per year depending on how many transactions you run.

Yes! PHPurchase supports both physical and digital products. In fact, you can sell both at the same time. Your customers can add both physical and digital products to their shopping cart. After they checkout, you will be notified and can ship their physical products and they can immediately download their digital products directly from the receipt page.

The goal of PHPurchase is to be extremely easy to configure and use allowing you to turn your WordPress site into a money generating machine. WordPress excels at allowing users to easily manage the content of their website, display photo galleries, run blogs, etc. PHPurchase is designed to allow WordPress to keep control of all the things that it does well while adding the ability to process credit card transactions.

With PHPurchase you don’t need to learn a new min-content management system common to other ecommerce plugins. To use PHPurchase, simply log into WordPress like you are already accustomed to doing, create the pages and posts like you already know how to do, and if you want to sell a product, just drop in an add-to-cart button.

You are not forced to organize your products by brand or category. You don’t have to rely on any predetermined page layout structure. Everything about PHPurchase is easily customizable. It really is the easiest, most configurable ecommerce plugin for WordPress.

WP e-Commerce vs PHPurchase

Read a review from one of our customers comparing WP e-Commerce vs PHPurchase.

Yes! It’s very simple to set up PHPurchase. We don’t just give you a plugin and leave you on your own. You will get a detailed video showing you exactly how to configure your payment gateway, add products to your website, and how to customize virtually every aspect of PHPurchase for your website.

Absolutely. If you don’t have a website at all, we can set you up with a professionally designed WordPress website running PHPurchase. If you already have a WordPress website we can help you install and configure PHPurchase. Once you get your site up and running, we can also help give you ideas on how to increase traffic to your website, optimize you search engine rankings, and improve your ecommerce conversion rates. Contact us for more information.

PHPurchase was developed by PHPoet, a web development firm in Virginia. We specialize in creating websites for small businesses, non-profits, and individuals. We have been in business since 2002 and our team of developers are eager to help you grow your business. Our goal is to provide an honest, ethical, and friendly experience for all of our clients while delivering the highest quality products and services available.

You can install PHPurchase on any WordPress website. We have three different types of licenses. With a Single Site License you will get automatic updates to PHPurchase on a single domain. The 5 Site License let’s you get automatic upgrades to PHPurchase on up to five domains. The Unlimited Developer License lets you get automatic updates to PHPurchase on as many websites as you like. The support for PHPurchase is given to the owner of the license. So, if you are a developer and buy the 5 Site Licnse or the Unlimited Developer License then your clients will need to contact you for support and you contact us. If you want your client to be able to contact us directly for support, they need to have their own Single Site License.

We take support very seriously and have put a great deal of resources into maintaining our support ticket system and our Get Satisfacton forum. The money you spend for PHPurchase enables us to continue development, maintain our servers, feed our developers, and is very much appreciated! Your purchase is not applied to, and does not entitle you to any additional services such as web site development, graphic design, or technical support. Again, however, we do try our very best to provide as much free support as we can for our community.