Welcome to our new blog on REC+

To read all prior REC+ releases going back over 5 years, please visit our knowldege centre 

Time To Migrate To HTTPS

What Is HTTPS?

HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) is an internet communication protocol that protects the integrity and confidentiality of your users' data as it i… Continue Reading »

Prospect Manager is our own integrated CRM system for sales and marketing teams. 

We were asked by our main reseller on a number of occasions whether we could offer this type of solution, des… Continue Reading »

CHANGES IN BRIEF

Available 1st November 2017

A number of small changes have been introduced in ecommerce with product re-ordering and the Google product feed, a "form fade" effect when forms are completed plus making it easier to enter an ID for a user to identify them in your accounts system.

Read all about the changes on Freshdesk

REMINDER TO REC USERS

Remember to upgrade to REC+ to access all features, while the upgrade is currently free. You do this in admin by clicking the link to upgrade to REC+ in the top left hand side of the admin screen.

NB Separate charges may apply when using extra modules such as bulk email and Prospect Manager.

STILL TO MIGRATE TO HTTPS?

We strongly recommend that you migrate to HTTPS. See our previous post for full details.

We have introduced a new Invite system, helpful management reports on pages and products and extended the session cookie.  

Read full details and setup instructions on freshdesk

Invite System

The Invite system can be used to send out emails to invite people to use your site. This allows them to accept the invite and set up their own password.

Top Pages Report

This displays the top 100 most viewed pages on your website.

Top Products Report

View your top 500 most popular selling products with the facility to select by specific categories or brands. 

Top Manufacturers (aka Brands) / Top Categories Report

View sales grouped by manufacturer / brand to see which brands are most popular, or by category for your most popular categories.

Revenue Sources & Form Responses

Available for marketing clients to view the different sources driving revenues or replies to your forms, directing you to the detailed information on the Marketing Console.

Session Cookie Change 

We have changed the session cookie so that users can now see their incomplete shopping cart baskets for up to 30 days after they have closed the browser. This will help to increase conversion rates for returning users who abandoned the shopping process and can still see the products in their baskets when opening a new session.

Read full details and setup instructions on freshdesk.

These new features are available in REC+, remember to click on the top right link in the header to upgrade for free currently. Charges will apply in the future!

As usual, we only provide technical support over the Christmas period, namely server and uptime monitoring, starting 12pm on Friday 22nd December. Regular advice, support and project services wi… Continue Reading »

VIEW VISITOR ACTIVITY IN PAGE MANAGER 

You can now see a 30-day activity graphline in Page Manager against individual pages so you can see which pages are being viewed the most, with the exact visitor numbers appearing when you hover over the graphline. This data appears when you have connected your website to your Google Analytics account. This is useful to see at-a-glance where you have the most activity and any spikes in visitor traffic across your site.

REMINDER TO REC USERS

Remember to upgrade to REC+ to access all features, while the upgrade is currently free. You do this in admin by clicking the link to upgrade to REC+ in the top left hand side of the admin screen.

NB Separate charges may apply when using extra modules such as bulk email and Prospect Manager.

STILL TO MIGRATE TO HTTPS?

We strongly recommend that you migrate to HTTPS. See our previous post for full details.

We have introduced a number of enhancements including Weekly Tips to help admins with your conversion optimisation program, being able to email by user tags so you can precisely segment who receives your campaigns and you can now connect to Google Tag Manager to make it easier to insert 3rd party tracking code. In ecommerce, you can add meta data on Manufacturer records for improved SEO and Order Manager has improved sorting to complement the recent release of 30-day session cookies. There's a minor tweak in Download Manager to allow you to drag and drop the download file in without needing to click to upload it.  For Prospect Manager users, we have now made it easier to roll forward a reminder with some pre-set links to add an hour, a day etc, plus you can now create a prospect directly from a form created in Forms & Processes. There's also a small feature to disable a dropdown option temporarily on a form by adding a '-' in front of the drop down text. These enhancements are available on either 26th or 30th January. 

Available Tuesday 6th February 2018

You now have the ability to enter an email signature on admin user records (in this case you'd be using it for sales agents) and have this displayed within the emails you send via Prospect Manager by adding in the tag {{ email_signature }} to the "email quote" system page.

Membership number (often renamed to Account ID via site defines) now appears on the main user record and prospect activity record which saves having to look it up. 

The "value" field displayed in the email message will be suppressed if the value is zero (tip: remember to remove the preceding text which is normally just the word 'Value".

IMPORTANT: Scheduled Maintenance
WHEN: Tuesday 20th February between 9am - 10am
TIME: Up to 10 minutes
UPDATES: Follow our twitter feed for updates 

IMPACT: We advise not to update content or produc… Continue Reading »

The server was updated successfully yesterday with available patches for the Meltdown and Spectre 1 vulnerabilities. 

This is a second call to join our beta testers for our new Vizitas Price Compare app. Daily scans show whether you are under- or over-priced so you can consider changing your products to price m… Continue Reading »

We are excited to announce the release of Version 7 and the Module system which is now available to REC+ users. This brings a new method of creating and displaying custom content and optionally displaying the data on web pages with full design control for web developers. In this way you can use a single design style to create unique pages with their own URL's and content plus tagging and filtering, all populated from a database table you define yourself.

On the fun end, you can create polls and make better looking team pages. Or maybe you want to publish web pages containing detailed recipes, technical FAQ's with lots of data fields, case studies or knowledge articles - all nicely styled the way you want. You could also store your business data in the site which only admins can view and edit, such as audit reports, project tasks, approved supplier lists, purchase authorisations and more. 

We have provided documentation on Freshdesk on how it works. Due to the bespoke nature of custom content, all implementation, support and training is chargeable time.

The Module System has been developed to ease a common issue faced by CMS systems - how to create highly customised data-driven pages that rely on a lot of design and therefore complex HTML/CSS b… Continue Reading »

Applies To: Ecommerce Sites Taking Standard Paypal Payments Through The Checkout Process
Does Not Apply To: Paypal Encrypted and Paypal Express methods, or Form payments

We have recently received a few reports where a small number of users paying via the standard Paypal method have had an issue completing the payment process. This does not apply to your site if you instead use the Paypal Encrypted and Paypal Express payment methods, or you are taking payments via a form rather then the normal checkout process.

This is a small, random problem which we cannot recreate and Paypal cannot offer an explanation why it has occasionally occurred. We therefore recommend you consider moving to Paypal Express which has not had any reported issues and also offers a much smoother and faster checkout process for the user as an added benefit.

How Do I Know If I Am On Standard Paypal Payments?

Go into Payment Processors Manager and see if "Paypal Or Credit Cards" is set to a Status of "on" and Mode of "live". If it is then we recommend you migrate to Paypal Express. 

How Do I Update To Paypal Express Checkout?

Follow this article on Freshdesk

Test!

Make sure you test your changes by successfully putting an order though the checkout process using the Express Checkout method you have set up.

We have been working hard to ensure the REC platform complies with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which comes into force on 25th May 2018. This is a heads up about the changes we will be releasing next Tuesday 24th April which will enable you to take many of the necessary steps to ensure you are compliant.

New Cookie Message

A newly-worded cookie message and layout will be displayed to first-time visitors in place of the existing message. The new message will inherit the colour schemes of your site if you have adapted it.

New Cookie Pop-up (for responsive design websites)

When the Cookie Settings link is cliked it will fire up a modal window giving the visitor the ability to manage which cookies they wish to allow, as required under GDPR. A version of this will be made available for non-responsive websites at a later date. 

Positive Opt-in Consent For Newsletters / Email Campaigns

The system will cater for positive opt-in consent to newsletters where the individual will have to tick a box to be added as a newsletter subscriber, rather than it being pre-ticked for them.

Re-permissioning For Email Campaigns

A re-permissioning process has been defined to include a program for bulk unsubscribes and a new "Subscribe" field which can be added to email templates to allow people to opt-in to future marketing emails.

Form Data Collection Tips

This enables you to add some explainer text on form fields to explain why you wish to collect that particular data. 

Users Can See Their Form Submissions

Users will be able to see what forms they submitted on your site when they log in to their User Home page.

Additional Auditing

The audit log will keep a record of when users are added to the system and when there are changes to their newsletter subscription, status, level and group. This will help administrators to see what has happened historically as part of complying with individuals' rights to restrict processing or to be forgotten.

What Will You Have To Do?

We will be providing guidance on the steps you need to take to use these new features when the release is made available next week.

There will be further releases before the 25th May which are more targeted towards alerts and notifications when administrators access private data. This is part of extending the perimeter for data breach detection because many data breaches originate from inside a company rather than being external website hacks.

The checkout process has been updated to enhance the user experience on the checkout page and the code has been generally improved. 

This is a notification that the change comes into effect on Wednesday 25th April 2018.

GDPR Is Now Live!

Find out what you need to know to set up and implement the changes required to make your website GDPR compliant before 25th May 2018.

Features added on 22nd May include making Cookie Manager available to non-responsive design sites and allowing the Subscribe link to work with Mailgun integration and showing 3rd party domains correctly in the non-essential section of the cookie pop-up. All users are being asked to sign our latest terms and conditions which include GDPR updates mainly in the form of the new Data Processing Agreement.

Read all features and how to implement them here

You also have access to our full GDPR section which includes how to run processes that help you comply.

Do You Need Help WIth Your GDPR Website Compliance?

We are helping users to achieve compliance on their websites by performing cookie audits, form reviews and updates to cookie and privacy notices. These typically take around 3 hours and are charged at £75+VAT per hour or part thereof. Book your site in for GDPR via a freshdesk ticket.

Filter Users By Subscriber allows you to select your users in User Manager > Filter Users by whether or not they have subscribed to your newsletters. You can then assign selected users into specific user groups (1,2,3 refer to the groups shown on a user record) which you may want to do for segmentation and emailing purposes. NB Email Manager will not send to users who are not marked as subscribed.

Filter Users who are ungrouped allows you to find users who have been entered without being assigned into a group, so you can quickly identify them and then add them into the desired group.

Script Finder is a new program which allows you to scan areas of the website to find scripts that have been embedded in the site, such as 3rd party apps or tracking which may introduce cookies and therefore you need to be able to turn off those scripts in conjunction with Cookie Manager.

View this article in full on freshdesk

Combating Form Spam. There has been a recent sharp increase in spam, some of which is by-passing Google Captcha, in particular from Russia. We have introduced our new Intelligent Spam Filter to help combat this. In the most obvious spam cases, when the spammer has wasted their time submitting the form we will automatically reject it without their knowledge. For other possible spam items, we will place them in the spam folder of the corresponding form in Forms & Processes.

Google Products Variation Manager. This has been renamed from 'Multi Ad Generator' and you can export your product feed data to a CSV file, modify it with any alterations you need, then import it via the Import System, selecting Google Products GTINs in step 2. The reason this change was introduced was to help the situation where products are set up with multiple options and each one needs its own GTIN (in this case for clothing that had a GTIN for each size/colour combination). 

REC+ Version Numbering. Because we are rolling out continuous product updates we will no longer be displaying version numbers in REC+. Our team works on the software every day of the week keeping it up to date with security updates, software patches and enhacements. The updates are automatically rolled out overnight to all sites, meaning your software is always on the very latest version available. NB If you are an REC user then remember to switch to REC+ for free currently in your admin console!

Under GDPR registered users can object to having their data processed. In REC+ this means restricting processing via Email Manager (so the user won't be included on emails) and in User Manager and Prospect Manager a red warning message is displayed when you select the user advising:

"Restricted User
This user has been restricted from processing under GDPR, please do not contact them or process their data."

To mark a user as restricted go into User Manager > select their user record > Status & Levels tab > tick the field 'Restricted User'.

The system upgrade has been completed successfully this morning. The update will move us onto the newest version of PHP which is extends its supported life to 30th November 2020. This version also brings further security and performance improvements. 

In this issue of REC developments we have a number of fantastic new features to help run your website, let's take a look:

In this weeks issue we focus on smaller day to day improvements, let's dive in:

Highlights

• PDF downloads for Invoices.
  You can now download order invoices directly from order manager as PDFs.
  Available in Order Manager > Orders > "PDF Invoice" button under the summary details.
  This uses the design of your print invoice which is also available to customise in Templates > select the active template > html/invoice/base.html.twig
• Further order manager improvements.
  Continuing from last week we've made further improvements to the flow of the new order management screen based on the feedback we've had so far from you. If you've switched to the old version, please consider trialing the new order experience again to see the latest changes. Your feedback is always welcome. 
• Mobile touch icon.
  On mobile devices this is shown when adding to favorites, bookmarks & adding to the home screen (similar to favicons). 
  We automatically create scaled down versions of your mobile touch icon for the most popular different mobile browsers. 
  Available in Site Settings > Company > Company Details > Mobile Touch Icon.
  Recommended size: at least 200x200px & must be a square image.
• Social Sharing Image.
  Ever shared your site and wondered why Facebook / Twitter / Instagram used a specific image? This change let's you have more control over this by setting a default image for sharing. This image applies to all main pages of your site, while blog & product pages still use their main images by default. 
  Available in Site Settings > Company > Company Details > Social Sharing Image
  Recommended size: 600x315px or 1200x630px.
  You can test with Facebook's Sharing Debugger tool.

Tweaks & Improvements

• Rename delivery countries 
  Though you can rename countries in the system already, this would lead to issues with existing data in the system.
  An example of this would be renaming UK to UK Mainland to seperate out Islands for delivery rules.
  To resolve this, we've added a new "Country display name" feature to delivery regions letting you set a different name for countries to appear as. 
  When setting this, please make sure you set all the relevant regions for that country. 
  Available in Delivery Manager > View Delivery Regions > Edit delivery methods, set "Country Display Name".
• Form sign up process now supports updating existing users
  Previously the sign up process on forms would only subscribe new users, and if a user had unsubscribed they'd need to resubscribe from their account page.
  Now existing users who have unsubscribed can resubscribe on sign up forms easily through the form they originally subscribed through. 
• Email deliverability improvements.
  Continuing our work to prevent emails going to spam, we've made further changes to the FROM addresses we use on all admin notifications.
  Follow the full guide on better email deliverability & troubleshooting here.
• HTTPS additional domain redirects
  Multiple domains pointed at a single IP doesn't work with HTTPS, but you can redirect to the main domain from these additional domains. 
  Previously this meant also setting up HTTPS for the other domain due to how the HTTPS connections happen prior to redirects.  
  We've now introduced a way to have HTTPS enabled redirects setup for any addition domains you might have that you want redirected to your main site.
  Please contact us if you need one of these enabled for your site with the domain name(s) you'd like to have redirected.  
• Facebook Analytics.
  Similar to Google Analytics, Facebook offer their own form of analytics.
  Available in Connect > Social > Facebook Analytics, app id can be set here and then you can enable the js tracking too.
  You can set this up in Facebook:
  https://developers.facebook.com/apps/ > "+ Add a New App", setting the name to your domain name & any contact email.
  App ID given at the top of the screen, click to copy it and paste over in REC > Connect > Social > Facebook Insights APP ID.
  Under "Analytics" click "Set Up", then click "Web".
  Click "I already set up the Javascript SDK" & skip adding the code as REC handles this for you.
  Enter your Site URL, click Save & then Continue, then skip through the remaining steps by clicking Next on each screen.
  Last screen leaves you on there so now you can click to view your Analytics.

Designers & Developers

• Users API can now accept delivery prices with or without VAT set
  You can set custom delivery prices (when enabled) on user records & the API can now handle this with a way to set if you're passing a VAT / non-VAT price.
  In the Users API, you can send the following against each user: "delivery_charges": {  "default": "", "free_threshold": "" },
  we assume VAT prices by default but pass the "use_non_vat_prices" URL param.
• WebP & SVG images support.
  We now support images throughout the system for Google's WebP image format & as SVG.
  With SVG please optimize the images before uploading them to the site & when using WebP please be mindful of browser support as this is a new format. 
  Available throughout the system such as product/blog images as well as logos and all other image uploads.
• Mailchimp Upgrade.
  Keeping up with the latest Mailchimp upgrade, all users should be able to be synced once again.
• SMTP email debugging.
  If you're having issues sending emails through SMTP you can get full debug logs.
  This new area is available at the bottom of SMTP Settings section in Admin.

With Black Friday fast approaching, in this week's issue we've introduced a useful new feature to help boost your sales, as well as other tweaks and improvements to the system and some helpful hints: 

Highlights

• Coupons can now trigger FREE DELIVERY!
  With Black Friday on the horizon, you can now offer free delivery to customers with this new type of coupon.
  You can narrow it down to just a specific delivery zone such as UK only & gain all the normal coupon controls over this including date ranges, maximum number of uses & more.
  Available in Coupon Manager > add/edit Coupon > under "How much is this coupon worth?" it now gives the a tickbox option against the question: "Or do you want this coupon to trigger Free Delivery?".
• Stress testing REC+
  With big sales come big traffic spikes! We've been working with load testing tools more lately to stress test REC+ to it's limits to identify and optimise areas that could be affected by extremely large volumes of traffic. A deep dive article will follow on this soon. This is all part of ongoing improvements and monitoring of the core infrastructure and REC+ application performance.

Tweaks & Improvements

• Improvements to email delivery
  Further improvements have been made so Sender & Return-Path addresses can always be the system address, which you can also now override. 
  This lets you be receive form reply emails from the visitors email, even through the sender address behind the scenes is actually still the system, which then prevents any SPF issues. 
• Further improvements to order manager
  We have been delighted to introduce further improvements to Order Manager, after receiving a lot of useful feedback from you. Thanks.

Did you know...

• Email marketing reports
  A somewhat hidden away feature of our Email manager system is reports on not only who read & clicked the emails, but also how many form replies & orders came from the campaign. 
  You can find these in Email Manager > View Sent Emails > Click the email you'd like to see > Check out the Ecommerce & Form Responses tabs.
• Coupon usage reports
  From inside coupon manager you can click the Report link between Edit & Delete to find a detailed report of orders that used the coupon, top products it was used on and more. 
• & more useful reports!
  Remember there are a number of helpful reports to assist you in measuring the success of your Black Friday campaigns, as well as planning which products & categories to run offers on. These include: Top Products Report, Top Brand/Category Report, Top Pages Report & your Revenue Sources report.
  Available in the Reports system in Admin.