1 Introduction to Cart2Quote
1.1 Introduction
Cart2Quote is the most complete Magento module that enables customers and shop owners to create a Request for Quote (RFQ’s) on Magento websites. With Cart2Quote you can effectively track customer quotations, edit quotation requests, create proposals and convert quotations to orders. This all via the frontend and back-end of Magento.
This manual assumes you’ve already successfully installed Cart2Quote on your server. If you need instructions with installing, please read the Installation Manual that also comes with the installation package.
With Cart2Quote, you are in business! We wish you many, many leads generated by Cart2Quote. Cart2Quote gives you the best chance of converting these leads into orders.
– The Cart2Quote team
2 Front-end from a customers perspective
2.1 Add to Quote button
Cart2Quote gives the shop owner complete control in enabling quotations for products. The “Add to Quote button” can be enabled for each product individually, but also per product category. Furthermore, Cart2Quote lets shop owners decide where they want to show the “Add to Quote" button The "Add to Quote" button can be enabled on the product detail page near the "Add to Cart" button, on the product category page, or on both.
For an in-depth explanation of all Cart2Quote configuration options and how to ensure that the quotation functionality is activated as per your requirement, read our Installation Manual.
(Grid/List view)
(Product Detail Page)
2.2 Shopping Cart and Quotation Request page
With Cart2Quote, a Magento webshop features two important pages for finalizing orders, which are:
1) Shopping cart page
2) Quotation Request page
Customers can easily switch between the two lists and can order or request a quote at the same time.
2.3 Shopping Cart page
The shopping cart page can be shaped in any way a shop owner likes using the tools Magento offers. Cart2Quote adds a “Copy to Quotation button” to the Shopping Cart page. With this button, all products that are available for quotations will be copied from the shopping cart to the Quotation Request Page.
2.4 Quotation Request Page
A basic Quotation Request page consists of the products, prices, quantities, information of the buyer, text boxes for specific and general remarks and a submit button. The page is very easy to understand for customers and they will be able to request quotes for multiple quantities of multiple products. After requesting a quote, shop admins can submit a proposal via the back-end to the customer. The customer can checkout as normal but with the custom price.
2.5 Estimate Shipping and Tax Form
Cart2Quote offers a form to estimate shipping and tax. Entering the shipping details by selecting “Request a shipping quote” is optional but can also be set to mandatory using the Cart2Quote configuration.
2.6 Submit form
Cart2Quote also offers a minimalistic submit form. This will help the conversion of visitors to leads.
2.7 Transactional emails
Cart2Quote allows the shop owner to create different templates for e-mails to inform the customer of his/her activities and the actions that are to be taken by the shop admins. Optionally, a PDF can be attached to the e-mail with the price proposal.
(Welcome Email)
(Proposal Email)
2.8 PDF attached to email with price proposal
For the printing of the PDF logo and store address Cart2Quote uses the identical settings as Magento for the PDF invoices and orders:
For the PDF logo’s – In your Admin Console. Go to: Configuration -> Sales -> Invoice and Packing Slip Design -> Logo for PDF Print-outs (200×50)
For the PDF store address – In your Admin Console. Go to Configuration -> Sales -> Invoice and Packing Slip Design -> Address
2.9 Magento customer dashboard
The Magento Customer Dashboard is a very user-friendly interface. Cart2Quotes adds a “My Quotes” tab to the Customer Dashboard. In this tab, the customer has an overview of all his quote requests.
3 Managing Quotations in the Back-end
3.1 Quotation Grid
The shop admins are able to view all quotations in a grid that displays the most important information in the back-end. The shop admins will be able to change the status of the quote request from within this screen.
3.2 Quotation detail page
The Quotation detail page contains many useful features. Below the complete Quotation detail page is shown. In the next pages, all functionality will be further explained.
3.3 Quote information
This tab contains the quote information. It gives the time and date of the quotation request and the site from which is ordered. The status can be changed manually, because some orders will be closed per mail or phone, but the status will also change automatically when the ordering process progresses through Magento.
3.4 Quotation Management
This tab gives advanced management possibilities for both internal use and notifying the costumer. Here the expiry date and reminder date can be set and changed. It is optional to inform the customer about this. Also, comments can be placed. General comments, which can be seen by the customer in the “My Quotes” tab when signed in to the webshop, but also comments for internal use which are only visible in the backend.
3.5 Account information
In this part of the quotation detail page, all relevant customer information is shown.
3.6 Product information
In the product information section prices and tiers can be proposed. Furthermore, comments with different products can be entered and the products can be edited.
3.7 Edit a Quotation
Editing a submitted quote is easy. After saving the proposal the “Edit Product” button will become active. Pressing it will bring you to the normal “Create Order screen” of Magento with the selected items, including their prices and quantities transferred to this screen. You can press the “Edit Product” button after you have selected the items and quantities that need to be edited. Editing a quote requires you to save the request and to select one quantity per product. Remarks and shipping prices will not be transferred as are the extra quantities per item that were originally requested. This is simply because Magento’s Create New Order screen does not support this functionality.
Magento’s Create New Order screen is extended with an extra button at the bottom of this screen. After you have changed the items in the list, you can press the “Update Quotation” button and all products including their quantities are transferred back to the quote detail page. Back in the quote view the shop admin is enable to create new tiers again.
3.8 Create a new quotation
The workflow is exactly as above, but you will start with an empty form by pressing “Create New Quote” at the right top of the quotation grid page.
3.9 File upload
With file upload, a file can be attached to your proposal e-mail.
3.10 Message History
In this section, messages can be sent to the customer via e-mail when “Notify Customer by E-mail” is enabled. When disabled, the message will be visible in the back-end for internal users. This section differs from the general comment section, because the messages from the general comment section will only be seen by the customer in the “My Quotes” tab of the Magento webshop.
3.11 Discount
In this section, discounts can be applied to the quote. With “Enter new Quote Subtotal” a fixed price or a fixed percentage can be entered. A fixed price, will set all products on the same discount percentage to approximately reach the entered fixed price. Entering a percentage will give a percentage discount over the quote. Coupon codes can also be applied here. Simply select one of your Magento promotions and hit “Apply”.
3.12 Quote Totals
In this section all amounts will be added together to make a Grand Total. The profit will also be given, based on the entered cost prices. Taxes will be computed by the extensive tax configuration of Magento. This sections gives two buttons, “Submit Proposal” and “Create Order”.
With “Submit Proposal” a proposal will be send via e-mail to the customer who requested the quotation. The customer then can view the proposal and proceed to checkout, make a counteroffer or reject the proposal. The customer can do this when logged in to his account on the webshop, but he is also able to proceed to checkout directly from the proposal e-mail.
With “Create Order” the selected items and quantities will be transferred to the create order section. Then an order will be created like any other order on Magento.
4 Troubleshooting, API and installation tips
4.1 User forum and support articles
For general instructions, troubleshooting and best practices installing Magento extensions check out this article. You will find more specific development en configuration tips in our forums. Please feel free to share any tips and tricks in our user forum: Cart2Quote development and configuration help forums.
4.2 Manuals and help tool
This manual is accompanied by an Installation Manual This manual explains everything with regard to the installation and configuration of Cart2Quote. We have also added a help tool for all the options in the Cart2Quote configuration settings. Just hoover over the question mark and a help text will appear.
4.3 Api information
Cart2Quote Enterprise users can also use our API. For more information download the API manual of Cart2Quote.
4.4 Purchase installation support
It is strongly recommended to let this Magento Quotation Module be installed by a technical implementer when you do not have the necessary knowledge of Magento modules installations. Cart2Quote has a core team of experienced professionals who are dedicated to offering Cart2Quote software installation, configuration and fine-tuning. Order installation or development support here.