Purchased Items Overview
Purchased items can be individually saved to a weblog entry after a transaction has completed. This option makes it possible to associate a particular product with a member id, as the purchaser is set as the author in the purchased items weblog. This is a great option if you sell products that are downloadable, or otherwise intangible and need to create member specific access to the purchased product.
Setup
The Basics
Several fields in a Purchased Items Weblog can be mapped for use by CartThrob. Item ID, Quantity, Price, Order ID, License Number can all be mapped for use by CartThrob. ID will store the original entry_id of the item. Quantity stores the quantity purchased. Price stores the price the item was purchased at (because you might change the price over time, it’s good to have a reference for what the customer paid). The Order ID field stores a reference to the order id that he purchased item is associated with. The license number field will automatically store license numbers for items that have been identified as requiring a license number during the add_to_cart_form.
Additionally, you can create any other custom fields that you would like in your purchased items weblogs. Additional custom fields will allow you to add notes after a purchase, or capture more data from the customer during the purchase. While using the add_to_cart_form you can create input fields to gather customer data, for instance:
<input type="text" name="item_options[customer_notes]" value="I'm buying this for my big sister" />
If you have a field in your purchased items weblog with the short_name of “customer_notes” or “purchased_customer_notes”, the data from that item_options field will automatically be added to your purchased item.
Set up your weblog and then map the fields in CartThrob’s backend.
Advanced
As mentioned earlier, purchased items are associated with the purchaser. This association could allow you to create a shopping cart for a classified ads site, a professional test/quiz taking site, or a for selling paid advertisements.
If you need to allow lots of different types of customization, you may need to look into other options beyond adding extra fields to the purchased items weblog. Please see the tutorials section for more details.
