Our Custom Product Configurator now has a Responsive Interface!

A custom product configurator needs to have controls that are easy for the end user to define exactly what flavor of your product they desire. Options that are not possible at a certain size, material, or whatever the criteria may be, should not be shown until they are really an option. An interface must be developed that is both easy to use and does not allow mistakes to occur by having ineligible options presented to the customer.

As part of the process of developing your configurator, we will extract that information from you in order to create a compelling interface that responds to customer inputs to hide, show, or alter the available options based on real-world product parameters. The goal is to always show the fewest options possible at any given time while always having the full range of options readily available. 4 to 6 options at a time is ideal — any more and you risk what social psychologists call choice overload. This is why Amazon only lists six items in their “customers who bought this also bought section.” Social Triggers has more on that subject, but when you think about your own experiences online, you likely click away from a form that pops up where there are zillions of fields, or a page with a huge amount of options for a certain product all presented at once. Read more ›

Credit Card Fulfillment to Increase Sales

Credit Card Fulfillment is an absolute must for sales on the internet. First and foremost, research shows that credit cards increase the probability, speed and size of customer purchases…. by a minimum of 30%.  Couple that with the ability to have a product tailored exactly to the customers needs/desires, you now have one hell of a powerful sales tool!

In this post, the second installment of our embedded configurator posts, will show a live (test mode) implementation of a Stripe credit card fulfillment system. You can test it by configuring and updating the model, then click the “Order Now!” button. The pop-up that appears will list the cabinet width, cabinet type, and the cost (located on the “Pay” button). Make up the email, expiration date, and four digit CVC code numbers, but use the credit card test numbers below to get a ‘successful’ test transaction. The transaction does nothing, and you cannot accidentally charge something….. but having said that, I wouldn’t enter a real CC number regardless 🙂 Read more ›

An Embedded Product Configurator with pricing lets your customers design and purchase your product all by themselves!

If you have not visited our website lately, you may have missed an exciting new development – the ability to place an embedded product configurator on your own website!

Below is an example of an embedded product configurator that allow your customers to design and purchase their own custom cabinets directly on your website! We can make configurators for any product, but we will concentrate on custom cabinetry for now in order to show some of the exciting features over the next few posts.

If you are new to 3D models, you can use the tools on the right to move around the model, or use your scroll wheel to zoom in and out as well as click and drag the model. You can also click and hold the left mouse button to rotate the model. Select features from the ‘Options’ panel, and close the panel when you are done to see more of the model. Notice that every choice made affects the price of the cabinet, and that the width choices change depending on the type of cabinet selected! Go ahead, configure the cabinet a bit, then continue with the article below, but keep in mind, the model is not fully featured quite yet.. Read more ›

The Sectional Flight Conveyor Screws Complete…

The Sectional Flight Conveyor Screws — CEMA Standard No. 300-002 — were added to the configurator, but we went WAY beyond that with the underlying model to align it more closely with an actual detailing methodology — specifically the one we found on the Martin Stock & MTO Screw Conveyor Components online catalog shown below…

Read more ›

Screw Conveyor Spouts – A Progress Report

The Screw Conveyor Spouts have been added to the model (along with other things) and the model is now approaching the state where it looks much like the first model from an earlier post this subject  — but there is a huge difference of course. The new screw conveyor spouts, along with the rest of the configurator, are fully CEMA compliant…..and are fully configurable to the standard’s specifications.  On to the new stuff.

The CEMA Standard Parts that were added this week were:

• 300-032 Conveyor Inlet Spout, Flanged
• 300-011 Conveyor Discharge Spouts, Plain
• 300-023 U-Trough Flanged Covers
• 300-024 U-Trough Semi-Flanged Covers
• 300-0025 U-Trough Flat Covers

As I stated, the model is now looking a lot like the first model I created…

Read more ›

The Move to CEMA Standard 350 is Under Way!

Our copy of the  CEMA Standard 350 arrived last week, and reading through the majority of it, I decided to start a fresh model based entirely on those standards.

The old model that we had planned to use for the first tutorial series on the Mechanical Web Portal  was created from drawings that were created by a associate of ours who used to be a Screw Conveyor Designer that worked for a company that designed and built screw conveyors designed for very heavy use. He recommended that moving forward with our design, we should use the CEMA Standard 350 as a guide as to how our model configures — so that’s what we did.

We started over from scratch using the CEMA Standard 350 as our guide to how this configurator operates. The 300 series of the standard contains the Dimensional Standards which cover the design of normal screw conveyor components, and is what we are using to develop the model.

Read more ›