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Magento World Newsletter (April 16, 2010)

Today we are ready to bring to your attention our regular monthly newsletter of aheadWorks Magento World store – the real treasury of effective tools for efficient running of your Magento-based site. In this newsletter you will find the results of our efforts in developing new and updating existing Magento extensions.


We would like to start with a significant developer’s mega event - Magento Developer’s Paradise - which will be held on April 18th, 19th and 20th in Spain. We are really proud to sponsor this momentous occasion where the world’s best eCommerce developers will gather to share their wealth of experience, exchange ideas and increase their knowledge of Magento platform and its development.


New Extensions


Market Segmentation Suite


aheadWorks’ Market Segmentation Suite takes the concept of customer segmentation to a whole new level. Whether you choose to target your customers on a one-to-one (personalized) or one-to-many (customer group) basis, you control with precision who sees what and when based on what you know about them. Use your understanding of a visitor’s propensity to buy to maximize the probability of a purchase.


Some features making Market Segmentation Suite a powerful and sophisticated targeted selling platform are the following:



  • Audience segmentation based on any criteria

  • Export segmented lists using the most appropriate channels and methods for each segment

  • Targeting rules based on multiple conditions:



    • total sum of orders

    • number of orders

    • customers’ information

    • etc.


  • User-friendly admin interface

  • Possibility to use API extensions for developers

  • Advanced Newsletter and Z-Blocks extensions support


Find more information, demo and screenshots on the Market Segmentation Suite page.


New User Guides


Advanced Newsletter User Guide


The Advanced Newsletter User Guide is intended for the Advanced Newsletter extension users as well as for those who only planning to purchase this aheadWorks software. This User Manual aims to explain in layman’s terms how Advanced Newsletter works. It introduces you to the software settings and gives you detailed and illustrated description of the following aspects:



  • Advanced Newsletter configuration

  • Managing segments

  • SMTP configuration

  • Auto-managing rules

  • Managing subscribers

  • Customer’s subscriptions


Download the Advanced Newsletter User Guide right now from the extension page!


Updated Extensions


Automatic Product Callouts


The Automatic Product Callouts extension allows you to organize your Top product sets in blocks anywhere on your store’s site. Though this extension is most commonly used to enable an automatic Category landing page that lists the category’s top products, it can also be used for similar outcomes elsewhere on your site.


Current version: 1.0.1

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new:
   + Vertical and horizontal displaying improved
   + New 'item_height' variable added


Please find more information about this aheadWorks extension on the Automatic Product Callouts page.


Advanced Newsletter


The Advanced Newsletter extension will help you increase your subscriber base with a highly customizable user interface and targeted sign-up options, while the segmentation features let you target your subscribers with the most relevant content. Building upon all the inherent newsletter functionality that Magento offers, the feature-rich Advanced Newsletter equips you with a newsletter subscription and management system that will catapult your sales to greater heights.


Current version: 1.3

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new:
   * Error occurred when ticking off in the "Sign Up for Newsletter" field while creating an account in the frontend
   * Incorrect work of subscription/unsubscription option when editing customer from backend


Learn more how to catapult your sales to greater heights from the Advanced Newsletter page.


Z-Blocks


The Z-Blocks extension uses native Magento functionality, allowing you to create an unlimited number of static blocks and content items. Best of all, you don’t need to manually change your template and layout files every time you want to add an advertising banner or other applicable information. Everything you need to administer changes can be conveniently found in the admin panel!


Current version: 2.2

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new:
   + The 'cart-content-top' block position type is divided into 'cart-content-top' and 'checkout-content-top'
   + Category restrictions are now applied to custom positioned blocks
   * Midnight interval
   * Time settings taken from server
   * Category info loss when editing block content without displaying 'Categories' tab in the admin section


Want to know more about this extension? Visit the Z-Blocks page.


Advanced Reports


To assist your company in achieving success in today’s fast-paced, competitive global marketplace, the Advanced Reports extension by aheadWorks is ready to be your reporting partner. Not only does this Magento extension allow you to obtain more sales information than ever before, but you can also use the information you cull to better draw conclusions about the status of your business.


Current version: 2.0.6

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new:
   * Reports crash for Magento v.1.2 - 1.3.1.1
   * Additional items disappear when Config Cache is enabled
   * Invalid titles and sorting in Roles Resources
   * Permission isn't applied to Units


If you want to get more detailed infomation about this software, please visit the Advanced Reports page.


Customer Purchases


Customer Purchases not only makes viewing customers’ purchases simpler, but it also allows users to avoid loading additional pages. The extension incorporates a "Purchases" tab into the Customer Information page which allows you to observe a complete listing of any customer’s purchases. And with the "View Order" button, you can easily check the date and time each order was made; the product title(s); the quantity ordered; the price per item ordered; and the total purchase price.


Current version: 1.2

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new:
   + Discount amount and Row total columns have been added to purchases grid


You can find the complete list of extension's features on the Customer Purchases page.


Subscriptions and Recurring Payments


If you deal online in memberships and subscription products and want to manage them efficiently and effortlessly, your hunt for a solution stops here. The Subscriptions and Recurring Payments extension from aheadWorks is for you if you sell products that are purchased with a certain regularity: be it magazines, software licenses, or products like grocery, bottled water, memberships, pills, detergents etc.


Current version: 1.2.2

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new:
   + ArgoFire Payment gateway support


Get the list of all available payment gateways on the Subscriptions and Recurring Payments page.


Booking and Reservations


Looking at the needs of customers for whom booking-related services is the crux of their business, aheadWorks Co. introduced Booking and Reservations – a feature-rich Magento extension that helps you efficiently manage your booking and reservation work.


Current version: 1.2

Upgrade: recommended from any previous versions

Upgrade cost: free for all versions

What’s new (main changes):
   + Booking period is added to Order details and invoice
   + Dynamically changing price with AJAX while changing reserved period at frontend
   + AJAX calendar loading and navigation
   + Live price change while changing custom options
   + AJAX Cart Pro support
   + Booked period is shown to customer as unavailable for reserving even without being checked out
   + Ability to define the number of calendar pages displayed on the product page
   + Ability to specify the number days the booked item is kept in abandoned cart
   + JavaScript load optimization
   * 'Recurrent day of week' option works incorrectly
   * Possibility to order a bookable product on excluded days
   * 'Duplicate' button disappears
   * Wrong custom options summing
   * IE incompatible JSON notation
   * Backend crash after exporting/re-importing all products to CSV
   * Some minor bug fixes


Try how the all these features have been implemented in the new version in demos from the Booking and Reservations page.


Promotion of the Month!


Have you ever thought how tremendous lot of your time is spent on looking through hundreds (or even thousands) of orders, customers and subscribers in the search of those few corresponding to specific conditions?


We have the solution of this problem – a powerful pack from aheadWorks with effective tools for managing your store and expanded opportunities for blocks displaying:



Thus you gain not only manage-your-store-efficiently pack with a possibility of extensions integration (Market Segmentation Suite supports both Advanced Newsletter and Z-Blocks), but a 35% discount as well! Everything you should do is to add all these extensions to cart and use the following coupon code:


APRIL35MSSPROMO


Power Pack cost: $251.55 (Original price: $387.00, you save $135.45)


Don't hesitate - the offer lasts till May 16, 2010!

That was a brief review of our user guides, new and updated extensions. We are always happy to get all kinds of feedback. If you need a new feature in our product or some extension - just let us know - it has good chances to be implemented.


Thank you for being with us and good luck to your business,

Sincerely yours,

aheadWorks Magento department