1. Create a folder on your website called "store". Then unzip the download and upload all files to the new folder. Note: You may use a different name for the folder but you will also have to change this in the "Manage Defaults" view once you are set up.
Note: You can host the files in your root directory eg: http://www.yourdomain.com - however this will mean that you cannot name any other files on your website with the same name as the files contained in this program. It may be better to create a new directory to host the program in eg: http://www.yourdomain.com/store/
2. Open the setup.asp file in your browser.
eg: http://www.yourdomain.com/store/setup.asp
Note that you will only be able to set up the program once the files are uploaded to a web host or web server running Active Server Pages. You cannot simply click on the setup.asp file on your computer (unless you have IIS web server running on your computer and you create a website on localhost).
3. Enter your organization name. This organization name is mentioned in the email messages that are sent to your affiliates.
IMPORTANT: If you get an error, the most likely reason is that your server is not allowing WRITE permissions on the database file. Ask your web host to give both read AND write permissions to the database file - LM.mdb
4. Next you need to enter the Administrator details. You will need to create a username and a password. Make sure you remember these as you will use this to log into all the admin functions of your site.
NOTE If you wish to give individual members access to administrative functions you can set their permission to "1" (by clicking on the Members Manage button in the Admin Panel) however this will give them access to ALL admin functions. It can also only be done after a member has signed up. Next you will be allowed to access the Admin Panel. You will have to log in with your new Admin username and ID (which you entered in the previous step) and click on "Admin".
5. The next step is to set up the defaults for your affiliate site. Click on the "Manage Defaults" button link.
The following are required.
The default site URL eg: http://www.yourdomain.com
The default site Folder - eg: /store/ - note you need to beginning and ending "/". If you host in your root folder just enter one "/" here.
Payment refused page - this is the page that the customer is returned to if there is a problem processing their payment. You must create this page.
Logo URL - this is the url of your logo that some payment processors can display on their payment page. In PayPal for example the image displayed will have dimensions of 150 x 50 pixels.
The mail program that your server uses to send out notifications to you and your affiliates whenever a sale is made or a new affiliate joins. Most Windows servers have CDONTS pre-installed but you can choose SendMail instead if it is available.
The admin email address which is the address your affiliates will see when they receive an email.
Specify the default group that new members will be added to. This should be Affiliates (2). Three groups are automatically set up, ADMIN and AFFILIATES and QUALIFY. The ADMIN group has a permission of Level 1, the AFFILIATES group has a permission of Level 2 and the QUALIFY group has a permission of Level 3. This ensures that only the Administrator has access to certain program functions. Make sure that you do not change these.
If you want to pre-screen your affiliates you need to set QUALIFY as the default group. Otherwise set it to AFFILIATES. You can then qualify your affiliates by going to the Member Search page and clicking on View.
No need to set up default product ID at this stage, however you will need to come back and specify the default product ID after setting up your products (see below #7). Even if there is only one product you MUST remember to set it as default or your affiliate sign-up process will not work.
Specify the table background colors to match your site.
Specify the currency to be used. This should be the currency of your merchant account or PayPal account and will also be displayed on product and store pages.
6. Next click on "Add products" to add your product or service. You will need to add a unique product ID, name, price, commission rate for up to 5 levels of commissions, and any text that will appear on your product pages. You must also add the images for the store thumbnail and the main product pages. The product pages will be dynamically created depending on the settings that you enter here.
You can allocate a different commission structure for EACH product - i.e.: specify whether it is fixed or a percentage and how much to pay out on each level. If you don't want to pay a commission, leave the value as 0.00.
If commission is a percentage then the commission rate values should be entered as a decimal between 0 and 1. (eg: 0.35 = 35%).
7. IMPORTANT! - You must now go back to your defaults page and choose a default product.
The default product id is used in your affiliate referral code when they first sign up. If a default is not specified your affiliates URLs will not be generated. If you only have one product, then you must set this as the default.
8. ACCEPTING PAYMENTS
ACCEPTING PAYMENTS WITH PAYPAL
PayPal's Instant Payment Notification (IPN) allows you to integrate PayPal payments with your website back-end operations.
The advantage of PayPal is this is that you don't need a merchant account. In this case, when a sale is successful, PayPal's IPN (instant payment notification) system sends a message to AG which records the details in the AG database and returns the customer to the thank-you page you have set up for your product.
To set up your program to accept payments with PayPal you need to go to the "Manage Payment Settings" on the Admin control panel. This lists the possible Payment Systems you can use. Click on PayPal to set up your PayPal details.
PayPal payment email - (eg: sales@yourdomain.com) - this email is the one your customers will see when they make their payments through PayPal.
Notify URL - this is the url of the PayPal_ipn.asp file provided with the program. This is the URL where the PayPal notifications are sent to notify if a payment is valid or not. eg: (http://www.yourdomain.com/store/paypal_ipn.asp)
You also need to ensure that you have turned IPN on in your PayPal account. Log into PayPal, go to "Profile" then select "Instant Payment Notification Preferences" under Selling Preferences. Set the IPN url to http://yourdomain.com/store/PayPal_ipn.asp (included with the software).
Payment receiver_email - It is important that the receiver_email is your PayPal PRIMARY email address.. PayPal allows you to set up more than one email address for the same account, but the one they use for WebAccept notifications is your PRIMARY email address.
Due to the huge number of payment processors in use you will need to edit one file = payment.asp.
This file contains the fields contain the sale information that is being passed to the payment processor. Open this file in a text editor and read the comments then change the field names to match those required by your payment gateway.
NOTE: It is essential that the checkout_id field is passed back from the payment processor to your "thank you" page. Without this, the sale and commissions cannot be recorded in your database.
You can usually pass optional fields to the payment processor and these are returned to your "thank you" page. However if this is not possible you need to pass the checkout_id as the value of one of the required fields, such as Invoice or Order Number. If this is the case you will also need to edit the custom_received.asp page so that it picks up the value of the checkout_id:
p_checkout_id=cINT(Request.Form("checkout_id"))
Request.Form("checkout_id") needs to be changed to Request.Form("some_other_field_name") where some_other_field_name is the name of the field you passed to the payment gateway in payment.asp.
9.AFFILIATE TRACKING CODE
The affiliate tracking code works on the store.asp and the product.asp pages. When you set up your product information (see #7 above) each product has a "product id". The product id is incorporated into the URL for the affiliate link. e.g: http://www.yourdomain.com/store/product.asp?pid=0001.
10.SET UP BANNERS AND AFFILIATE LINKS
You need to set up some banners and links that your affiliates can use to link to your site. Click on "Manage Links/Banners" on the ADMIN page and then on Create New Link.
You choose an ID for your link, a descriptive name which the affiliate will see when s/he chooses the link, the type of link, and the product that it will used for. Then if it is a banner, you must enter the image url and the width and height. If it is a text link, then leave the image url blank.
The referral url will go directly to your product page. The advantage of this is that you can have affiliates linking to more than one product on your website. You will therefore be able to give a higher link popularity to more than one product page.
Your affiliate program is now ready to accept affiliates.