January 26, 2018

I was so excited when I was pregnant with my first child. When I had time on my hands I spent it shopping and daydreaming. Shopping for items for his nursery and for clothes when he was born. And don’t you know, as soon as we knew we were having a boy and chosen his name I needed to have all of those baby blanket, onesies and even the diaper bag engraved with his name or initials. 

I obviously wasn’t alone. When I went to buy the diaper bag I had my eye on for a while at PotteryBarnKids.com there was a question in the checkout process asking how I wanted the bag monogrammed. A click of a box, an additional cost and customization happened. “CJM” would be on the diaper bag when it arrived. It was amazing. And so expensive that my daughter, “LMM,” got to have the same one. 

The fact still remains, many of you may have products that could use customization that your customers really want. You can charge a fee for these or they can be free. If you have a WooCommerce jewelry shop, you could ask your customers if they want a personalized engraving for an additional cost. For clothing, maybe the logo over the pocket is a free add-on option.

No matter the direction you choose there are always customers looking for these types of products. 

Here are 3 Ways You Can Create a Custom Experience your own store.

1. Ninja Forms

Ninja Forms is a popular free-form creation plugin for WordPress. It is most commonly used for contact forms and other such form-to-email requirements. However, the code is flexible enough to integrate seamlessly with WooCommerce products, using this extension.

For this, you can add a simple text input field to your product listing, and charge an extra fee, using the Ninja Forms Product Add-ons extension

Ninja Forms Product Add-ons Extension

In the above example, Ninja forms were attached to the “weapon” product notating that there was another decision the customer needed to make. A simple form with straightforward choices for the customer to see. 

I like this option a lot as Ninja Forms is already a free plugin. So with this add-on, your store could have the add-ons it is needing. Plus, if you are using Ninja Forms for your contact form needs, this would be an easy extension for you to add. 

2. Gravity Forms

Gravity forms is another form builder that has created an add-on for product extensions. They have a really fun demo where you can walk through all sorts of product types, including a pizza builder! I think the style of Gravity forms looks really nice under the products. 

Nexcess Recommends Gravity Forms

It is a pretty comprehensive solution. It provides advanced product configuration forms that can be built and linked to any product in WooCommerce. Forms that contain conditional logic, pricing fields, user input prices, conditional-pricing fields, conditional submit button logic can all be created for your products.

Additionally, any product that contains a Gravity Form is tracked in the cart to ensure, no matter how complex your product form only unique configurations are added to the cart and duplicates are incremented in quantity. 

What I don’t like about it is that I feel like it is a bit of a steep price tag when compared to these other options. However, if it is the solution you are looking for and you are making revenue from the customizations it may not matter to your bottom line. A single site license starts at $99. 

3. WooCommerce Product Add-Ons Plugin

WooCommerce has also developed a plugin for product personalization during the checkout process. Allow your customers to customize your products by adding new options such as input boxes, dropdowns or checkboxes.

With the Product Add-Ons extension, gift messages, donations, laser engraving and any other product that requires user input is now an option for your customers. 

Nexcess Recommends WooCommerce Product Add-Ons Plugin

This plugin is $49 for a single site. I love how it fully integrates into WooCommerce. Plus, you can create any type of product personalization that your products could possibly need in a very straightforward way while still on your “create product” pages. 

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Lindsey Miller
Lindsey Miller

Lindsey Miller is a WordPress and WooCommerce expert and Chief Executive Officer of Content Journey, a content marketing agency that focuses on increasing organic website traffic for their clients through SEO and blogging. She knows WordPress inside and out and has been working with WordPress since 2010 when she started her first WordPress blog. Since then she has attended WordCamps all over the world and had the honor of speaking at many WordCamps and other WordPress events such as WooSesh and WordFest. Lindsey has a bachelor's degree in history and a master's degree in human relations, clinical mental health from the University of Oklahoma.

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