Industry guru Dave Taylor answers free tech support questions about a wide variety of business and technical topics, including blogging, Google AdSense, MySpace, Sony PSP, Apple iPod, Mp3 players, management, Linux, SEO, Mac OS X, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Microsoft Windows.

Can I add "free" items to my Paypal shopping cart?

I currently use paypal shopping carts on my website, 1 Madd Max.com. I am going to be releasing some new products but will offer them as an add on to existing items. What I need is a FREE paypal button to add these items to the shopping cart. Currently I cannot do this as the shopping cart needs a currency value to work.


Dave's Answer:
Note: This priority question received a detailed answer within 24 hours, quite a bit faster than the usual 2-3 week turnaround for the subset of questions at Ask Dave Taylor that I'm able to answer. If you're submitting a question and need the answer soonest, please consider paying for a priority upgrade. It also helps offset the cost of running this site too, and it's just generally going to give you some good karma.

Thanks for your question, It's an interesting one. In fact, I called and talked with the tech support people at Paypal to ensure that I wasn't missing something when I gave you this answer.

The bad news: they do not support zero cost transactions in the shopping cart. Period.

I even tried creating a one-cent item with their "button builder" tool then in the HTML code changing the cost to zero, but when you try to add that item to your shopping cart the Paypal system generates a "please enter an amount greater than zero" and it won't go through.

Here, try it for yourself:

Penny image from the US MintAt this point I am afraid there's no way to do this with the Paypal system. Given that, I'd suggest that you just offer "penny upgrades" or similar and have a picture of a penny right next to the item to emphasize that it's only one cent more to add those to an order.

Wish I had a better answer. I imagine if you wanted to go through the hassle of switching to a different shopping cart system you could easily add zero-cost transactions, but Paypal doesn't support that.

The only other thought I have is that perhaps you could have a pull-down option menu for the item that you know people have to purchase, and on that menu it would have all the free optional add-ons? Or even do that as check boxes associated with a specific item in your store?

Good luck however you proceed!



Help others find this article at Del.icio.us, Digg, Netscape, Reddit, and Simpy.

Subscribe!

Never miss another useful Q&A article again! Subscribe to AskDaveTaylor with Google Reader.

Comments

Create multiple items:

1) Basic item
2) Basic item w/ free addon #1
3) Basic item w/ free addon #2
4) Basic item w/ free addons #1 and #2

They all cost the same.

Posted by: Ray at March 13, 2006 3:47 PM

can i get items online for free. Like an action repaly.

Posted by: kenneth at February 29, 2008 9:09 PM

I have a lot to say, but ...
Starbucks coffee cup I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!









Remember personal info?


Please note that I will never send you any unsolicited commercial email. Ever.

While I'm at it, please note that by submitting a question or comment you're agreeing to my terms of service, which are: you relinquish any subsequent rights of ownership to your material by submitting it on this site.









Search
Find just the answers you seek from among our 1700+ free tech support articles by using our Lijit search engine.


Help!





Subscribe to
Ask Dave Taylor!

Add to Google Reader
Add to My Yahoo!
Subscribe in NewsGator Online

RDF   XML

Free Updates!
Sign up and get free weekly updates and special offers on books, seminars, workshops and more.


Recent Entries
Join the List!
Join my author info mailing list, where you'll learn about my upcoming books, speaking gigs, and more!


Book Links
© 2002 - 2008 by Dave Taylor. All Rights Reserved.

Note: This web site is for the purpose of disseminating information for educational purposes, free of charge, for the benefit of all visitors. We take great care to provide quality information. However, we do not guarantee, and accept no legal liability whatsoever arising from or connected to, the accuracy, reliability, currency or completeness of any material contained on this web site or on any linked site.

[whiteboard marker tray]