Since TWD-Auction allows you to maintain and run your auction site from within a browser, you have the ultimate flexibility in handling your site. You can administer your site from virtually anywhere that has an Internet connection. You can even collaborate on your site's administration with someone in a totally different geographic location. TWD-Auction provides you with a wide variety of administrative features and benefits, many of which are explained in detail below. The hallmark of TWD-Auction is in its flexibility. You can customize it to use as many or as few of the built-in options as you like. We've had users who have had a basic TWD-Auction sites up and running within minutes, as well as those who have spent countless hours on customizing and tweaking the look, language and functionality of their sites until they find a combination of the built-in options that makes their site look it's best. It's all up to you!
Auction Statistics
As soon as you log into the Auction admin area, you will see some statistics about your auction site. This allows you to always have a quick snapshot of how your auction site is doing.
Default Auction Page Display Options
You can choose to highlight either Featured or Premiere auctions on the front auction page of your site. This allows you to optionally charge an additional fee for this added visibility for these auctions types. You also have a number of options for displaying these auctions either as a list or in a thumbnail view (Option requires additional optional components to be installed on your web server.) A pseudo-randomized option allow for a fair distribution of Featured or Premiere listings.
Item Image Display Options
You can choose from among several possible formats for the images displayed on the auction item view page. The first option is the traditional view where all images are displayed full size. Another option allows you to choose a view which would display thumbnails only and have the an end-user click on each thumbnail in order to display a pop up box of the full sized image. And the final option is to display a one full size image along with all the other images as a series of thumbnails. Then when an end-user clicks on a thumbnail, the image is displayed full size in place of the default full size image. Again, TWD-Auction is configurable and lets you choose which display format you prefer for your site. It's all up to you. (Option requires additional optional components to be installed on your web server.).
Gallery Options
The Gallery is where end-users' auctions can be viewed in a more visual context, organized into rows of thumbnails. You can decide to charge extra for auctions that are included in the Gallery. Alternately, you can use the Gallery to showcase all auctions with thumbnails. Or, you can disable the Gallery view altogether. (Option requires additional optional components to be installed on your web server.).
Category Options
TWD-Auction contains powerful category organizational options. You can decide the order in which your categories will be displayed. Also, you can define special Cat Sets which will allow related categories to share and display the same list of Featured auctions; this is a great option if you are just starting out or do not have a large number of active auctions and you don't want your site to look so bare. TWD-Auction allows you to define an unlimited number of nested categories. This allows you to completely define the hierarchy of your auction site. You can decide whether a category can itself hold posted auctions or whether it will instead act as an organizational placeholder for the subcategories beneath it.
Easy Site Configuration
Configuration and auction system settings are controlled via plain text files. This makes it very simple to make setting changes. You can even make many of these changes using a browser, in real-time!
No Programming Knowledge Necessary
TWD-Auction does not require you to have a computer science degree to get it working. In fact, you do not need any programming skills to use it on your site. To completely install TWD-Auction, you just need to be familiar with transferring files to and from your web server (typically using FTP). If you have good HTML skills, you will be able to completely customize the look and feel of TWD-Auction. If you are going to be using a SQL Server database, you may need the assistance of your SQL Server administrator (if your site is hosted at an ISP, most likely the ISP will be able to completely set up your SQL Server database). If you do not have experience with setting up web sites or web applications and feel you need assistance, XCENT technicians can be made available to help you get up and running as painlessly as possible (at an additional hourly rate - details are available on request).
HTML Templates
TWD-Auction relies on HTML templates to generate much of it's user interface. This is what makes it simple and fast for you to customize the look and feel of TWD-Auction on your site. If you can use an HTML layout tool- or write directly in HTML for you hard-core web site designers- you can create a new HTML template to give your TWD-Auction site a distinctive look. This makes it very quick and easy for you to integrate TWD-Auction into an existing site. In fact, you can just take any existing HTML page from your site design, remove the existing content, and your template is ready to go.
Customize Colors, Fonts and More
In addition to allowing you to customize the template that frames its content, TWD-Auction allows you to customize the look of the dynamically generated content itself. You can customize the Fonts (colors and sizes), table widths and background colors. For advanced users, TWD-Auction also supports cascading style sheets for additional font and link color control.
Moderated User Feedback
TWD-Auction can be configured so that your site's user feedback is moderated before being posted. This allows you to screen any user comments before they appear on the auction site.
Multiple E-Mail Component Support
TWD-Auction, like any ASP based application, must utilize a server side component to send e-mail. TWD-Auction supports a variety of the most common of these components currently in use on ISP servers. Microsoft CDONTS, also known as the Microsoft SMTP service is a free component included with Microsoft's Internet Information Server (IIS) and is the default component for which TWD-Auction is configured when it ships. Some of the other components TWD-Auction currently supports are: Microsoft CDONTS, ASPEmail, ASPMail, ASPQMail, BambooSMTP, JMail, SmtpMail, and SmartMail.
Customizable Email Messages
One of the most important ways in which TWD-Auction interacts with your site's users is by sending out automated email messages for events that include outbid notices and current auction status. You can edit the text in these messages to suit your site. This customization allows you to cater the messages to your audience or even to add advertising or other content to the emails that are sent out.
Mailing List
Through the XUD user management system that is built into TWD-Auction, you can define multiple E-mail lists for your site. Users can sign-up and remove themselves from your auction mailing list themselves without requiring the intervention of the administrator. Since you can send email to an entire list at once, it's easy to maintain a newsletter mailing list, or just to send out news about your auction site.
Language File
TWD-Auction utilizes a common language file which provides a centralized way for you to edit the language TWD-Auction displays to the user. You can easily customize TWD-Auction for another language, for locale specific words, or for language specific to the niche your site serves. You can even just tweak the phrasing here and there to give the site your own personal touch.
Fees
You have complete control over how much you want to charge your users. At the time of posting, you can charge a base fee as well as fees for additional options to showcase the auction (such as image uploads, featured items, premiere items, bold listings, etc.). You can set up your site so that different base fees are charged depending on the type of auction (Standard, Reverse, Multiple Item, etc.) You can also set up closing fees depending on the auction type as well as on the price range of the winning bid; closing fees can be defined as a combination of a flat fee and/or a percentage of the winning bid. You can also choose to make any or all of these options free. So it is easy to set your site up to charge the fees you want.
Subscriptions
Through the TWD User Management System, you can define subscriptions that you offer to your site. You set the price and the time period covered by the subscription. You can even set your site up so that different subscription options allow for different user capabilities or for percentage discounts on all of your site's fees.
Billing and User Management System
TWD-Auction incorporates a built-in user billing and registration system called TWD. Because this system is shared with certain other TWD applications, your auctions can be seamlessly integrated with these applications. If you want to charge for auctions on your site, TWD-Auction will automatically post these charges to the registered users' accounts. You can then bill them on a periodic (usually monthly) basis. Billing information can be exported to any merchant processing software, such as the popular ICVerify. Any merchant processing software or online processors that can accept batch processing jobs in a CSV format will work with TWD-Auction.
PayPal and NOCHEX Integration
It is easier than ever to bill your users through PayPal and NOCHEX. TWD-Auction can now be integrated with PayPal's IPN as well as with the NOCHEX APC. Using these types of integration, users' accounts will be credited automatically when they pay.
Online Processing Modules
If you are accepting credit cards, you can process your billing with just a click of a button using one of the Online Processing Modules that are available. There are currently modules available for:
- AuthorizeNet
- Bank of America eStores
- DirectOne
- IonGate
- Verisign PayFlowPro
We are always adding new modules.
Create a Sense of Community
TWD-Auction comes with TWDForum, which is a message board application that integrates seamlessly with our existing user management system. This is a great way to build a feeling of community among your site's users. You can choose whether or not you want to install the TWDForum module.
Encourage New Users to Join Your Site
Since TWD-Auction allows you to bill auctioneers for posting auctions, you can encourage activity by defining a new user credit. This will allow you to issue a credit to new users so they can feel free to try your site out without risk.
Interfaces to Specialty Auction Indexing Services
TWD-Auction provides interfaces to some search engines that specialize in indexing auction sites. These sites index a variety of auction sites and provide an additional method to make new users aware of your site. By making sure your TWD-Auction site is registered with services such as these, you will make it easier for more people to find your auction listings and therefore to increase traffic to your auction site. Current interfaces are available for BidFind and AuctionHawk.
Automated System Processing
TWD-Auction can automatically send out status emails to users and process closed auctions without your intervention, even if it is hosted on an ISP's web server that does not allow installing executables (EXE, and DLL files). By taking advantage of the features in Windows Scripting Host and Internet Explorer, you can have any Internet connected machine command TWD-Auction to run these automated processes. By sending out these timely messages and updates, TWD-Auction makes your site visitors want to keep coming back for more. |
