New 3.0 Multi-Step Ad Form Demo

It’s a beautiful Friday here in San Francisco and I’m crazy for staying indoors and making this video now but I really wanted to reveal the new 3.0 multi-step ad form. So I just put together a screen cast to show you all how the new multi-step ad form submission works. In this demo you will see exactly how your customers will submit, review, and then pay for their ad via PayPal before it automatically appears live on your site.

For one of my ad categories called “Boats”, I created a custom form layout and then added my two custom fields.  I then reordered the fields and made them mandatory all within a matter of seconds. I also demonstrate how the new form validation works for both fields and image uploads.

In step two of the new ad submission form you’ll see a summary of the ad as well as a breakdown of how much it will cost. There is also a “terms of use” text box that you can easily modify to your needs. Once the ad has been submitted, you automatically get redirected to PayPal to make your payment. After payment has been made, you’ll be sent back to ClassiPress to see your new ad published.

In addition on the new ClassiPress dashboard, the developer’s edition (professional edition) will show you how much money you’ve made thus far. Watch the demo below to see it all in action.

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Rating: 3 - 3 votes

 Comments (119)

  • Gus

    Hey David, the new ClassiPress is looking great, I know you have been working a lot on it, congrats! 🙂

    Have you considered putting a character/word limiter for the tags input? Users tend to abuse this kind of thing, ending up on having irrelevant tags/keywords in the system and ad, not to mention spammers placing ads on free listings based CP sites. If the user has a limit, they will think more carefully what to put, which will benefit the quality and minimize the amount of time needed from administrators deleting tags not deemed necessary for the website.

    • Carlos Takemura

      @Gus – I agree with your comment but I would like to see David take it one step further and NOT allow users to submit any tags. WP will soon support custom taxonomies with a UI in 3.0, and it will be hierarchical too.

      Tagging is problematic, they will offer little value to the site’s users with typos and redundancies, lack of consistency i.e. pluralisation etc.

      Better for the site admin to create a set of tags that listers choose from.

      In WordPress 3.0 they can even tie them to custom post types. Imagine the implications of this! I’m excited just typing this comment 😉

      Of course, this won’t matter to lazy site owners, but for those of who care it will matter a great deal.

      General tagging, as we know it, will soon be obsolete as the new custom taxonomies feature in WordPress begin to mature.

    • David

      No character limit so if you want to prevent abuse, you can always just remove the field altogether. It’s easy via the new CP form layout gui.

  • Sushi Barcelona

    Hi David,

    After watch your new video I thing you are doing a fantastic job! I didnt get yet any CP theme but I will very soon, but before, one qüestion:

    1.- Is possible in the new 3.0 version to categorization ads by location? Just to help visitors to search local products/services/etc. from the home page?

    Thanks in advance for your answer. With patience waiting new 3.0! 🙂

    Regards,
    Ricard

    • David

      Thanks Ricard.

      1 – Yes. CP uses the standard WP category engine so you can build your hierarchy however you like. If you want the google maps feature to work though you’ll still need to ask the ad owners to enter that location info.

  • Tiago Baron

    Olá David, sou do Brazil, desculpe a traduçao automática, antes de tudo gostaria de te parabenizar pelo ótimo trabalho, gostaria de te dar uma dica que creio eu ser muito importante para pessoas de outros países assim como eu…. por exemplo no Brasil o PAYPAL é pouco usado, usamos mais o PAGSEGURO (Pague Seguro)- https://pagseguro.uol.com.br/#rmcl – assim como em outros países deve acontecer a mesma coisa, eu gostaria que os usuarios do meu site pudessem escolher entre PayPal e PagSeguro, seria muito dificil voce fazer isto? http://www.winnext.com.br/integrar-o-classipress-com-o-pagseguro
    não sei se fui claro, obrigado pela atenção.

  • Tiago Baron

    Hello David, I’m from Brazil, sorry for the automatic translation, first of all like to congratulate you for the great work, I would give you a hint that I think is very important for people from other countries like me …. eg Brazil PAYPAL is little used, the more we PAGSEGURO (Pay Insurance) – https://pagseguro.uol.com.br/#rmcl As in other countries is the same thing happen, I would like the users my site could choose between PayPal and PayPal, you would be very difficult to do this? http://www.winnext.com.br/integrar-o-classipress-com-o-pagseguro
    I do not know if I was clear, thank you for your attention.

    • David

      Hi Tiago. Thank you. Right now 3.0 will only support PayPal. The next payment gateway will be Google Checkout. Since I can’t read or speak Portuguese I won’t be able to write a plugin for Pagseguro.

      Ideally there will be many different payment gateways available in the future and I’ll have to figure out a way to accomplish this.

      If you know of a Portuguese developer who can help, please let me know.

  • Arun

    Hi Guys,
    I can not wait either. But do we have a release date? My business can really benefit from the new release. Luckily we have not gone live so I can wait may be a li’l more for 3.0. Kindly update us on the release dates?
    wp/ classiP fan,
    Avs

    • David

      We are just finishing up on our second week of beta testing. We’ve squashed a lot of bugs and still have a handful left. I am targeting the release for this coming Friday April 2nd assuming the rest of the beta testing all goes well. Keep your fingers crossed!

  • kim

    We are at the end of the month …

    • David

      kim, unless you want a bug-filled product, 3.0 will be released when it is ready which shouldn’t be much longer. Thanks for your patience.

    • Carlos Takemura

      @kim – Not sure where in the universe you are, but here on planet earth the end of March is still 3 days away.

    • Louis

      Kim, we all want it yesterday, having said that, David has every reason to get this to market ASAP, don’t you think? If it is riddled with bugs, YOU and everyone else will be SCREAMING and DEMANDING for it to get fixed immediately..Patience and understanding my dear.

      • Stef

        Louis, to how many people have you told about this ? That a new awesome version of Classipress will be released ? To how many do you think the rest of users have said this ? What about the people who heard from you or others ? How about the videos so people remain excited and want it more and more, desperately ?

        Now.. a question with response :

        What is the best marketing strategy ?

        Use google.. and when you find out, you will realize one thing… when you know what that is, post a comment again here..

      • Stef

        Oh… and how many people do you think have purchased the theme since everybody else spread the word all over ? Just to reserve a spot, because like it`s said everywhere… price will increase …
        When you have a product to release at a higher price, i don`t think you encourage people to purchase it at the current low price…

        You have a brain.. think a little..

      • David

        Louis, I’m glad you have patience and understand. 😉

  • Wasee

    David i got another question for you i have asked a question to you before but got no response from you here is my another question hopefully this time i will get a response.

    Is it possible to create multiple custom fields and combine the values and store them together?

    Let say we have three select boxes day/month/year to get user date of birth and we want to store them together in a custom field called dob?

    Or

    If we have a two fields one select box with predefined phone codes and another text box to enter the phone number and thn combine the phone code+phone number eg 0044+555555 (0044555555) and store it in a custom field?

    Is it gonna be possible in 3.0?

  • kim

    Perhaps it is all pure strategy … As you know that barely wpclassipress 30 is released will be available to be downloaded for free on the Internet, are trying to sell as much as you can before …

    This could be understandable, but it is unfair to those who have already paid for the product …

    • Stef

      Exactly… you don`t need few months to add some features to an already made theme… especially when you have developed it… How many of you have added new features to the theme after you have purchased it ? A lot of you, especially those who know PHP… and you didn`t nmake that changes in few months right ?
      Videos with the new theme ? A demo can be installed and you can make it to reset changes if someone makes them… or you can set it with no changes.. so everyone can see it live.. But.. maybe some decide that they don`t like it.. especially those who are encouraged to purchase a copy now because the price will increase…
      Have anyone of you saw sponsored ads on google ? You won`t… this is the best marketing strategy.. and free of cost… current clients and new ones are doing all the work already… so it doesn`t need to pay an adwords campaign..
      I admire David because he knew about this strategy.. congrats.. but i think few months of free promotion are already enough because people will get tired of this, then everything will go down suddenly..

      • David

        Sure, pretty much anybody who knows what they’re doing can hack some php theme code and it might work great on your site. I do it on my sites when I need to.

        Now imagine having to build a product that needs to be able to work with hundreds of different host providers, in dozens of different languages, and with thousands of different customers all who might configure their sites uniquely.

        There’s a huge difference when writing code for your personal site vs a product that you sell to the public.

        There is also just a general perception in the WordPress community that believes themes are simple to build and develop. Most of them are because they’re just skins for your blog. The most time spent is on the design.

        The main difference being is ClassiPress is a business application with lots of moving pieces that just happens to use WordPress for it’s engine.

        Quality products aren’t just thrown together and pushed live without public beta testing first.

        3.0 was also completely rebuilt from the ground up with much much better integration with WP native functions and cleaner more efficient code. No path problems, no MU image directory problems, etc.

        I am putting the finishing touches on 3.0 right now so we’re just about to cross the finish line.

        ~David

        P.S There is no marketing “hype” strategy going on. The rough release date was set over a month ago and prices will indeed increase after 3.0 comes out.

  • Wasee

    David i am still waiting for your reply to my 2 questions?

  • randy

    Maybe I am missing something but didn’t he answer your question….

    D.
    “There is no field grouping functionality at this time. Good idea though.”

  • Levi

    What a bunch of whiny bitches. David, killer job so far. I’ve never used a theme that was as easy to set up and actually did what it claimed to do like Classipress does. Then I stumbled on this preview of CP 3.0 and I’m even more impressed and excited.

    I’ve got the developer package. I’m in for the long haul.

    • David

      Thanks Levi. You all will be rewarded for your patience with 3.0 by the end of the week (meaning no later than Sunday 10pm San Francisco, CA PST for those of you who live in future time zones. ;-)).

      So a quick update. I’ve just sent out the RC (release candidate) to our beta testers who are doing their final tests over the next couple of days.

      I’m sooo ready to unleash this monster!

  • Tuffclassified.com

    I followed your tweets and found that you are in process to validate your code as per recommended by w3c .
    Thanks for it.

  • Arun

    David,
    I think you are doing what you have to…at the end of the day you are not running a charity and your product is one of the cheapest in the market (though it is not full featured as well). The advantage come of course from wordpress and the large WP community. So continue doing what you are doing…it is a good effort.
    Can you suggest if WPCP 3.0 will have the capability to distinguish between pages and classifieds…as I want to use WP blogging and WPCP in the same website…is it possible?
    Regards,
    Arun

    • David

      Yes, there are essentially three different objects you can use in CP 3.0. Pages, ads, and blog posts. You no longer need to setup a separate instance of WP to run a blog….it’s all built into 3.0.

      WordPress 3.0 is supposed to have new post types which will make things much easier at some point.

  • ppro

    Hi,
    I was wondering if CP 3 has a build in advance search option or how can I add an advance search to it?
    thanks for your time

  • Wasee

    Yea same question i got for you what about advance search or filter search results?

  • Arun

    David, Great to hear about blog support in 3.0.
    People can use an advanced search plugin for custom fields that I use on my classified site ‘WP Custom Field Search’. Very effective and quite flexible.
    Arun

  • ahmed

    hello sir i want ask are this support arabic ?

  • ppro

    Hi David,
    would you please guide me how can I change the layout of CP User UI to Right-to-left instead of LTR ? which css files I should edit ? I know that http://cssjanus.commoner.com/ dose it automatically so how.
    thanks a lot

    • David

      ppro, please post your request in the forum so somebody from the community can help you. I’m not exactly sure how to help.

  • AD

    Is it possible to add regions, countries, cities using classipress (similar to Craigslist)?

    Thank you

    • David

      Yes, you can create as many custom fields and values as you like. The Craigslist pivot table feature won’t be available until a later date, however. But your visitors can do a search based on region, country, city, etc and easily find related ads.

  • Annonces gratuites

    Yess ! very good work !

    Same question, it is possible to add and search by region, cities… with an import…

    Thanks

  • new user

    Does CP 3.0 work with WPMU ?
    Thanks.

    • David

      Yes, Professional and Ultimate Editions both support WPMU.

      • tim

        David what’s the difference between the new editions. Also what edition update will the registered users receive erm ie developers? Im confused what’s the difference between regular, professional and ultimate editions?

        • David

          It will all make much more sense tomorrow but essentially here’s the mapping:

          -Personal Edition (maps to Single Use License)
          -Small Business Edition (maps to Single Use License no footer credit link)
          -Professional Edition (maps to Developer License)
          -Ultimate Edition (Brand New)

  • pedrox

    I bought the wpclasspress 2.9. How do I get the upgrade to 3.0? How do I prove that I bought 2.9? Who buys should not have a reference number? I fear that will have problems …

    • David

      Hang onto your e-junkie email that contains the download link. That will always give you the latest version. Wait until it officially goes out tomorrow before you try again.

  • pedrox

    Sorry, I do not understand:

    “Hang on your mail-junkie that contains the download link.

    I have received or will I receive e-mail-junkie?

    Thanks

    • David

      When you purchased ClassiPress you were sent an email from e-junkie. That email contained a link to download ClassiPress. That same link will also download v3.0 once I have uploaded it tomorrow.

      • Errol

        Hey David!

        first off I wanna say how excited I am over this great pordpress theme you’ve put together! I’ve been coding a site http://www.onlinematchbook.com and I’ve since abandoned that project because this theme is an all in one package that will allow me to set up a dating site such as the one i was putting together! thanks!!

        I also am working on a classifieds theme which will require a separate license i know but before i get too far into coding and configuring the pages how I want them to look I’ve read up on 3.0 and it’s ideally what I need for a “craigslist type site”

        my main question in 2.9 is I couldnt figure out what files to edit to get the different categories also is there an option to set up classipress to search within a certain vicinity like craigslist does per state and per city etc?

        3.0 looks great man it will be uploaded tomorrow?!

        thanks again man looking forward to your response.

  • pedrox

    I no longer have that link … What I do, please? I changed my computer …

  • pedrox

    You do not keep a copy of sent messages? My email is danie@netcabo.pt

    I apologize for the inconvenience

Discussion is closed.