Reordering Customized Products
Reordering Customized Products Using Shopify Customer Accounts
*Please note this article is written in context of Shopify, this same concept applies to any E-commerce platform supporting the concept of customer accounts and account order history.
Overview
Customers who have previously purchased customized products through the VU Customizer can easily reorder those items through the use of Shopify Customer Accounts.
By leveraging Shopify's order history capabilities, brands can provide a streamlined reordering experience that allows customers to quickly recreate and purchase previously designed products without starting from scratch. Operationally, factories benefit from consistency in reproduction of previously purchased products as typically the designs do not vary significantly upon repeat purchase.
How It Works
When a customer completes a purchase through the VU Customizer:
The customized product is added to the Shopify cart.
The order is processed through Shopify.
The order is stored in the customer's Shopify account history.
The order contains a reference to the associated VU Recipe used to create the customized product. The VU Recipe contains the configuration details required to recreate the original design.
*Pre-requisite requires the customer to have logged into their customer account prior to placing the order.
Customer Reorder Experience
Step 1: Log In to Your Account
Customers log in to their Shopify customer account using the same credentials used when placing their original order.
Step 2: View Order History
Within their account, customers can access their previous orders and view products they have purchased.
Step 3: Select a Previous Customized Product
The customer locates the customized item they wish to reorder. Because the order contains a reference to the original VU Recipe, the system can identify the exact design that was purchased.
Step 4: Open the Original Design via the Recipe Reference
The VU Customizer retrieves the saved recipe and loads the product with the original customization choices, including any applicable:
Colors
Materials
Graphics
Logos
Text personalization
Product options
Step 5: Review and Purchase
Customers can:
Purchase the product exactly as originally configured.
Make modifications to the design before purchasing.
Add the product to their cart and complete checkout.
Requirements
To support reordering of customized products, brands must:
Enable Shopify Customer Accounts
Customer accounts must be enabled so Shopify can maintain purchase history for each customer.
Store Order History
The customer's order history must be retained within Shopify.
Preserve the VU Recipe Reference
The original order should store a reference to the VU Recipe associated with the customized product. This recipe serves as the source of truth for recreating the customer's design.
The Recipe reference should also be stored as a link, so when clicked by the user to access the design, it relaunches the customizer. This can be accomplished by generating a link with the URL from the PDP of the base product, and appending the Recipe to it. When landing on the PDP, feed the saved Recipe into the customizer initialization script to load the exact Recipe and have users pickup with the same design.
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