We are happy to announce the introduction of iScripts ReserveLogic, online reservation software for the hospitality industry. This software allows independent hotel/motels , B&B, time-shares, campgrounds, tour companies etc.. to take their business truly online with online reservation and customer management.

Your customers can search for availability, book services online and pay online. In this economic downturn it is important for smaller players in the industry to compete with larger players in terms of efficiency and enhanced client management. iScripts ReserveLogic works well with a single property or multiple properties and multiple destinations. This flexibility makes it a great application for travel agencies, tour companies and independent property operators.

We have created this online reservation script with input from number of different types of businesses in the industry. This enabled as to create software flexible enough to meet the needs of your business the way you want run it. There are number of features supported by the system. You can enable or disable any feature with the click of a button to customize it for your business.

Some of the main features of this online reservation script is:

Reservation System    A Complete and easily customizable hotel portal and reservation system.  
Online Payment    Online payment processing with major payment gateway, such as Authorize.net , Paypal, 2checkout, Linkpoint and Google checkout. Also supports offline payments    
Detailed hotel information    Hotel contact information (address, telephone, fax, email, and internet), Hotel class (stars), full description, extra services, full room and room pricing information, time-sensitive availability and pricing.  
Search Facility    Advanced search ability on various parameters (city, room types, class, prices, services and so on).    
Reservation of Rooms    Complete online reservation of the rooms for the ease of both the hotel and the customers. 
Picture view   The customers can view the rooms in detail before booking.  
Dynamic packages   Allows the hotel to provide flexible packages to different types of customers.    
Special offers   Allows the hotel to include special/seasonal offers.  
Inventory management   Provides complete control over the inventory including room allocation and corresponding room rates.  
CMS   Administrator can edit all static pages from the admin panel through the Content Management Systems. No need to fumble through html, ftp and all.  
Multiple Themes   The admin can set different themes so the reservation system appearance changes.

iScripts ReserveLogic is priced at $147 for unlimited users and unlimited transactions.

Just with all other iScripts products, iScripts ReserveLogic is distributed as open source. So you get full source code so that you can make any changes to the software as you like. Or iScripts team can make the changes for you. The hotel reservation software is developed in PHP with AJAX with the backend of MySQL database. As the software is hosted on your server/hosting account your sensitive information is within your full control all the time. And there is no per booking fee. It is your business and you keep 100% of the revenue.

After months of development and testing finally iScripts Cybermatch, online dating site software, is released. Thank you for all your feedbacks and comments. Special thanks to all those who participated in the beta release testing.

One of the major issues with online dating is the safety and security of the members. Unlike the real world your customers can choose to be whoever they claim to be. You can now offer a safe outlet for online dating. We have partnered with leading background and identity check gateways for you to offer optional background check for your customers. It is an optional service for your customers which would improve your customer’s member profile. This is an additional source of income for you, the website operator.

This software is very scalable to support unlimited members. We have stress tested the software to support a large number of online users at a time. It works just fine. So if your dating website grows beyond your imagination, iScripts CyberMatch can handle it. The software comes with multiple layouts. You can change the look and feel by changing the themes from the powerful admin panel. If you want to change the look and feel beyond this, you can modify the css file or the html page files.

Most dating sites they have a single membership plan. This is one size fits all approach, which doesn’t work very well with a diverse member base. iScripts Cybermatch – the turnkey dating script allows you to create multi-tiered types of memberships with different features. For example you can have a free membership with limited features and a paid membership with additional features. It’s easier to convert your free users to paid users than get a new paid user. This reduces your customer acquisition cost.

This dating software supports a number of payment gateways – Authorize.net, PayPal and Yourpay is supported off the shelf. Other payment gateways can be added easily. A different payment types are supported eg: one time, subscription etc. to support whichever model you want to adopt. Of course you can also offer free services to your members.

We have made special attention to improve the usability of your members. Most forms, profiles etc. are further improved with use of AJAX technology to give a better usability.

Some of the other features of iScripts CyberMatch

• Instant messenger - provides an instant messenger service for members to chat with others within the website.
  
• Success Stories -Success Stories could be added based on user input as inspiration and encouragement for potential members.
  
• Content management System -Administrator can edit all static pages like about us, contact us, terms etc. from the admin panel through a Content Management System. No need to fumble through html, ftp and all.
  
• Free Codes -Administrator can distribute free codes for new users as incentives for marketing the site. This is especially useful in the initial stages of the site. If you do any offline marketing its a great tool to bring in new members who can be converted into paying members.
  
• Single Events-Single events can be shown and advertised.
  
• Multiple Profile Photos -Multiple photos of members could be added to their profile.
  
• Multiple Alerts -A wide variety of alerts could be set to sent e-mail alerts or SMS for events like new user registration, Profiles being viewed, new match, interest request etc.
  
• Tell a friend –this feature helps to make the site more popular.
  
• Abuse Reporting -Abuse reporting lets the members and admin block unwanted members from their profiles and from the site to make the site safe.
  
• Powerful search-The powerful search lets users to search and identify users that match various search criteria.
  
• Module Management-The site admin can enable or disable and decide which modules needs to displayed to the user.
  
• Centralized Site Management-The settings panel lets admin to predefine user approval type, album approval type , payment gateway information etc
  
• Multiple Themes-The admin can set different themes so the site appearances changes. The look and feel can further be customized by modifying the css and header, footer files.
  

This dating software is developed in PHP with mySQL backend. As the software is source available, you change any part of it by modifying the PHP software. No part of this software is encrypted. If you do not have access to a PHP programmer we can do the changes for you for a fixed fee.

You can try a full featured online demo to see it in action for yourself. If you want see it in your server, you can purchase it. If it doesn’t work for any reason we have 30 days unconditional money back guarantee.

I see a number of online businesses getting started using hosted platforms or encrypted software solutions. Initially it might be okay when you think you know exactly what your customers want and need. As things progress you will realize the business model you had in mind may not be very accurate. Success of a great business is to adapt to a successful model early in the life of the company. The slower you are, more painful it is going to be.

There are number of articles about the flexibility of business models. Two main examples cited are Paypal and YouTube. Paypal started out as a company to beam money between palm pilots. Fortunately they figured out how to reinvent their model in time. YouTube started out as a online dating site. Imagine what if YouTube was created using a hosted application or using software which is encrypted.

Some of you creating the online businesses know exactly what your business model is and know who your customers are. Good for you, since you are among the tiny fraction of entrepreneurs. For most of us mortals, we have a good idea of what we want to do and we have an idea who our customers are what they need. Beyond that we have not done any user group research that would cost us tens of thousands of dollars. Our focus group testing is normally at beta launch or for some, after the site launch. Sometimes we know we have been right all along, sometimes we figure our models need little bit tweaking. Wouldn’t it be nice if you have freedom and flexibility to do so? When you are using a hosted solution or an encrypted software solution you will not have the freedom to do so. Before you buy any web business software, you want to know if you what it takes to customize the software and what’s involved and the cost. You would be surprised with the answers from many solution vendors.

IScripts develops the turnkey web software and distributes it with full source code that runs behind it. We don’t encrypt anything at all and we are proud of it. It’s not the smartest thing to do for a software company to share the source code with the world. We understand it and we are fine with it. We want you, our customers to have an option to change your online business anyway you want to. With the source code, you can get any PHP programmers to make the changes. IScripts can also do these changes for you. In most cases we would be the most economical and timely solution as we created it from scratch. You come to us for customization because you choose to, not because you have to.

Compared to hosted solutions and Saas offerings, installable software might be teeny bit time consuming to install and set up. You might save few minutes in setting it up. But you are trading it for being stuck it in a rigid business model for a very long time. Once your business is established what would be the cost of migrating to a new platform if you can at all. However for short term projects hosted or encrypted solution is very well be fine.

Here is the bottom line you might need the flexibility for your business model more than you think. It’s good to know you have the option with us at iscripts.com

In the recent years the high bandwidth penetration has been increasing, hardware cost and bandwidth cost has been declining. This has been putting pressure on the top and bottom line of ISPs and hosting companies. Have you, as Internet Service Provider (ISP) or hosting provider, ever thought of how you can benefit from these trends?

As the online backup market is growing rapidly, this should offer you a new revenue stream from your existing customers and infrastructure. iScripts has developed the iScripts Backuper platform with hosting companies, ISPs and resellers in mind. We have developed software platform as a scalable, private labeled solution to offer as a standalone service or along with existing services. Web hosting is an ideal candidate to expand to data backup business.

ISPs and hosting companies can generate additional revenue streams (increase ARPU) by adopting new services, like an online backup service. The demand for securing critical data increases over time. With our technology you can help your customers. Therefore our product is a valued addition to your existing services.

Private branded solution with your name, your logo and your server

We recognize that you want to give their customers a transparent experience. Therefore, we can provide partners with a branded software solution. To achieve an ultimate branded solution that is part of your total data protection and disaster recovery solution, iScripts Backuper allows you to brand both client software (your own name, logo and contact details) and user management panel. Most of all, the entire backup is stored on your servers in your datacenter. It can even share it with your hosting servers.

If you want to create your online store the typical path is to use a shopping cart software. Then assemble different components like payment gateway, shipping trackers etc.. Usually it’s a daunting task for a novice to handle. So most often than not, a web developer is hired to develop the store front.

Recently a number of hosted shopping cart providers have started offering their services. This means small businesses or mom and pop operators can create their storefront by just filling few forms online. This makes the entire process of selling online very easy. This is along the same lines of online site builders appeared in the past. Many shopping cart providers jumped on the SaaS (software as a service) bandwagon.

Here are the main hosted shopping cart services. If you are looking to create a storefront these sites might be a good option. But if you want to offer services similar to them checkout iScripts GoStores

1. Volusion. You can use their templates and design tools to create your own look or you can have one of their designers do it for you. There are several pricing packages to choose from, based on your needs. If you have a good selection of products and you want a truly professional looking storefront, Volusion should be your choice.

2. ProStores. Like Volusion, ProStores lets you design your own storefront or have one of their designers do it for you. And it offers several different tiers, depending on your needs. Unlike Volusion, in addition to the monthly subscription fee, there is also a transaction fee for each successful transaction. While the subscription fee is less than Volusion’s, the transaction fee could add up quickly if your business takes off

3. Yahoo Merchant Solutions. Yahoo offers most of the same features as Volusion and ProStores. The biggest drawback is the 1.5% transaction fee in addition to the monthly subscription fee. If you are at all successful in building your online business, 1.5% can add up to a lot of money fast! Other than that, it brings all the experience and marketing clout of Yahoo to your efforts. Not a bad choice if you can swallow that transaction fee.

4. Shopify. Shopify’s biggest asset is it’s design flexibility. You can have a professional looking store up and running in no time. It doesn’t have all of the features of Volusion or ProStores, but it is easy to work with. Once again, there are several pricing options to choose from and like the others, Shopify offers a free trial.

Where does iScripts come in the picture? We have recently released new version of iScripts GoStores. It is a hosted shopping cart software. It means you can create a hosted storefront business using iScripts GoStores. You just install the software on your server , do the branding and you are ready to offer the same services as Volusion, ProStores Yahoo Stores and Shopify. This open source software from iScripts clone the business model by other hosted store vendors. It took them years to create their SaaS business. You can do it in couple of hours. How is that for a competitive advantage? This is your opportunity to get into the red hot SaaS business model.

Your customers select a store package, register a domain name, create a storefront and host it on your server. All your customer needs to create their store front is fill in the forms just like Shopify, Volusion etc..Once completed it will be hosted on your server. You get monthly recurring revenue from each of the store hosted in your server. Once a customer creates their store they normally stick with you as the pain of moving everything into a new setup very difficult. You can host unlimited store fronts, customers using iScripts GoStores. Its limited only by your hardware limitations. You can generate additional revenue by partnering with payment gateways and offering related design, SEO services to your store customers. iScripts can work with you to offer custom designs to your clients if you do not have designers on staff ( our designers will be in the background).

This software is ideal for virtual communities, hosting providers, web developers, marketing agencies and entrepreneurs.

We have just released iScripts Socialware 2.2 to make the social networking software even better and reliable. The key feature introduced in the new release is a point system and improvement to the job posts section and layouts.

As you know one of the key factor to keep any social community grow is to keep the members engaged. The point system allows social community managers to create a way to engage the members to reward for being active. The point system is fully configurable and admin can decide how many points for which activities. The sample activities include inviting others to join the community, writing a blog, forum post, adding video, picture etc.. This encourages users to add more content and members to the social network. Members have a leader board that show where members with the points. Also members can redeem the points for virtual gifts or real gifts as decided by the social network admin.

In the job postings section now any member can post jobs. This is nifty feature to have a paid membership plans. If you have local community network sites, you can have a paid plan for local businesses. One of their perks is to post jobs in the community. Other regular members can potentially apply to the jobs.

We have also added a number of new professional layouts. Now you have around 30 beautiful layouts or themes to choose from. These layouts cover number of industries and community types. So pick one that best suits your future community or we can create a custom design from scratch.

In addition to it we have improved a lot of minor things across the website. We have paid attention to improving the usability of the website from administrator perspective and end user perspective.

You can test drive the new version at the live demo.

As usual the new release is a free upgrade if you purchased a license in the last 12 months. Others can upgrade if they have an extended support/upgrade plan. You can purchase a extended support/upgrade plan for $50 per year.

Please let us know your feedback on the new version.

We get a number of enquiries from potential customers asking us to compare the inherent business model of iScripts MultiCart to that of existing marketplaces. Customers used to ask how its similar to Amazon market place model. Recently we are getting questions on how it’s comparable to Dawdle.com and Etsy.com.

Our Chicago neighbors Dawdle.com is a new online marketplace specifically for gamers. Main point of the site is to make it “moronically easy” for gamers to list, buy or sell games. The site caters to both individual sellers and professional sellers. The site does not charge any listing fees. Dawdle charges a commission (12% for public) when a transaction is completed. Dawdle charges  buyers and sends the money less commission to the sellers by direct deposit. This  is similar to the business model of iScripts MultiCart. Additionally, Dawdle has a Priceline like name your price method.  This is not part of iScripts MultiCart, as the idea behind iScripts MultiCart is to create storefronts and not auction sites.

Etsy is a peer to peer marketplace for handmade items. Brooklyn based Etsy describes their site as a crafty cross between Amazon and Ebay and Your Grandmas basement. Here users list the items for sale. There is a $0.20 listing fee per item. Once its sold, similar to eBay buyers pay directly to seller through paypal. Seller ships the item to buyer. When the transaction is successful Etsy charges a small commission (3.5%) to the seller’s credit card on file. There are few differences from this model and iScripts Multicart model. First of all in MultiCart buyer pays to the main store not the seller. This is to provide the security of paying to a well known merchant instead of some stranger somewhere. I would be very skeptical to pay to stranger compared to an established business. Another reason for not having a peer to peer payment is that, it limits you to buy from one seller during a transaction. With iScripts MultiCart model a single transaction can include items from multiple sellers. However if you choose to follow Etsy model, it can be achieved by MultiCart with some simple customizations. Also Etsy has a listing fee and iScripts MultiCart does not.

Another business with a similar business model to that of iScripts MultiCart is Amazon marketplace. There seller lists an item at Amazon.com. Buyer buys it. Buyer pays Amazon.com. Seller recieves the order and ships the item to buyer. Seller gets a check from Amazon, after deducting the commission. Some of the advantages with Amazon Model is that I, as buyer am paying to a Amazon. Not to some schmuck in a basement somewhere. That’s huge confidence booster. For the seller Amazon does the marketing, payment processing etc.. for a small fees. This allows the seller to focus on what they do best making widgets as fast as they can and make them well. For Amazon they transfer the product manufacturing, fulfillment etc.. to the seller. They utilize their brand name and powerful online store technology to earn revenue. This is a win-win-win situation. This is the same model iScripts MultiCart follows. As I mentioned earlier in another post, we created this model before Amazon adopted it. No, I am not going to ask for royalty from Amazon.

DaWanda.com is the European version of etsy.com. This marketplace sells unique handmade items and tailor-made items. DaWanda charge a commission of 5% when an item is sold. They payment is going from buyer to seller just like eBay.com or Etsy.com. There is no listing fees for sellers. iScripts Multicart software would require only some minor changes to clone the DaWanda business model.

If you want to create an online marketplace with multiple vendors support take a look at iScripts MultiCart script. If we are close to what you are looking for, we can customize the software to cater your specific needs.

Just to let you know we have just released iScripts Multicart 2.1. It has added few features requested by new and existing customers. Thank you for all suggesting new features. These are the main changes: In shipping we have added real time pricing for UPS, US Postal Service, Fedex, Canada post, Australian Post. The shipping module also supports simple and complex shipping charge calculations. In the tax module we have added some flexible tax mechanisms. It can now support US sales tax, GST in Canada/Australia, VAT in Europe, PST in Canada. You can also assign a flat tax structure for all your products. On Payment Gateways module we have added support for Google Checkout, YourPay and Worldpay. This is in addition to existing support for Paypal and Authorize.net Then there are number minor improvements in terms of usability and functionality. Also there are a bunch of bug fixes.  We are sure these improvements will keep iscripts Multicart the best solution for your multiple vendor marketplace Let me know what you think about the new iScripts Multicart 2.1

We are not supposed to count the chickens before they hatch. But still I think we have a pretty cool application in the making. Its almost ready to hit the limelight. As you know we have a multi vendor shopping cart and a online site builder software.  We have been getting a number of requests from clients on modifying either of it to a online store builder - so that they can offer it as a service similar to yahoo stores,  volusion.com or prostores to their clients.  So this would allow them to be an ASP / or SaaS provider easily. This would a great addition for hosting companies, design houses and marketplace communities.

We have a new online store builder software in the making. Its independent of both iScripts Multicart and iScripts EasyCreate. Current plan is to allow the end user to select a domain or subdomain , select a payment plan and create store. The store would be saved on your server. Your customer can customize the look and feel of the store, add edit categories, products , shipping etc. from the management panel with few clicks. I am not sure about the name yet. But we have been kicking around the name iScripts GoStores for now internally. I will update you once we finalize. If you want to be keep posted about this application or you want participate in the beta trial let me know. If you want to take look at our beta demo contact me at abraham(@)iscripts.com Aji Abraham

Its always difficult to useful and aggregate customer feedback on products and services. Yes, we do get our share of feedback from customers, some more vocal than others. But translating it into actionable and viable ideas are mostly a trial and error method. Recently we have added an idea lab, where we add a laundry list of things in our to-do list and let customers vote for it.  The iScripts Idea Lab ( we copied the concept from Google shamelessly). Goal is to keep it as an informal venue to get ideas to fuel our future growth. So lets know what you want us to work on. We have limited resources, like everybody else. so we want to spend it in areas that can have maximum impact to our customers profitability. So lets know what you want to see from iScripts , let it be a new applications, new features to existing ones or other services. Speak your mind. and be heard.

By the way, thanks to the folks at user voice who created this app, its awesome.

Aji Abraham