MIVA Merchant is a great shopping cart. Miva Merchant is a browser-based storefront development and management system that allows merchants to create multiple online stores from anywhere in the world where there is Internet access. Miva does not host your site for you. The hosting service you use has to be configured specifically for miva. Which limits your hosting options and making it more difficult for you.

One thing that stands out about miva is their customer service. It was by far the worst company that I dealt with during the review process. They are not interested in answering your questions. Maybe if you pay an additional six hundred dollars to be a Platinum member you might receive some extra attention. But, you shouldn’t have to pay for customer service. The bottom line is that Miva Merchant is a great product but you should be aware of the poor support system.

Feature Set: 

A couple of the features that stand out in Miva Merchant are their shipping and tax configuration capabilities. Miva uses your existing FedEx account info to create a “Meter Number” which links your website to accurate shipping information. Miva also provides real-time calculation of US Postal Service rates for orders in your Miva Merchant store. Miva Mailer conveniently emails your customers, affiliates, etc. within your system special offers and relevant information about your site. Another great feature is their affiliate capabilites. This new feature makes it easy to control commissions you pay to affiliates for both sales and click-thrus. Both you and your affiliates have access to payout reports and you can even choose to add your affiliates automatically or with administrative approval.

Miva has a couple of limitations. Miva offers the ability to integrate with quickbooks for your accounting needs. However, you need to pay an extra $399.00 for it. Their customer support was terrible. Questions take a long time to be answered. Despite the fact that Miva has great brand recognition in the shopping cart industry, they are apparently not concerned with your needs.

Ease of Use: 

Miva is server based software. The merchant tools are setup up with a step-by-step wizard to guide you through the entire process of setting up your website, adding products, configuring shipping, and taxes. Miva adminstration is very simple to use with their interface design. The design is set up with a left side navigation bar to jump to whichever topic you need.

Ease of Installation:  

It is not easy to install Miva. The merchant needs to find a hosting service that already has miva software on it so that it can run your shopping cart. This limits where you can host your site. Also, if you have a question with installation it may be difficult and take a lot of time to receive any help.

Help/Documentation:  

The Help is very poor, unless paid for. First you have to sign up for support ranging from $150.00 to $600.00 a year. They do have FAQs and How-to-Guides on their website.

True E-Commerce Solution:

Is Miva Merchant an E–commerce solution? Yes. They have hosting partners available (although they won’t host it themselves), they give you the tools to develop your website, the merchant tools to manage your website, they offer the ability for credit card processing, and allow flexible shipping options.

Summary:  

Miva Merchant 5 is a good product and receives our eighth ranking of all the products reviewed. Overall it is easy to use and has many features that will help. You can purchase this software so you can host it where you want. However, if you expect good customer support and help getting set up, look elsewhere.

Review: Miva Merchant 5
By Sean Michael Kerner
June 30, 2005

The name “Miva” is now more inclusive than just an e-commerce storefront, thanks to a corporate rebranding of FindWhat.com and a string of acquisitions. Yet the name, Miva is still best known for its Miva Merchant e-commerce solution, which recently hit version 5. The new version includes a number of new and improved features that will likely help to keep the name Miva synonymous with e-commerce storefronts for some time to come.

What is Miva Merchant 5?
Miva Merchant 5 is a mature and robust e-commerce storefront solution with the usual sorts of e-commerce functionality. It allows you to create and manage an e-commerce catalogue, handle payments and shipping - as well as Inventory and Merchandising capabilities.

Miva Merchant 5, as was the case with its predecessors, is quite extensible thanks to a long list of add-on module (at various prices, many of them listed on http://mivacentral.com/). Miva Merchant is available from Miva directly (for installation on your own and installed on your own web server) as well as from Miva hosting partners as a hosted service.

San Diego, CA, 2007/08/06 — Miva Small Business Solutions has been purchased from Miva, Inc. by a management team led by Russell Carroll, who will serve as new CEO for the enterprise, and former Miva executive Rick Wilson, its new Executive Vice President. Rounding out the team are Mark Johnson, VP of Development, and David Roquemore, VP of Technology.

Russ Carroll stated “Our entire focus will be on improving our customers’ experience by concentrating on our core products, enhancing our hosting partner relationships, and supporting our developers.”

Executive VP Rick Wilson added, “As an example of our customer-centered focus, we will be transferring support in-house as quickly as possible. This will dramatically improve service levels as well as strengthen the feedback mechanism from our client base.”

About Miva Small Business Solutions

Miva Small Business Solutions, maker of Miva Merchant, is the world leader in e-commerce software.

Contact Info:
Miva Small Business Solutions
Penni Walraven, (858) 490.2570 x100
pwalraven@mivamerchant.com

San Diego, CA, 2007/08/07 – Miva Small Business Solutions has brought its technical support department back to be staffed and managed “in-house” at its San Diego office. Our new support hours effective immediately are 7 AM – 3 PM Pacific Time.

The new support team is being led by former Miva support engineer Wayne Smith as the new support manager who is building the team with only the highest quality support reps in the industry.

Wayne says, “Building our customers trust in the quality of our product support is my single objective here at Miva Small Business. We’re focused not just on providing support but providing the most competent support for our products possible. Please bear with us as we complete building the team back home in San Diego. While we might have to schedule callbacks with our customers during peak hours, the tradeoff for excellent support is an easy choice.”

Please note when calling during peak hours (usually between 9 AM and 10 AM Pacific time and Noon and 2 PM Pacific time) we may ask clients to leave a message for a callback or go online and open a ticket in our support system.

SpiderWeave.com is now a Premier MIVA Merchant Hosting Partner.  This means great opportunities for our customers.  Our Technical and Sales staff is recognized by MIVA Merchant as being and proficient in MIVA Merchant technology, product features and benefits. 

As part of our commitment to help you grow your business, MIVA Small Business now supports Google Checkout™ for MIVA Merchant 5. Google Checkout is an exciting new checkout process quickly gaining popularity with buyers and sellers, and from now through December 31, 2007, Google will process your Checkout sales for free!

Through MIVA Merchant™, you can easily integrate Google Checkout into your website alongside your existing checkout process. Google Checkout integration enables your customers to buy from you quickly and securely, using a single username and password. Once customers make a purchase, you can use Google Checkout to charge their credit cards, process their orders, and deposit funds in your bank account.

Join the millions of buyers already using Google Checkout, including familiar names like Toys-R-Us, Jockey and Zales, by signing up today and getting free transaction processing until 2008!

Turn shoppers into buyers with buySAFE – and get paid to do it!

buySAFE for MIVA Merchant 5 is a FREE end-to-end trust solution for your MIVA Merchant store that helps you create more confident shoppers, which results in higher conversion rates and more revenue for you every single month.
Best of all, buySAFE pays you for every transaction that your customers guarantee with a bond from buySAFE, so you generate additional revenue while turning more shoppers into buyers.

How buySAFE for MIVA Merchant 5 works

Only the best merchants qualify to display the buySAFE Seal, which certifies that you are trustworthy and reliable, and it makes shoppers more likely to buy from you. To convert risk-averse shoppers, buySAFE also enables your customers to purchase a buySAFE bond to guarantee their transactions – and you’ll earn a revenue bonus for every bond purchase.

MIVA Merchant™ Fast Track gives you the high performance and strong design you want, at a price you can afford. Many e-commerce packages promise simplicity, but ours delivers. With our intuitive, web-based administration and easy-to-use features, you can start selling online instantly.

Specifically designed for new online businesses,

• Simple setup in five easy steps.
• Powerful design tools, with a choice of templates or a custom look.
• Advanced catalog, customer and order management systems.
• Integrated payment and shipping calculation.
• Robust marketing features.

MIVA’s world-class solution lets new online businesses blaze a path to success. Got 10 minutes? See our demo now

No more exporting, importing or time consuming data input! MIVA Synchro provides a quick and efficient way of moving data between MIVA Merchant and QuickBooks^®.

MIVA Synchro does all the work for you with one click of the mouse. You can even schedule it to automatically synchronize at set intervals.

Add or update products, customers and inventory in QuickBooks and MIVA Synchro will update the data in MIVA Merchant.

MIVA Synchro can also synchronize with multiple MIVA Merchant storefronts and/or multiple QuickBooks files, with the use of the MIVA Synchro Additional Store license. 

System Requirements: Microsoft Windows 95 or higher; QuickBooks Pro or Premiere, 2003/2004/2005/2006 (Not included)

Is a MIVA Tune UP really needed? 

Just as it is with many other items we use, such as our cars, web sites, and hard drives, your Miva Merchant store also requires regular maintenance to run properly.

In order to keep your Miva Store running efficiently all stores should adhere to a regular maintenance schedule. The schedule varies from store to store. It is dependent on the volume of traffic and number of orders, module usage, if administrative changes have been done, and other factors. Your store maintenance activities could be weekly, bi-weekly or monthly.