We recently upgraded our automotive clip site from CS 1.3.5 sp4 to CS 2.1.? and needed to get a better looking skin that didn’t look like an “out of the box” skin. So after talking with a couple of people on the forum we started in contact with brandonvd. What we ended up doing was taking the old skin we had and getting it converted on to 2.1.? Not only did Brandon do an excellent job, but he was very fast and fixed a couple of things that didn’t look right.
One of the other nice parts is he used “hooks” on most of the changes and only had to change the bottom.tpl and one minor “language” change. So hopefully the skin won’t get messed up with the next upgrade.
[QUOTE]One of the other nice parts is he used “hooks” on most of the changes and only had to change the bottom.tpl and one minor “language” change. So hopefully the skin won’t get messed up with the next upgrade.[/QUOTE]
You will be amazed at just how much difference this will make as soon as you perform your next upgrade!
Yeah, the whole “hooks” things is still a mystery to me. I tried to customize with them but just couldn’t figure it out. Brandon did a great job and without a doubt made the site look better. Likewise I’m not quite as afraid to upgrade…well at least because of the skin. I still have to worry about other mods and also if the upgrade works itself. 
[quote name=‘clips’]Yeah, the whole “hooks” things is still a mystery to me.[/quote]
It’s easy to understand what ‘Struck’ means: If you use the built-in hooks created by CS-Cart team in the templates, then the upgrade should be fine untill the same hooks-tags will appear in the upgraded files. If you make your ‘own’ hook-tags in the templates, they will be overwritten by the next upgrade.
I just can’t figure out how to get the hooks to work in the first place. I tried a few things a couple of months ago but I could not get anything to show up on the site, so I gave up the ghost on it and spent my time elsewhere. The good part is Brandon got it done for me.
Many thanks to Brandon (brandonvd) who just re-skinned another site for our playing card and game website. He successfully brought our custom skin from 1.3.5 sp4 to 2.1.4 and it makes our site looks so much better! The day we launched it our sales started to increase. Sometimes I don’t think we realize how important it is for a small site to “fit” what you are selling. I think it lets people know you are more serious about selling online. In my opinion cosmetics are important.
Anyway, if you need someone who can bring your skin over from an older version, and still allow you to be update your site without breaking it, then without a doubt brandonvd will do a good job at a fair price.
[QUOTE] In my opinion cosmetics are important.[/QUOTE]
Well, Hello! If I visit a site that looks like my Aunt Betty’s 7th Grade son built, then I will quickly click on outta there, for starters 1st thing I will wonder is, considering the way the site looks, if they even know enough about security to have the ability to protect my personal details, my conclusion will be no. 
Considering you have like 15 microsites now, you should just hire Brandonvd as a full time employee with a full benefit package!
[quote name=‘Struck’]Well, Hello! If I visit a site that looks like my Aunt Betty’s 7th Grade son built, then I will quickly click on outta there, for starters 1st thing I will wonder is, considering the way the site looks, if they even know enough about security to have the ability to protect my personal details, my conclusion will be no.
Considering you have like 15 microsites now, you should just hire Brandonvd as a full time employee with a full benefit package! :p[/QUOTE]
I’m confused. So…does this mean that our old design and Brandon’s updated skins for our sites look like “Aunt Betty’s 7th Grade son” built them? I believe both sites look very professional and both sites fit the product we are selling.
Also, the designs that were done were for licensed CS-Cart sites that use a ssl.
BTW, a good example of a “cosmetic” site that fits their product would be someone like Build a Bear. I’m know there are tons of other examples. Not everyone can look like a generic Wally World or Amazon and WOW am I glad they do not! Talk about a boring internet.
On the microsites, I’m not for sure how we’re going to play that one yet. They are pretty much just a test at this point so we won’t do a different skin for each site, if we do one at all. We really don’t know what to expect from them. They may end up being a waste of internet space (and our time), or they may prove to be something we can better. I really don’t know. What I do know is they will provide more links to our main sites and they have already been “spidered” by search engines and put on the 1st or 2nd page for particular search terms even though we have not loaded any products on them yet! So what the heck, I can’t write CS scripts and I haven’t figured out how to “skin” a CS-Cart, but I can test marketing techniques and ways to try to increase business and the sites give a batch of links back to CS-Cart.
Not to mention I sure as heck know how to install CS-Cart on a server now! It ended up being a lot easier than I thought.
On the microsites, if we do a skin for each or one for all, then I probably will use Brandon if he is interested. Unfortunately, I doubt it would be enough to hire him full time. 
[QUOTE]I’m confused. So…does this mean that our old design and Brandon’s updated skins for our sites look like “Aunt Betty’s 7th Grade son” built them? I believe both sites look very professional and both sites fit the product we are selling.[/QUOTE]
Of course not Clips, I haven’t even seen your sites nor would I say anything that cruel even if I did have thoughts like that!
I was just kidding you, and I am sure that my 1st site or two did look like something my Aunt Betty built, but she is nasty and hopefully doesn’t read this post! 
I was kind of thinking you were kidding, but I wasn’t for sure what your thinking was.
@struck
I was going to pm you the sites as I would love to hear your thoughts but it appears you do not have the pm or contact set up. I really do not want to post them here because it creates too much bogus traffic. I also thought someone said it helps hackers or something know which shopping cart we use and they could attack our site easier. I really can’t remember.
Yeah, sorry for turning off the PM.
I just have so much on my plate most of the time that I end up feeling bad when I can’t reply to someones PM, so i ended up just disabling it several months ago.
Maybe I can turn it back on.
I had BrandonVD skin one of my sites and he was really great. Can’t say enough good things about him. On time, professional, really knows his stuff, helped me in an emergency.
I will definitely use him again on future projects.
[quote name='sholand' timestamp='1300490079' post='107206']
I had BrandonVD skin one of my sites and he was really great. Can't say enough good things about him. On time, professional, really knows his stuff, helped me in an emergency.
I will definitely use him again on future projects.
[/quote]
Ditto. Brandon is smart, fast and nice. Pleasure to work with.