Product Sample for WooCommerce

Product Sample for WooCommerce makes it easy for your customers to order a free or paid sample.

Once you have purchased the plugin, you can download the plugin zip file from the Order Confirmation page. You should also receive a confirmation email containing your license key and a download link to the plugin. If you don’t receive this email, please get in touch.

1. Download the plugin.
2. Go to your WordPress admin, then go to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
3. Click “Choose File”, select the woocommerce-product-sample.zip file you just downloaded and click “Install”.
4. Once uploaded, click “Activate”.

Once you’ve installed Product Sample for WooCommerce, remember to keep it up to date. Read more about plugin updates.

Enter your license key

Once you have activated the plugin:

1. Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Products → Product Sample and enter your license key. You can get this from the Order Confirmation page and the email confirmation that was sent to you after purchase.
2. Click Save Changes to validate and store your license key.

If you get an error saving your license key, please try a second time. If the error persists, please search for your error above or view our article on license key problems.

Plugin settings

• Enable sample for all products: Enable if you would like to offer samples for ALL the products in your store. If you only want to offer samples for certain products then you should leave this blank and enable samples for individual categories or products instead.
• Sample price number field: Use this field to set a price for all your product samples. To offer free samples, you can either leave this blank or enter 0. To charge for samples, enter the cost e.g. 4.99.
• Button text: Defaults to Order Sample: {price}. Use this setting to adjust the default text, such as “Order free sample”. If the sample is free and you are using the the {price} merge tag then it will appear as $0.00 (depending on your store’s currency).
• Enable on shop/category pages: By default, the ‘Order Sample’ button will only appear on the single product page. Enable this option to also display it directly on the product listing pages in your store, such as the main Shop page and product category pages.
• Maximum sample quantity: By default, customers can order as many product samples as they like. Enter a whole number here to restrict the maximum number of samples that can be ordered. For example, if you are offering free samples then it makes sense to add a restriction in order to manage your costs.
• Maximum quantity logic: Use this dropdown to choose how the maximum sample quantity (if set) will be calculated:
  • Set a maximum number of samples per order (the default) – This restricts the total number of product samples that each order can contain. For example, if you set a maximum of 5 then customers can order any combination of 5 samples, whether this is of the same product or different products.
  • Set a maximum number of samples per category – This restricts the number of samples that can be ordered per category. For example, if the maximum is 5 then customers can order up to 5 samples from multiple categories in the same order.
  • Set a maximum number of samples per product/variation – This restricts the number of samples that can be ordered of each individual product or variation. For example, if the maximum is 5 then customers can order up to 5 samples of a simple product. For a variable product, they could order up to 5 variations for that particular product, as well as up to 5 samples of other products.
• Cart/checkout text: By default, Product Sample for WooCommerce will display Sample -  before the product name in the cart, checkout, order confirmation page, and in order-related emails. You can change this to any other text, or delete it completely.
  
  If you want to display the ‘Sample’ text after the product name, then you can do this by adding the {name} placeholder to the ‘Cart/checkout text’. For example: {name} - Sample
• Shipping class for product samples: If required, then you can choose a shipping class which will be used for product samples. For example, this allows you to charge a different shipping amount (or offer free shipping) for samples, without affecting the postage costs for your other products.
  
  Before doing this, you need to set up your shipping classes in WooCommerce → Settings → Shipping → Shipping classes. If needed, refer to the official WooCommerce shipping classes documentation.
• Tax class for product samples: If required, then you can choose a tax class which will be used for product samples. For example, this allows you to charge different tax rates amount (or set zero VAT) for samples, without affecting the tax settings for your other products.
  
  Before doing this, you need to set up tax classes in WooCommerce → Settings → Tax. If needed, refer to the official documentation on setting up taxes in WooCommerce.

Send follow up emails when customers order samples

One of the most important features of Product Sample for WooCommerce is the ability to send a follow-up email to customers after they order a sample. This helps you to convert them into paying customers, encouraging them to order the full version of the products. As a result, the email can have a big impact on your sales.

• By default, the follow-up email is disabled. This is because while it contains helpful wording straight out of the box, we understand that you need to review this – and perhaps make changes or translate it into your language – before you start sending it to customers.
• The follow-up is only sent for orders that contained free samples. It is not sent when the customer only ordered standard products. If the customer ordered a combination of samples and full products, then only the samples they ordered are listed in the email.

You can configure this email under WooCommerce → Settings → Emails.

By clicking “Manage” for this email, you’ll be able to configure:

• Enable/Disable – Enable this setting to start sending the email notification.
• Email delay – Enter the number of days after ordering samples that you would like the follow-up email to be sent to the customer.
• Subject – The default subject for the email is “How did you like our samples?” You can change this to anything you like.
• Email heading – The default heading at the top of the email content is “How did you like our samples?” You can change this to anything you like.
• Main content – This text appears above the table of product samples which the customer ordered. You can change this to anything you like. The following placeholders are supported:
  • {site_title} – The name of your website, which is set under General → Settings.
  • {site_url} – The URL of your website.
  • {order_date} – The date that the customer ordered the sample(s).
  • {order_number} – The order number from when the customer ordered the sample(s).
• Additional content – This text appears below the table of product samples and is a good place to add extra text, such as adding a closing greeting or signature block.

The follow-up email contains links to the full version of each product. Customers can click on these to quickly access the single product page, from which they can add the full version to their cart.

Managing product samples by category, product, or variation

While some merchants offer samples globally, others may have specific items that have samples. You can configure Product Sample for WooCommerce to:

• offer samples of some product but not others.
• make some of your product samples be free, and charge for others.
• select different tax or shipping classes for different product samples in your store.

You can override the global options for each individual category, product or variation. Similarly, you can override the category options for specific products or variations. The plugin will always use the most specific option available.

Product Sample category options

You can optionally manage the product sample settings for all the products in a particular category. Where set, these will be used for all products in the category and its sub-categories, unless you have overridden these for individual products/variations.

Sub-categories will inherit the settings from the parent category, unless you choose to set different product sample options for that sub-category.

The ‘Samples’ column in the list of categories indicates whether samples are enabled for that category. This allows you to see which categories are using samples at-a-glance.

• Use global settings (the default) – This inherits the Enable sample for all products option from the plugin settings page, plus all the other options such as sample price and shipping class.
• Configure the settings for this category individually – This enables samples for all products in the category and its sub-categories, regardless of whether or not samples are enabled globally. When you enable this option, additional fields appear on the ‘Add/Edit Category’ page so that you can override the global settings for this category only (e.g. the sample price and shipping class).
• Disable samples – This disables samples for all products in the category and its sub-categories, regardless of whether or not samples are disabled globally.

Product Samples for individual products

You can manage your product samples for individual products, overriding the global or category-level options.

To avoid clutter, some of the sample options for individual products are hidden by default. If an option (e.g. price) can be managed at a global or category level then it is hidden by default. If it can only be managed per-product (e.g. stock) then it is always visible.

If ‘Configure the settings for this product individually’ is selected then some additional options will appear depending on whether it is a simple or variable product:

• General: Set a price for the product sample
• Inventory: Manage stock for your samples
• Shipping: Manage shipping options and classes for the sample
• Variations: (If applicable) By default, each variation will use the same product sample options as the overall product. If you would like to configure the product samples for a particular variation individually (e.g. to change the price for that variation only) then you need to change the ‘Variation sample options’ option to ‘Configure the settings for this variation individually’. Alternatively, select ‘Disable samples for this variation’ to disable samples without affecting the other variations.

FAQs