Best enhanced ecommerce plugins for Magento

scommerce mage blueacorn tatvic plugins

With the release of Google Analytic’s Enhanced Ecommerce tracking, Magento shop owners now also have the option to track more powerful shopping and checkout behaviour events. Using a Magento plugin to add the tagging to your store could save a lot of development expense.

But choosing a third party library has risks for reliability and future maintenance, so we’ve installed the plugins we could find to review how they work.

The options available right now are:

Advanced features

PluginCheckout options?Promotions?Social interactions?Refunds?
Tatvic
BlueAcorn Y – – –
ScommerceYYY
AnowaveYYYY
DIY setupYY

Our overall scoring

PluginEase of installFlexibilityPrivacyCost
Tatvic422Free
BlueAcorn315Free
Scommerce335£65 / US$98
None (DIY)155Your time!

There is no clear winner so choose the plugin that suits your needs best.

If you are concerned about data privacy then go for either BlueAcorn or Scommerce, but pick Tatvic’s plugin if you prefer easiest installation process.

If you want to spend more time capturing further data – like promotions and refunds – you might want to consider implementing the tracking yourself with Google Tag Manager.

Tatvic’s plugin

Advantages:

  • Fast and easy to install (it took less than an hour to configure everything).
  • Good support by email after installation.
  • Basic shopping behaviour and checkout behaviour steps captured.

Disadvantages:

  • It injects a Google Tag Manager container into your site that only Tatvic can control. Some reviewers on Magento Connect raised privacy concerns here, so Tatvic should clarify how and why they use this data. At the very least it is a security flaw, as any Javascript could be injected via that container. *
  • Product impressions are only segmented by product categories – there is no separation for cross-sell, upsell or related products widgets.
  • No support for coupon codes or refunds.

* Tatvic can help you configure your own GTM container if their standard setup is an issue for you.

Scommerce plugin

Advantages:

  • It doesn’t need Google Tag Manager, so you can be sure that no one can add scripts to your site.
  • You can install from Magento Connect.
  • Update on 24 Aug 2015: Supports one page checkout.

BlueAcorn plugin

Advantages:

  • Easy to install.
  • It doesn’t add Google Tag Manager to your site.

Disadvantages:

  • You have to set your shop currency to US dollars.
  • Support is slow to respond.

Enable Enhanced Ecommerce reporting

To be able to install listed plugins for Magento, you will first of all need to enable Enhanced Ecommerce tracking in Google Analytics.

If you already have it enabled, you can skip this section.

  1. Go to Google Analytics > Admin > View > Ecommerce Settings. Enable Enhanced Ecommerce and set up the checkout funnel steps (see the screenshot for standard checkout steps). enable enhanced ecommerce to install tatvic plugin
  2. Remove your Google Analytics tracking code from the website.

Installing Tatvic’s plugin

  1. Go to Magento Connect centre, open the “settings” tab and enable beta extensions. install tatvic plugin for magento
  2. Go back to the “extensions” tab, paste the link into extension and click ‘Install’. tatvic extension key to install
  3. You should see a successful completion message. successful tatvic installation for magento
  4. Go back to the configuration page. Don’t worry if you see 404 error. tatvic 404 error
  5. Log out and back in again and you shouldn’t see the error anymore. completed tatvic installation for magento
  6. Now add the missing details in the configuration settings, eg Google Analytics account, checkout URL.configure settings to install tatvic for magento
  7. You should see all the checkout steps working. check tatvic for magento is working

Installing BlueAcorn plugin

BlueAcorn’s plugin supports only stores that have their currency set to US dollars. If your online shop is in any other currency, you won’t be able to see most of the data on your product’s sales performance.

blueacorn shop currency US dollar

Installing BlueAcorn’s plugin is similar to Tatvic’s but you have to do two extra steps.

  1. Go to the cache store management, select all items, select ‘Disable’ from the Actions dropdown list and click ‘Submit’. installing blueacorn for magento
  2. Go to System > Tools > Compilation and click button ‘Disable’. how to install blueacorn plugin
  3. Install the plugin.
  4. Log out and log back in.
  5. Re-enable the cache by going back to the cache store management, select all items and enable them.
  6. Go to the Google API tab (System > Configuration > Google API), enable plugin and insert your Google Analytics account number. configure settings for blueacorn magento plugin

Installing Scommerce plugin

  1. Disable compilation mode by going to System > Tools > Compilation and click ‘Disable’ button. how to install scommerce for magento
  2. Disable Google Analytics API. disable ga api for scommerce installation
  3. Upload module to root folder (PDF).
  4. Now flush the cache.  complete scommerce installation for magento
  1. Configure plugin.  configurations settings to install scommerce for magento

If you have any further queries regarding the plugins we reviewed, don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments.

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