Introducing the Interspire Secure Payment Gateway

So what does this mean to you? Put simply, we can now help you with everything you need to sell online - software, design services and accepting credit cards. Integrating Interspire Secure Payment Gateway into your store is a simple process. After applying and being approved, it takes just seconds to begin accepting credit cards online.

As per the setup instructions page, it's simply a matter of going to the Settings -> Checkout Settings page in your store's control panel and filling in the new form with your merchant account details:



That's all you need to do to accept credit cards from your Interspire-powered online store. I've also published the press release below:

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PayLeap Announces Partnership with E-Commerce Software Leader, Interspire

PayLeap is an innovative online payment processing solution. The company proudly announces its partnership with Interspire, a leading on-premise and SaaS provider of e-commerce software to over 35,000 customers worldwide.

(PRWEB) June 22, 2009 -- PayLeap is proud to announce its partnership with Interspire, a leading provider of ecommerce software with North American headquarters in Austin, Texas and offices in Sydney, Australia and London, England. Interspire has achieved a Preferred Reseller Status with PayLeap, offering the PayLeap solution to clients across the U.S. and world.

PayLeap has now provided Interspire with a branded payment portal, found on a personalized URL. Interspire's merchant clients are directed to a payment platform "powered by PayLeap" to process online payments, but the portal is branded to match Interspire's online presence, enhancing the user's confidence and comfort. Users get the robust security of the PayLeap solution, without a distracting departure from the Interspire experience.

"By offering our ecommerce software bundled with the excellent payment processing system offered by PayLeap, our customers can now enjoy a whole product solution without having to deal with 3 or 4 separate vendors - it's a big time saver for them" said Mitchell Harper, Interspire co-founder and Chief Product Officer.

PayLeap provides a vital service for software developers like Interspire. The company bundles merchant account and payment processing services for software developers to integrate or resell to their merchant clients. By combining both services into one secure payment platform, PayLeap lowers overhead costs and simplifies billing for developers. Meanwhile, the solution's customizable formatting and easy integration give developers an ease of use that is beneficial for their merchant and ecommerce clients. PayLeap manages all customer service and support, making their solution a one stop shop for developers and merchants alike.

About PayLeap

Priding itself on service, the PayLeap mission is to be an outstanding corporate citizen in the electronic payments industry. Transparency, simplicity and service are the core values of the innovative payment processor. Visit http://www.payleap.com/ to learn more about the PayLeap bundled payment solution.

About Interspire

Interspire is a global leader in web-based e-commerce, content management and email marketing software for over 35,000 businesses, web hosting providers and ISP's. Interspire's offices are located in Austin, Texas, Sydney, Australia and London, England. For more information please call 1800 939 5570 or visit: http://www.interspire.com.

Interspire Featured in the Austin American Statesman's Tech Monday
Our founders Eddie Machaalani and Mitchell Harper thought long and hard before choosing Austin as the headquarters for their new North American office.  When they set up a 4300 square foot office in North Austin, the city took notice.

Interspire was featured in Austin's only newspaper, the Austin American Statesman on Monday. In the article Eddie discusses why they chose Austin over San Francisco, as well as how Austin is different from Sydney, where Interspire's headquarters are located.

Take a look at the article and help spread the word! 

How Interspire Shopping Cart Helped HoodiePeople.com Rank Top 10 on Google
The Internet is the perfect platform for businesses which sell one thing and sell it really well.  Wired Magazine editor Chris Anderson calls this concept the longtail.  Instead of going after everyone, pick a specific niche as your market and focus on giving that niche everything you've got - a great product, great customer service and great support.

One such business using the longtail concept and Interspire Shopping Cart to sell into what some would consider a crowded niche is HoodiePeople.com. By focusing on youthful hoodies from brands such as Zoo York, Marc Ecko, Atticus, and Harajuku Lovers, Hoodie People built both an audience and decent search engine rankings to boot. 

I caught up with Hoodie People owner Hasan Luongo to discuss what it takes to be a successful online store owner in a niche market.  Here's what he had to say..

3 Tips for Creating Ads People Actually Want to See
At one point in time when I was freelancing, I hated my job.  I was underappreciated, underpaid, and totally miserable. My friend suggested that I go to tech happy hours to network and let people know I was an online marketer for hire.  There, I could meet CEOs, coders, designers, and other people who could help me find a better job.

As a somewhat shy female in a male dominated field, I needed something catchy so people would actually remember me instead of toss my card in the trash. Ironically that's how I landed the gig of community/social media manager for Interspire, but I digress...

I bought a Canon 5D digital SLR camera and decided I would take pictures of people.  After all, it's hard to come up to someone just to pass them a card. It's easy to introduce yourself when you have a camera and you can take a nice photo of someone.  I would then post the photos to Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

3 Ways to Keep Track of What is Said About You in Real Time
Keeping track of what is said about your product or industry can be quite hard.  Google rewards sites that have been up for a long time, so just doing an ego search on your company on Google isn't telling of what's going on right now.

There are conversations occurring online right now about your company and in your industry.  What are the best tools for keeping track of what is said about your company or a certain trend either within a day or so or even right now?

Want to Increase Your Google Rankings? Start by Ignoring Google
Search Engine Optimization can seem daunting.  After all, studies show that if you are not on the first page of Google for a certain keyword, most people will simply change their keyword search rather than go to the next page. 

Some SEOs will tell you to pull up Google's Keyword Tool and scour through the most unused keywords and scatter them through your site.  While including useful keywords is key, Google is simply a tool to connect you to the person who is looking for your website.  It is key to write for the person on the other end of your message rather than writing for a search engine itself.  Customer friendly copy is SEO friendly copy already.

Think I'm naive?  Follow the logic...

Top Five Reasons Why We Love Small Businesses
Greetings! My name is Michelle Greer and I'll be blogging/tweeting/writing for Interspire - basically I'll be looking to reach out and connect with you using social media to help grow your business.

My background is in ecommerce and internet marketing and it is something I am very passionate about.  If you'd like to see my credentials, please check out my ClaimID profile. You can also follow me on Twitter, @michellegreer

I was excited to work for Interspire because they create products that make it easy for small businesses to succeed.  As a consumer, I like doing business with small businesses and try to do so as much as possible.  Why are small businesses the wave of the future? Here's what I think:

Interspire Email Marketer 5.6 is Here!


We've just released version 5.6 of Interspire Email Marketer, our email marketing software. Version 5.6 is a free update for existing customers with valid maintenance and can be downloaded from the client area.

Interspire Shopping Cart Powering the Official Store of Wayne Gretzky


After working with our design team for a few weeks, the official store of Wayne Gretzky (the world's most popular Hockey player - or the Michael Jordan of Hockey, as we like to call him) is now live, and is of course powered by Interspire Shopping Cart!

Interspire Shopping Cart 5.0 is Here!

Click here to watch a video overview of new features in Interspire Shopping Cart 5.0

The biggest upgrade ever released for Interspire Shopping Cart is finally here. Interspire Shopping Cart 5.0 took 6 months to develop and includes a whopping list of new features, including discount rules, custom form fields, terms and conditions during checkout, re-ordering, add multiple items to the cart and delivery/event dates!

Learn About the New Features

Visit the What's New? page to learn about new features, view screenshots and more. Each feature is explained in detail and the video tour shows the new features in action.

Existing Customers: How to Upgrade

Existing customers running Interspire Shopping Cart 4.0.x or below can upgrade to Interspire Shopping Cart 5.0 at a special discounted price here. Upgrade instructions are listed on the developer network. Please note that the beta release of version 5.0 cannot be upgraded.

All existing customers will also receive an upgrade email shortly detailing their options. Please note that you are still entitled to maintenance releases of version 4.x if you decide not to upgrade to version 5.0.

New Customers: Try the Demo and Buy

Before you purchase Interspire Shopping Cart you might like to take the online demo for a test drive. Pricing is available online and you can buy directly from our website for immediate download.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact us using the phone numbers at the top of the page. You can also email us or submit your questions from our contact page.