I surprised myself when I realised that I hadn’t written a blog post on customising the OpenCart footer area to change the Information Page links it shows by default. It was one of the very first things I did when I started playing around with OpenCart just four or five months ago but I guess it just fell to the side after I had finished poking at it.
On some of the stores I have worked on, I have put in highlighted products, blocks of text, fitting guide links, custom information pages, contact information and social media icons into the footer area. As an added bonus to Local SEO, having a specific address show up on every page will give you vital citations needed for getting a solid base going in your town/city. But generally, editing the OpenCart footer area can help make the ecommerce software your own and can channel visitors around the store a little more effectively.
The file we will be working with can be found at:
- catalog/view/theme/[YOUR THEME]/template/common/footer.tpl
Notice this is just the template file and not the controller? I would always advise editing the file where is is rendered rather than the one where it is put together because there is a much lower chance of it all going to the dogs.
Removing The “Powered By OpenCart” text From The OpenCart Footer
Although we all love the guys at OpenCart, having that “Powered By” text at the bottom of every page can really make your site look amateur and untrustworthy to your paying customers. In this section we will look at getting rid of it and either leaving the space empty or adding in a nice touch like a copyright caption for your company perhaps. Some people also add in a quick Twitter plugin to show their most recent tweets on a single line, again, no problem with that (although remember that it is at the bottom of the page so probably won’t drive a lot of traffic, but even a little helps!).
Simply open up the file I mentioned earlier and go down until you see:
Simply delete all of the text between the symbols to remove the comments and OpenCart Powered By text at the bottom of the pages.
Changing The Information Pages Shown In The OpenCart Footer
OK, to choose which links to put in the footer you just need to stop OpenCart from automatically looping through and gathering all of those which don’t have the “-1” sort order. To do this simply find this text:
You will need to remove the PHP part of this so there is just the HTML left and you can add each new page link as another list item to define your own pages the footer could link to. See the example below:
My New Pages
Remember to change the title of your block to customise that as well!
Adding Blocks Of Text/HTML To The OpenCart Footer
Similar kind of concept here as well, just remove the list style completely from the footer box and replace it with some paragraph tags and you can have a company profile, author box or contact details going across every page. See the example below:
About Me
Hi, I'm Jack! I work as a Marketing Manager but also do freelance work and write blogs on Web Development, eCommerce, Marketing and OpenCart. Follow me to get up-to-the-minute updates on what I'm writing about.
Adding Images And Social Profiles To The OpenCart Footer
Almost the exact same process for adding in images as there is for adding in the blocks of text. Simply remove the list style as before and add in the images with HTML code, link them out for extra chances to get your customer following you on your various Social Media Profiles!
Follow Us!
Follow us to get up to date deals, offers, promotions and more!
And thats it! Again, I’m a little unsure why I haven’t gone through this before as the header and footer if any webpage (not just OpenCart) is quite essential as it appears on every page so can be a decent place to drive a message home!
I would recommend that you be creative! The footer is not a crucial element when it comes to your users (althought it can be for SEO) so you have an opportunity to put new stuff in there regularly to see what drives the most traffic.
Some companies put a “Secret Link” in the footer or a similar mysterious sounding link which people can’t help but click on! See if you can get a few more hits on your promotion pages by trying it out!
Buy the vqMod file to remove the Powered By OpenCart Link
Don’t want to do this yourself or can’t work it out? You can buy the vqMod file which allows you to remove this link automatically without changing the core system of the store! Buying this download helps me keep blogging and giving away information for free and helps pay off that terrifying student debt! Please note that I developed this vqMod for OpenCart 1.5.3.1, which I would recommend using as it is the latest at the time of writing, so it may not work for other versions.
