• Edit customer account settings: Returning to the customers section, you'll notice below the list of customers, there is a link to configure the customer account settings. You may remember from the chapter on settings, there are three options for how customers check out their purchases in your store: by simply filling in the order form; with a customer account that was created after a previous purchase; or only when the store owner has created an account for them. Refer to customer account settings in the section on the checkout settings in chapter 8 for more details.

Searching For Customer Profiles

If you want to find a customer's profile based on their name, you can simply type their name in the search box "Start typing a customer's name..." As you type, the list of customers below will be updated to display the results.

You'll notice a Save this search button to the right of the search box. Using this, you can save this search so you can get back to it quickly in the future. A link to this saved search will be placed in the row above the search box.

You can of course also do a quick search for a customer or an order using the search box in the upper navigation. Type your search word and press enter or return on your keyboard and the orders that best match your search will be displayed under the search box. Click the order that interests you to see the full details of the order. Or you can click the link View all search results to see the full results.

Using filters with customer profiles

Filters can be a very powerful way to find specific customer profiles. We have already seen filters in action with orders. There are eight specific filters that you can use to find the exact group of customers that you want.

Just follow these simple steps to take advantage of these powerful filters:

• Click the button Filter customers to reveal the menu with the filters.

• In the dropdown menu "Show all customers where", you'll find a list of filters: "Money spent", "Number of orders", "Placed an order", etc. You can see the full list of filters in the screenshot on the last page. Choose the one that interests you - I chose "Money spent".

• A second dropdown will be revealed in which you will have to choose the next element to make up the filter. Having selected "Money spent", I have the choice of "is greater than", "is less than" or "is equal to". I chose "is greater than". In fact, for each of the criteria that you can choose in step 2, there is a different set of options. For example, for "Placed an order", you'll have to choose from "in the last week", "in the last month" etc; and for "Located in", you'll have to choose a country. Make your choice in the second dropdown menu.
  

• If the filter you chose requires a third element, fill it in. In my case, I need to fill in what the money spent should be greater than. I'll put in 100 to represent $100. That gives me "Money spent is greater than $100".

• Click on the Add Filter button and the list of customers will be updated to reflect the filter you used.

You'll see the filter name just under the search box - in the screenshot, it's "Money spent is greater than 100". You can always remove a filter by clicking the x.

Adding more filters

You can also apply a second filter, or indeed as many filters as is useful. This can help you find a very specific customer group. After applying a filter, simply create another filter following the steps above.

Saving a filter

Each time that you carry out a search or apply a filter, you have the option to save that search and/or filter. Click the button Save this search that appears to the right of the search box. In the pop-up that appears, you'll have the choice to "Save as a new search" or "Overwrite an existing saved search". Saved searches appear above the search box.

I named this saved search "Spent > $100 (Accepts Marketing)": you can see it above the search box.

Viewing And Editing Customer Profiles

There will be many times when you will need to look up a customer: perhaps to find a specific order or perhaps to find their contact details. Once you have located the customer using the search or filters, simply click on their name to view their profile. This provides an overview of their order history, contact details and any notes you have made.

In fact, the profile provides some really useful information. Apart from the customer's contact details, you can also see the status of all the orders they have confirmed and you can view any of the customer's orders by clicking on the specific order number.

To edit the customer's information, address or to add a note, click on the Edit link at the top right. You can also associate specific tags with the customer, for example "prospect", "business", "individual", etc. Remember to click the Save button when you are finished editing the profile.

Summary

In this section, we looked at how your dashboard will change after you launch: it's full of interesting statistics on your fledgling new business. Then we looked at managing orders in the admin: filtering and sorting through orders, managing the order payments and fulfillment, as well as cancelling or closing orders. Lastly we saw how you can search, filter and sort through customers to find the customer profiles you need.