I am adding the cost of shipping to my products. I have a problem. With each additional item people add to their carts, my shipping doubles! How can I calculate the shipping in an easier fashion?

Thank you,
Matthew

If you are using paypal Use there system to calulate I beleleve you go under merchant services . look for calulate shipping.

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How do I get my shipping chart set up? Is there a standard?

Log in to your PayPal account. Click "Merchant Services tab. Click the "Shipping calculator" link.
(It isn't exactly a shipping calculator!). It is where you assign regions that you are going to ship to and assign a shipping price for that region.
(Example would be to divide the US up into time zones at state border, then assign a price to ship to those states.)

Whenever someone purchased and wanted it to ship to those states; PayPal would list that price on the purchase at checkout. You can make many regions, called "shipping methods" by PayPal.

And how do I set these rates? Can I just go online to UPS, or USPS and figure out a cost?

I have a dropshipper, so I don't have to deal with fluctuating shipping costs much, so my experience with shipping calculations are limited. But, you have choices at PayPal to calculate as a percent of order value, set rate, or by weight. I noticed at the USPS site they calculate by weight, I haven't been to the UPS site yet, but it is probably by distance, because I know they allow up to so many lbs. & package has to be under a certain overall size.

With more sophisticated payment processors; there might be a way to link to UPS & USPS to have them calculate the shipping cost, but I don't think we can do it with a "Free" PayPal account.

If I decide to base the shipping cost on weight, where do I enter the weight of the item in Blue Voda so everything calculates?

Now this is just a guess, since I haven't used weight for my shipping calculations; but, I believe when you generate your PayPal "Buy Now" OR "Add to Cart" button; and you select "calculate shipping by weight" mode; you enter a price/lbs. in the chart,(at PayPal).

Then, when you have entered all the details that PayPal allows; they will create the coding that generates the button on your site. You'll copy/paste that code into an html box on your page in BV.

Now, you have one button with all the purchase details for that one item.

You can now paste that code into as many buttons as you need. Then go into the html box's properties and change the codes to set a different code for the rate or weight for that item, etc.

One thing you can't change in that code is the business name code.

Now this info is really just an educated guess, because I have not set one up for weight shipping calculations. You should go to PayPal and generate a payment button so you can see what the code is that it generates for shipping by weight. You can make many buttons at PayPal, so don't be shy about trying it! Infact when I get done with this post; I'm going to PayPal to set up a button for weight shipping to see what the result is!

OK....My educated guess was a little off the mark; but not too far!

You set up your shipping calculator in your Merchant Service page, (Shipping Calculator). Then you create your PayPal button at PayPal. Be sure to put a weight figure where it asks for weight. It will say (optional), but you need to put a figure in there. Doesn't have to represent the actual weight of any item, but must be there to generate the weight code in the button!

Then you just copy that code as many times as you need and edit it for each item.

Example:
<form target="paypal" action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post">
<input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_cart_SM.gif" border="0" name="submit" alt="PayPal - The safer, easier way to pay online!">
<img alt="" border="0" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif" width="1" height="1">
<input type="hidden" name="add" value="1">
<input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_cart">
<input type="hidden" name="business" value="xxxxxx@ipscompany.com">
<input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="Test Item">
<input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="12345">
<input type="hidden" name="amount" value="29.95">
<input type="hidden" name="no_shipping" value="0">
<input type="hidden" name="no_note" value="1">
<input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD">
<input type="hidden" name="weight" value="1.21">
<input type="hidden" name="weight_unit" value="lbs">
<input type="hidden" name="lc" value="US">
<input type="hidden" name="bn" value="PP-ShopCartBF">
</form>

Just change the codes in red to match each item you are selling.