# Questions for Deconetwork users??



## amc01 (Jul 18, 2012)

Hi All,

I am new to the forum and have a few questions for anybody using Deconetwork, If anybody can help I would greatly appricate as I don't want to find out the hard way!!

1. Can you upload your own blank design templates e.g. for sublimation novelties like jigsaws, Iphone covers etc?

2. What way does the contract work, is it Monthly/Annually and if annually can you terminate at any time if not happy with the product?

3. Are all the stock clipart/templetes royalty free/covered in the fee or does the customer have to pay to use them?

4. Are updates included in the monthly pricing as I see v5 is coming soon and I don't want to sign up now to find that I should have waited for v5? 

Hope this all makes sense,

Thanks in advance.


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## mike gammons (Mar 9, 2012)

I use the deco network and all the question that you ask the answers are yes. You can pm me or contact deco rep they will be glad to talk to you on phone. 


Sent from my iPhone using TShirtForums app


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi there,

I tried replying via my phone from LAX but the internet kept dropping out so sorry for the delay in reply on this one!

I'll answer each of your questions separately.

1. Yes you can upload your own artwork and designs. In fact, if they are CorelDRAW then you can nominate them as templates which a user can select and personalize. Here is a link to show you a CorelDRAW .CDR template in action on Deco. DecoNetwork Demo Store

2.We don't have any lock-in contract on DecoNetwork so its just month to month. We believe in keeping our customer through good service and product, not contracts. We also don't have any up-front set-up fees.

3. There are some royalty free ones and others have a royalty fee. You are made aware of this when you activate a collection. If there is a fee the fee is charged to the buying consumer on a per-use fee. i.e. For a t-shirt if the nominate a royalty design they will be told it is a $1.500 or $2 fee for example, and the consumer will be charged this as part of their order. Therefore, you are never out of pocket for the use of royalty designs.

4. All updates are 100% free so no need to wait! That's the great thing about a subscription model.

If you have any other questions feel free to reply or call us direct on 855-DECONETWORK.

Thanks,
Brenden


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## amc01 (Jul 18, 2012)

Hi Brenden,

Thanks for such an in depth reply,

Sounds great!! 
One last question, How does it handle photos Bitmap/Jpeg as it only mentions Vector output on the site what is the output for these?

Thanks.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi,

No problem at all with raster (bitmap). In fact, most users select PNG as the production output file and CDR as the editable file. You can actually nominate a different file format for the production and editable file. This way you don't need to keep converting. So no problem there.


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## amc01 (Jul 18, 2012)

Great,

Well I think thats all bases covered.

Am I right in reading your site that once I sign up I will instantly be redirected to configure the site and it will be live? 

Thanks.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

We live in a sense that you can start right away but of course you need to set products, etc before going "live".


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## amc01 (Jul 18, 2012)

Of course,

That's what I was referring to anyway!!

Thanks for all your help.


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## Richboyceo (Nov 28, 2007)

What are the advantages of the DecoNetwork vs InkSoft? I am looking to expanding my site.. looking for info..


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## Riderz Ready (Sep 18, 2008)

Richboyceo said:


> What are the advantages of the DecoNetwork vs InkSoft? I am looking to expanding my site.. looking for info..


In a span of three years we have installed and implemented OSS Designer, RSK, PikiWare (now Deconetwork), Inksoft and now back to Deconetwork.

I can say each has a place in the market and it really depends on what you need. If you are a standard on-line t-shirt shop I can say any of them will work. On the other end if you need great flexibility than Deconetwork wins hands down. Our site is totally Deconetwork - we did not imbedd the designer into our site as we tried that in the past with less than stellar results.

We do cut and sew jerseys with our main business being teams. There is also a huge market for individual riders which is why we have been searching for an on-line tool for so long. For us it was key that our site did not look like the majority of on-line t-shirt design sites. We did not want to distract visitors. We required our site to look like our standard web site yet have the on-line designer as part of the site. The best example is to visit our site and visit an Inksoft site. You can visit our site from the link below and you can visit an Inksoft example of someone that does what we do and compare - Animal Customs Jerseys | Custom Sublimation Jersey Paintball Bullfighter Angler BMX ATV Shooting Sports. 

One is not better than the other but points out the difference in what you can do with Deconetwork if you do not want a on-line design looking web site. 
Deconetwork has DecoCoach which allows you to use Deconetwork resources to create this type of look among others.

Another key feature for us is - how you can display a product. With Inksoft the Product Display is the "front view". With Deconetwork you can create a totally separate image to be you Product Display. With cut and sew this is a huge difference. See below for example. We believe strongly that the Product Display offered by Deconetwork will generate more sales than the Product Display of Inksoft. We have started to implement this feature into our affiliate sites and once done implementing it into our own store as well.

Last is the Deconetwork Business Hub that allows you to create quotes, etc. 

In short you are looking, at least in our opinion, the two best systems on the market. Just depends on what you need out of the solution.

Best of luck to you.


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## tshirtsrus (Jun 6, 2007)

Hi,

do you need to start paying from the start or they give you time to design/upload products?

Also how you handle or more correctly how the designer at Deconetwork handles customer submitted low resolution images?

Thank you.


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## Mietek (Jul 17, 2012)

Hi Tshirtsrus,
There is no setup fee in DecoNetwork, in that sense that you don't pay extra for opening a store, but the monthly subscription starts at the moment you will sign up. Also, in DecoNetwork you can set the minimum and perfect DPI against each design area on your products. If the quality of the uploaded image is below the minimum you expect, the customer will get a warning about the quality and it will ask him/her if they still want to proceed with the order. For the entire time you can also see the quality bar in the designer where green means - perfect quality, yellow -acceptable quality, and red - below the minimum DPI.

Cheers,


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## tshirtsrus (Jun 6, 2007)

Mietek,

thank you for your first post, it was very helpful


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

I've been looking at DecoNetwork.com today and I'm pretty impressed. So far as I can see it's got about everything we're looking for - without being stuck with lots of additional stuff that we don't need for our digital processes.

Something I don't understand - what is the Business Hub exactly? Why is there a commission charge for online orders, but not Business Hub orders? What's the difference?
(I couldn't find anything on the website that seemed to explain this).


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi Beachy,

Business Hub is an internal tool for you sales team to create quotes, orders and invoices for your clients. It will email a highly visual quote to your customer and allow your customer to approve and pay for it online. It all runs in the cloud and is compatible on all devices from Windows, Mac, Android, iPhone / iPad, etc. It's integrated with your DecoNetwork front webstore therefore shares the same customers, products, designs, etc. There are some videos on Business Hub - Quote, order and invoice management system for the decoration industry | DecoNetwork.

The orders generated in Business Hub are typically much larger in volume and value than online. I.e. staff uniforms, 1,000 tshirts for a charity event, etc. Therefore working with our existing customers in testing Business Hub a number of years ago we determined it is best if Business Hub is transaction free as the order is typically of a much higher value plus the sales person generating the order is typically entitled to some form of commission for the same.

There is no additional charge for Business Hub and its standard in all levels of DecoNetwork.


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

Thanks Brenden - that's very helpful. I haven't worked my way through all of the videos etc. yet!

I definitely think this is something we want to try. If nothing else I'm in love with the idea of not having to create individual images for every single possible combination of our products and designs, which is what I'm having to do at the moment! Anything that can do this for me automatically seems like a great idea!

Actually - when I was trying out the demo store earlier the "preview" for the design didn't work. Just opened a little window that stayed empty. Should this be working? (Could well just be my PC having a cranky moment again!)


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi,

Do you mean this preview in the designer? (See attached)

Seemed to open for me. If you have a direct link I will gladly check it out!


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

Yes - that's the one. I just wondered what it was supposed to do, as it wasn't showing the image for me, just the empty box. It was there Ok in the main window and the little thumbnails at the bottom left. Maybe it was just taking too long to process (it was a big image), but more likely a problem on my PC.

It really doen't matter, I just wanted to know what I should really be seeing. Thanks again!


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

No prob. If you have any other questions please feel free to ask here or our in site chat tool.

Cheers.


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

Strange. Must've just been something about that image it didn't like. I've tried again with some much bigger images and the preview came up very quickly with no problems. 

Couple of questions while looking through the videos...
Our pricing is all set up to include tax and shipping on every item. Is it possible to do this with DecoNetwork? Either by setting tax and shipping to zero, or is it possible to even skip the shipping step?
Thanks.


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## Mietek (Jul 17, 2012)

Hi Beachy,
In DecoNetwork you have a separate option dedicated just for the tax settings, and you can also decide to include that tax in your prices on the site, so the answer is yes you can do that  This is a common practice in European countries and in Australia, while most of the stores in US decides not to do it and display tax cost during the checkout only. DecoNetwork keep this optional, so it is up to you in which way you want to do it.

In regards to the shipping, that step is required but you can create "Free Shipping" method where the cost for it will be 0. Since your cost for the shipping is included in your prices, it can actually benefit you from the marketing standpoint that your customers will need to select "Free Shipping" during the checkout. 

hope this helps.


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

That's great! Thanks for the reply.


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## suzamac (Mar 18, 2008)

A quick question. We had Deconetwork but one area of frustration was the inability to create a matrix pricing scheme for full-color digital. We know it's possible because your embroidery pricing was in a matrix. Has that been added yet?


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi Suzamac,

Yes we have a quantity and #of areas used pricing table for DTG now.


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

Well.... finally decided I was ready to give this a try, but I'm getting nowhere fast at the moment 
The only thing I've managed to do successfully is set up the shipping.
The help files all seem to relate to a different version that has a completely different set of menus and everywhere it tells me to find something doesn't actually exist.

When I was looking at the videos a couple of weeks ago there was an introductory one for V5, that went through all the basic setup info. I can't find that anywhere now, does it still exist? The intro to V5 on the site seems to be for people who are already running the store.

Any chance of a link to the other vid please?


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi Beachy,

Here is the direct link to all the Getting Started guides:

Getting Started | DecoNetwork

You can also call our team direct on Tel: 855-DECONETWORK (855 332 6638 within USA) for any over the phone assistance!


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## beachy (Aug 2, 2007)

Thanks for the link.

I've had a quick look at the video and I don't seem to have the same menu items that are shown. Is this for a different version or have I missed something somewhere?
I seem to be missing most of the items that are shown under "Website Settings" for Branding and Appearance and Store Configuration.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Can you PM me your website address so I can check what version / level you are on?

Thanks.


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## redzar (Oct 26, 2012)

hi, brenden: a few questions about features for the premium plan.
1. on white label and domain settings:"Like to keep your technology a secret" - Q: when an affiliate signs-up, will my own domain (www.affiliate.*mydomain*.com)be the only choice or my domain would not even show up, instead deco domains will show?. if that is the case, does'nt it defeat white labeling?
2. the website shows a list of supported payment gateways;do you have a list of shopping carts too? unless, these gateways have their own shopping carts already.
thanks a lot.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi Redzar,

1. The choice is 100% yours. You can use DecoNetwork domain names like deco-apparel.com, deco-shirts.com, deco-printing.com, etc or add your own domain name such as freestores.com that way when people sign up they can call their site brenden.freestore.com for example.

If you hide DecoNetwork domain names then they will have no choice to to select one of your domains.

2. DecoNetwork has a shopping cart integrated so you don't have to worry about any of that! Website, online designer, shopping cart and API integration to selected payment gateways shipping providers are all included.

Hope that helps.

Brenden


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## redzar (Oct 26, 2012)

hi brenden:
1. if they signup under any deco domains and not under my domain, would that particular signup be my affiliate or an affiliate of deconetwork?

if they select other domains other than mine, then, they become affiliates of that domain?

2. i have other plans thats why i'd like to know if any of the shopping cart is available for my purpose. can i have the list?
Thank you very much.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi again,

#1. DecoNetwork does not do any printing or fulfillment so we don't have any affiliates of our own. We only provide the platform for printers and decorators like yourself to use.

So the way it works is on your site there is a 'Create a store link'. They select that and they are your affiliate selling your products. You do the production for them. When they signup they can pick a free DecoNetwork provided domain name. There are over 50 of them to choice from like the deco-apparel.com, deco-sports.com, etc that I mentioned before. They can also add their own like www.brendenstees.com. You as the owner of DecoNetwork can decide if you want to have the DecoNetwork domains listed. If not they wont appear but you can specify your own domain names and as many as you want. i.e. makeatee.com, mytees.com. When they create a store their domain name can be brenden.makeatee.com instead of brenden.deco-apparel.com.


#2. Just to clarify with DecoNetwork you don't need to get an external shopping cart software. Everything is provided so there is no list. There is just the DecoNetwork shopping cart that we custom built for the decoration industry.


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## marinot (Oct 18, 2012)

Hi Brenden, we are having a hard time with artwork issues as you advised us we went our and $1600 worth of artwork from digital art solutions which we were advised that are now partnered with you.

We were told that all their templates would be completely editable on your network, well we have been trying, with no luck spoke to your guys in Qld and are now waiting for some answers.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi Marino,

We checked out your case and the .CDR file was using unique fonts not available on our server. I emailed you the specifics of the issue. Once the fonts are sorted we should be good


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## marinot (Oct 18, 2012)

Brendan, I hope so...getting a bit frustrating... thanks again


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## familyfanclub (Jan 22, 2008)

marinot said:


> Hi Brenden, we are having a hard time with artwork issues as you advised us we went our and $1600 worth of artwork from digital art solutions which we were advised that are now partnered with you.
> 
> We were told that all their templates would be completely editable on your network, well we have been trying, with no luck spoke to your guys in Qld and are now waiting for some answers.


Brendan, what are the terms of using DAS designs in DecoNetwork? We have 12+ books of art, can I use all of that in DN? What are all the terms, agreements with using DAS designs in DN?


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi there,

I'm afraid I can't answer that as it's not DecoNetwork's terms and conditions that may have any restrictions. It is the copyright owner of the content that may apply restrictions so I would reach our to Digital Art Solutions for that. 

We have no restrictions. If you have rights to use the CorelDRAW files of a company then you can use them in DecoNetwork.

Thanks for your question!


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## Glyphism (Dec 5, 2012)

Speaking of restrictions. I am in Melbourne Australia, and I'm in the process of trying to setup a business using Deco Network, and I'm having a hell of a hard time with vendors. The one road block is that we need to change the text that appears on pages such as Returns Policy, Shipping, Privacy Policy etc. I'm being told it can't be done and that I need to use their text which states their own business name, contact details etc. Obviously I can't run a business with someone else's contact information littered across my site...

We have a site that is 99% finished and ready to go (and pre-orders already from buyers/shops) and the vendor is telling me I can't edit those few minor bits of text and I should go and build a new site from scratch. Is this really a restriction with the system, it makes no sense at all?

It's made the experience very frustrating, and now I'm looking for either alternatives to Deco Network, or a vendor in Australia who actually knows how to use the system.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

Hi Glyphism,

Thanks for reaching out. You actually can change the privacy, policy, and other agreements. That's essential for any business.

You browse to Settings > Commercial Terms. Here you edit a whole list of commercial related documents such as Returns Policy, Shipping, Privacy Policy.

Now if you don't have that setting then it could be because you are an affiliate of a DecoNetwork Fulfillment in which case yes you can't change these documents. The reason being is that you are not the trading business. You are just an affiliate and the fulfillment center is the legal trading business who has the commercial and financial exchange with the customer. Under this basis the agreements must legally be offered by the Fulfillment Center and must state their name.

It sounds like you might be a serious business more than just an affiliate in which case you should consider opening your own DecoNetwork Fulfillment Center. You can still outsource you production to who ever you want but you will then have full control over the agreements, finances and other settings that are only available for a fulfillment center.

The analogy would be Cafe Press. If you signed up as an affiliate to Cafe Press you can't modify their legal terms as the transaction with the consumer is between the consumer and Cafe Press.

I'm in Sydney so feel free to PM me your contact phone number and I can call you direct today to discuss how you have it setup and what options you have.

Thanks and enjoy your day.


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## Glyphism (Dec 5, 2012)

Hi Brendan, thanks for the fast response. In a couple of paragraphs you have been more clear and helpful than anyone who I have been trying to get to answer my questions these past weeks. That explains the restrictions.

Our hope was to keep things simple, as this is an initial experiment so we would prefer not have to setup our own fulfilment account, with the associated license costs.

It's quite frustrating actually, the site is 99% done and we just need to change about 10 instances of the vendors name and contact details to ours, which sounds like it can't be done for the reasons you stated. It leaves us having to look for a different system now.


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## brenden (Dec 11, 2008)

I understand  Well, there is a workaround but as long as you understand legally the contract should be with the Fulfullment center.

What you can do is go into your HTML and remove the links to the privacy, agreement, etc in you site footer. With DecoNetwork you get full control of your CSS and HTML so you can do that. Then in Website pages you can make new custom pages and write your own privacy and agreements. Then link to those in your footer. You should ensure your Fulfillment Center is happy with the agreements and return policy as they are actually the one taking payments from your customers as you've signed up under them as a free affiliate. But it will certainly get you by the text and allow you to define your own agreements. If you need some assistance with this just send me your details on PM and I'l be happy to assist where I can.


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## Glyphism (Dec 5, 2012)

Brenden, that's a great idea. That might work if it means I can control/hide the restricted text. I don't want to edit any legal terms, I just want to change business name and contact details so that the fulfillment centre doesn't get any of my customer enquiries accidentally, seeing they will have no idea about the products/orders/brand etc..

There is still one other section with restrictions that I can't edit. The search results page has a column on the right with check lists for:
- Pre-decorated products
- Non-decorable products
- Blank products
- Design

These terms are all irrelevant for our business, as we are selling shirts predesigned without any options for blanks, non-decorable etc. Can this be turned off somewhere?

I'm still guessing though that the vendors details may still end up in email confirmations and orders etc that I can't control through Deco...


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## Glyphism (Dec 5, 2012)

Actually I just noticed that those restricted pages such as Policy and Terms are linked to from elsewhere in the system. For example on a new user registration page. So even if I hide the links in the footer and make my own, there are hardcoded links to them from links elsewhere in the Deco system.


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## redzar (Oct 26, 2012)

if i do heat transfer printing, what category will that fall under in the deconetwork type of printing? for sure it is not DTG. if under screen printing, will there be a technical and legal conflict? or can you classify heat transfer printing under screen printing? or i cannot use deconetwork if i only do heat transfer printing?


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## Ace Money (Mar 15, 2010)

Great topic and great read. Deconetwork will be contacted by us after reading this, we had a web designer trying to do this for us not knowing it was already pre-packaged waiting on us!


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## Imagine It Vinyl (Aug 28, 2013)

To what extent is DecoNetwork compatible with Adobe illustrator? I do not have corel.


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