General Concepts

Overview

AppDirect is an e-commerce platform that helps managing and distributing your products through a network of SaaS marketplaces. This platform also enables to maintain and control your customer and reseller data.

AppDirect provides platform owners with multiple user interfaces that are accessible based on combinations of user roles, marketplace permissions, and marketplace configuration options. Furthermore, the provided interfaces can be used to perform the following tasks:

• Configure your marketplace
• Invite or add users
• Create and manage companies
• Customize your marketplace storefront
• Merchandize your products
• Manage billing, payments, and invoices
• Run reports and more

The AppDirect extension allows combining the benefits of both CloudBlue Connect and AppDirect platforms and consequently streamline the number of critical business operations. This documentation outlines features and specifications of the AppDirect platform and also provides instructions on how to successfully implement the integration.

AppDirect Roles & Company Access

AppDirect marketplace provide the same role based permission model as it is available on the CloudBlue Connect platform. Namely, each user should be assigned to a role and a specific company. Users can have multiple roles within multiple companies.

Note, however, that AppDirect users must be also assigned to a company membership. This membership represent the link between users and companies on the AppDirect platform.

Company permissions determine access to the marketplace, while role permissions determine what actions a user can take in the marketplace. For instance, users with the Marketplace Manager role can access a variety of management functions, accessible in the user interface via the Manage drop-down menu under Marketplace.

AppDirect Product Aspects

There are many different aspects of each product that it is recommended to get familiar with. Some product aspects can be changed at any point of time, while certain aspects are specified at creation, and it is not possible to change them later.

The following provides general product aspects that are highly important to familiarize with before you begin working with the products in the AppDirect marketplace:

• Service type—Whether the product is a separate product (Standalone), or an accessory for another product (Add-on). If a product is an Add-on, the buyer must already have its supporting product in order to use it. For example, an Add-on could be reporting software that tracks the performance of its supporting product. Note that this aspect cannot be changed
• Product type—The AppDirect platform is primarily intended to support digital products and services, particularly web applications and downloads. However, it does support some other types of products if you want to offer them on your marketplace. This aspect cannot be changed.
• Usage model—Whether each instance of the product can be bought and used by a single user only (Single user), or multiple users can be given access to it based on a number of licenses (Multiple users). The usage model determines which marketplace users will be able to use the product. A Single user product is only available to users who have the permissions to purchase it for themselves, while a Multiple user product may be purchased by one user who then assigns it to others. This aspect cannot be changed.
• Revenue model—Determines how you charge for your product. This includes free, one time, recurring (e.g., monthly), and tiered (i.e., different prices with different billing frequencies) models. This aspect can be changed at any point of time.
• Integration type—Whether the product listing will consist only of a link to a web site or download, or instead be fully integrated so it can be accessed on users’ MyApps pages after it is bought on the marketplace.

Marketplaces and Storefronts

Marketplaces that are provided on the AppDirect platform represent highly customizable systems. Marketplace Managers can change various basic marketplace settings such as links to legal or technical support pages, Google Analytics integration, SMS notifications, and password policies.

The look and feel of a marketplace are defined by the storefront, which consists of the pages that end users are likely to encounter when they browse for products and purchase them. Such pages include:

• The marketplace home page
• Product listing and profile pages
• The exit page displayed after user logout

Note that storefronts do not include administrative pages. Additionally, in order to customize the storefront, it is necessary to modify elements of its associated theme (a container for the elements of the storefront display). These elements include pages, components, and settings. A web developer can modify and fine-tune these elements to change the storefront.

In case more information on the AppDirect platform is required, please refer to the official AppDirect documentation.