Video: Creating Multiple Online Storefronts (Part 1)

In this video we showcase one of the more powerful Magento features, the ability to manage multiple Online storefronts from a single administration panel. This functionality allows an online merchant to centrally manage all facets of a business from one location, while selling through multiple online stores.

The first video goes through the basics of creating a completely separate website within the Magento installation, to be controlled from the same admin.  Below are the necessary steps to do this, carried out and recorded on the 0.9.17740 version of Magento:

• Step 1:  Creating a new folder for second website, copying index.php and .htaccess, necessary change of code to index.php
• Step 2:  Creating a new root category for the second website
• Step 3:  Creating the website in the admin, along with a store and store view
• Step 4:  Configuring the URL structure of the new site
• Step 5:  Adding categories and products
• Step 6:  Associating products with the new website

At the end of the video, the logo of the new website is updated and the homepage is set to a different admin-created CMS page.

Please note:  This demonstration uses example.com and some symlinks to make the URLs more readable.  You may notice the url of the second website switching between http://www.example.com/magento/mainstore/shoestore and http://www.example.com/magento/shoestore - this is why.  In a live environment each site will most likely have its own IP, so different domain names could be configured accordingly.

This is Part 1 of 2 videos showing Multiple Websites/Stores.  Part 2 will go into more detail about store views and multiple stores under the same website.