A popular free plugin that made it easy to add PayPal buttons to your website is now seriously outdated; the developer has stopped maintaining it and now charges $59 per year per website for his new version of a plugin that always has been free.
Whether you maintain your own website or we do, you do not need the plugin. You can use the multi-step process outlined below to create “Donate,” “Add to Cart,” and “Buy Now” buttons for your website. These instructions are for creating a “Donate” button for your website; the steps are the same for other types of buttons. Save the HTML code that PayPal generates for you and use it anywhere on your website.
If your website is maintained by Sunshine City Web Design, complete steps 1-20 and send the HTML code via email or our contact form.
Ready to get started? Here we go!
- Log in to www.PayPal.com.
- Proceed to “Account Overview” or “My PayPal.”
- In the top menu, go to “Tools” > “All Tools.”
- On the next screen, select “Integrate PayPal.”
- On the next screen, select “PayPal Buttons.”
- On the next screen, select “Donate.”
- On the next screen, choose Use PayPal button style, large, and check “Show accepted card logos.”
- Select “Continue.”
- On the next screen, you can upload your logo, if you wish.
- You also can enter a purpose, such as “capital campaign” or “unrestricted donation” or simply “donation.” (Or you can leave the purpose field blank.)
- On the next screen, you should see “USD” for US dollars.
- Under “Amount donors can give,” choose the option you want (any amount, an exact amount, or set 3 amount options, plus any amount). Recommended: Choose “any amount.”
- Under “Let donors make monthly recurring donations?” choose “Yes.”
- Select “Continue.”
- On the next screen, you have several options. For example, you can request donors’ mailing addresses. (Suggested: Click “No” to make the donation process as easy as possible.
- You also can route donors back to a thank-you page on your website, or not. If you do not have a thank-you page on your website, you can create one; publish it; pick up the URL for it, and enter that URL in this PayPal field. Your thank-you page must be published, but it should not appear on any menu on your website.
- Next, you can decide how to set your PayPal account identifier (merchant account ID is recommended; PayPal knows what that is because you are logged in to your account).
- Click or tap on “Finish and Get Code.”
- On the next screen, click on “Copy to clipboard” to get the HTML that PayPal has generated for you.
- Save the code to Notepad or another note-taking app on your computer or phone.
- Now you are ready to enter the HTML on your website. Go to the Dashboard of your website (or, if we maintain your website, send the code to us).
- Find the page where your donation button appears. (Under “Pages,” this page usually is called “Donate” or “How to Support Us.”
- Click on the “Edit” link under the page title.
- Delete the PayPal shortcode. It usually includes the words “paypal_button” in brackets: []
- In place of the shortcode, enter a row of x’s as a placeholder. For example: xxxxxxxxxxxx (It doesn’t matter how many x’s are in your row.)
- Switch to the Text/HTML View
If you are using the Gutenberg editor:
In the upper right corner of your screen, you’ll see three dots in vertical orientation, signifying a menu. Click or tap on the dots. Under “Editor” in the drop-down menu, click on “Code Editor.”
If you are using the Classic editor:
Switch from the Visual to Text view by clicking on “Text” just above your editing field. - Replace the x’s you just entered with the HTML code you copied from your PayPal account.
- Switch back to the Visual editor.
If you are using the Gutenberg editor:
In the upper right corner of your screen, you’ll see three dots in vertical orientation, signifying a menu. Click on the dots. Under “Editor” in the drop-down menu, choose “Visual Editor.”
If you are using the Classic editor: Switch from the Text view to Visual by clicking on “Visual” just above your editing field. - You should see your new PayPal button on your page. Click or tap on the blue “Update” button in the upper right area of your screen to save your changes.
- View the page on your live website.
- Test the new button to ensure it opens a PayPal donation page with the options you selected.
If you don’t have time or don’t want to complete this process on your own, Sunshine City Web Design staff will do it for you. Just let us know, and we’ll take care of it. The cost will depend on how many donate, add to cart, buy now and/or pay now buttons are on your website. The total cost is usually $40-$100 per website. We’ll email you when the work is done.