PayPal recently introduced a method of customizing payment pages using more than a simple logo. Now a shop that accepts PayPal can setup one or more “Page Styles” which define how your PayPal payment checkout appears to a customer. PayPal previously supported a small custom logo of size 150 x 50 pixels with the ability to make small changes over the background color. Because the checkout process is done over a secure server, unless the custom PayPal logo was hosted on a secure server (https), a warning message would appear indicating to the customer that a mix of insecure and secure items was present on the page. To remedy this, one simply needs to host their logo or image on a secure connection.

Under the new “Custom Payment Pages” PayPal allows the merchant to define a generously large “Header Image URL” of size up to 750 x 90 pixels. It also allows several background shades within the checkout page to be customized to enable the checkout experience to be fairly seamless for a customer paying with PayPal.

To begin setting up your Custom Payment Pages:

• Log into your PayPal Account
• Click on the Merchant Tools tab
• Scroll down to the bottom and look for “Custom Payment Pages” under Other PayPal Tools
• Click on Add to Begin
• Fill out the URL to your header image
• Fill out the HEX color code for your page background
• Create
• Next time you make a PayPal button in Merchant tools, click on “Add more Options” on this screen you there will be a drop-down to select which Custom Payment Page style you would like to use.

Tips:

• Keep the height of the custom image / logo around 50 pixels to allow for less scrolling
• Use a graphic which is associated with the products you are selling and distinguishes your brand
• If using a background color other than white, keep to light earth tone shades
• Setup a Custom Payment Page style for different product lines so the customer perceives that you are specializing in the product they are buying
• Host your logo on a secure server

Similar to customizing the checkout with a logo, the header image must also be hosted on a secure server to allow for the web browser to not display an error messages. Check with your web host first to see if they have a shared SSL certificate (many do) that will allow you to emulate a secure server. If your web host does not have SSL encryption or a shared SSL certificate, simply log onto SecureLogoHosting.com to setup an account in realtime.

Screen Shot of sample Custom Header checkout: