First thing you’ll need to do is to register a PayPal account to get started.

Single Item Payments (The Buy now button) method

The simplest quickest way to implement PayPal on your website is the Single Item Payments button. This doesn’t require a huge amount of technical skills to implement and can be done quickly.

With the Single Item Payments button (Buy Now Button) you just specify your PayPal business email, the currency of the amount, the amount details itself, item name and specify the buy now button. If a person clicks on the button they are taken to the PayPal payment page. Below is an example of the code:

<form action=”https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr” method=”post”>

<!– Identify your business so that you can collect the payments. –>

<input type=”hidden” name=”business” value=”herschelgomez@xyzzyu.com”>

<!– Specify a Buy Now button. –>

<input type=”hidden” name=”cmd” value=”_xclick”>

<!– Specify details about the item that buyers will purchase. –>

<input type=”hidden” name=”item_name” value=”Hot Sauce-12 oz. Bottle”>

<input type=”hidden” name=”amount” value=”5.95″>

<input type=”hidden” name=”currency_code” value=”USD”>

<!– Display the payment button. –>

<input type=”image” name=”submit” border=”0″

src=”https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_buynow_LG.gif”

alt=”PayPal – The safer, easier way to pay online”>

<img alt=”" border=”0″ width=”1″ height=”1″

src=”https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif” >

</form>

Recurring payments method

The Code above is just a once off payment system but one can also implement a “recurring payments” subscribe button which is for the more advanced users. You can specify the terms of the recurring payments easily e.g.

<!– Set the terms of the recurring payments. –>

<input type=”hidden” name=”a3″ value=”69.95″>

<input type=”hidden” name=”p3″ value=”1″>

<input type=”hidden” name=”t3″ value=”M”>

And limit the number of billing cycle’s e.g.

<input type=”hidden” name=”src” value=”1″>

<input type=”hidden” name=”srt” value=”5″>

This together with the initial payment amount and other data parameters e.g. item name and currency code makes it possible to easily implement a recurring payment subscription on your website.

In using PayPal you’re also able to implement entire shopping carts where more than one product can be added to a basket and then make payment via the PayPal payment gateway. You can learn more about implementing PayPal by clicking here