FluentCart 1.3.9: Ghost Products, Mercado Pago Payments, New blocks and Shortcodes

This release expands how and where you can sell with FluentCart, while tightening reliability and security behind the scenes. The focus is flexibility without forcing stores into rigid product models or checkout flows.

Whether you are selling traditional digital products, services, courses, or payments that do not fit into a standard catalog, this update opens new paths without complicating existing ones.

Here is what’s new and what it unlocks.

• Sell digital products or services to LATAM customers using a local-first payment option
  
• Reduce payment friction by offering a gateway users already recognize
  
• Accept one-time payments without changing your existing product or checkout setup
  

This integration fits naturally into FluentCart’s payment flow. No extra workarounds. No separate logic paths.

New Feature: Custom Product Selling Options (Ghost Products)

FluentCart includes a programmatic selling layer designed for products that do not belong in a traditional product catalog. Internally, we refer to these as Ghost Products.

Ghost Products are not stored as standard FluentCart products. They are generated, validated, and processed dynamically through FluentCart’s hook system while still going through the full cart, checkout, order, and payment lifecycle.

This allows FluentCart to function as a commerce engine, not just a product catalog manager.

What Are Ghost Products?

A Ghost Product is a purchasable item that exists only at runtime.

It does not need:

• A product post
• A stored variation
• A predefined catalog entry

Yet it can still:

• Be added to cart
• Be validated before checkout
• Be processed as an order
• Support one-time or subscription payments
• Appear in admin orders
• Trigger payment gateway logic
• Be audited, modified, or removed by admins

From FluentCart’s perspective, a Ghost Product behaves like a first-class commerce item without being a stored product.

Why Ghost Products Exist

Many real-world purchases do not map cleanly to catalog-based ecommerce.

Trying to force these use cases into a traditional product model often leads to:

• Artificial products created only for billing
• Duplicate products for every variation
• Complex pricing logic stored in metadata
• External checkout systems glued together with webhooks

Ghost Products exist to remove that friction.

Instead of reshaping your business model to fit ecommerce software, FluentCart adapts to how you already sell.

Common Use Cases

Ghost Products are intentionally flexible. Below are some common patterns where this feature is designed to be used.

Add-on Products

Items that depend on another purchase and should not exist independently.

Examples:

• Gift wrapping
• Extended support
• Priority handling
• Insurance or protection fees

These items are often:

• Dynamically priced
• Optional
• Context-specific

With Ghost Products, these can be added to cart only when needed, without cluttering your product list.

Service-Based Sales

Many services are sold as outcomes, not SKUs.

Examples:

• Consulting sessions
• Custom development work
• Setup or onboarding services
• One-off internal services

Ghost Products allow you to:

• Generate pricing dynamically
• Attach services to orders
• Process payment without inventing artificial products

Custom Subscriptions

Not all subscriptions are tied to downloadable content.

Examples:

• Membership access managed elsewhere
• SaaS billing layered on top of WordPress
• External platforms using FluentCart only for billing

Ghost Products support subscription logic programmatically, including recurring intervals and setup fees, while keeping order records clean and consistent.

Dynamic Products

Products created based on user input or configuration.

Examples:

• Pricing calculators
• Build-your-own bundles
• Quote-based checkout flows

In these cases, the product does not exist until the user finishes their configuration. Ghost Products allow you to generate the final purchasable item at the moment of intent.

How Ghost Products Work Conceptually

Ghost Products rely on FluentCart’s hook-based architecture.

Instead of pulling product data from the database, FluentCart asks your code to define the product at specific points in the cart and checkout lifecycle.

At a high level:

• The frontend signals that a custom item is being purchased
• FluentCart requests validation and structure from your code
• Your logic defines pricing, quantity rules, and payment type
• FluentCart processes the item like any other order item

From the user’s perspective, this is invisible. From the admin’s perspective, the order behaves normally. Read ful documentation on Ghost Product Checkout here.

New Payment Gateway: Mercado Pago (One-Time Payments)

FluentCart now supports Mercado Pago for one-time payments.

Mercado Pago is widely used across Latin America, and this addition makes FluentCart more accessible for stores serving customers in those regions. Buyers can complete payments using a method they already trust, without being pushed toward unfamiliar gateways.

Use cases and benefits

• Sell digital products or services to LATAM customers using a local-first payment option
  
• Reduce payment friction by offering a gateway users already recognize
  
• Accept one-time payments without changing your existing product or checkout setup
  

This integration fits naturally into FluentCart’s payment flow. No extra workarounds. No separate logic paths.

New Gutenberg Block: Add to Cart Button

FluentCart now includes a Gutenberg block for adding products to the cart.

This block allows you to place add-to-cart buttons directly inside the WordPress editor, without shortcodes or custom HTML.

Practical benefits

• Build product pages visually using the block editor
  
• Insert purchase actions inside content, layouts, or landing sections
  
• Reduce dependency on theme-specific templates
  

This is especially useful for content-driven stores where products are embedded inside articles, guides, or marketing pages.

New Shortcode:

This shortcode allows you to trigger checkout directly from a button.

It gives you full control over where and how checkout starts, without requiring a full product page or cart step.

Use cases

• Direct purchase buttons on landing pages
  
• Checkout triggers inside email-linked pages
  
• Custom layouts where the cart step is unnecessary
  

This pairs well with focused offers and single-item purchases.

New Shortcode:

This shortcode adds a product to the cart from anywhere on your site.

It is useful for themes, builders, or situations where Gutenberg blocks are not available or practical.

Why it’s useful

• Works across classic editors and custom layouts
  
• Keeps cart behavior consistent
  
• Enables fast implementation without design constraints
  

Together with the Gutenberg block, this ensures FluentCart works across modern and legacy setups.

Fix: IPN Issues for Some Third-Party Gateways

We fixed IPN handling issues affecting certain third-party payment gateways.

These issues could cause delays or inconsistencies in payment confirmation and order updates.

With this fix:

• Payment notifications are processed more reliably
  
• Order status updates are more consistent
  
• Edge cases with delayed callbacks are handled correctly
  

This improves trust in payment processing, especially for stores using multiple gateways.

Fix: Dashboard Styling Issues

Several dashboard styling issues have been resolved.

These fixes improve layout consistency and readability across different screen sizes and admin environments.

The goal here is simple: make daily store management feel stable and predictable.

Security Improvements

This release includes multiple security improvements across the system.

While not all security changes are visible, they strengthen how FluentCart handles data, requests, and internal processes.

These updates help protect stores without adding friction or configuration overhead.

What This Release Changes in Practice

FluentCart 1.3.9 is about removing artificial limits.

• You are no longer locked into a strict product model
  
• You can sell things that exist outside your store
  
• You can place checkout and cart actions exactly where they make sense
  
• You get better reliability and stronger security by default
  

This release supports more business models without forcing complexity onto existing ones.

If you are selling traditional products, everything continues to work as expected. If you are selling something less traditional, FluentCart now adapts to you instead of the other way around.

More refinements are coming, but this update expands the foundation in a meaningful way.