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Getting Started with Internet Commerce
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To help you get your commerce-enabled Web site up and running as quickly and easily as possible, we've put together the following step-by-step guide.
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| Step #1: Identify your needs |
Before you dive right in, spend some time thinking about what the needs of your business are. Identify the needs that you have and the features you want and then go with the products and solutions that work best for you.
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| Step #2: Investigate the options |
Once you've identified the needs of your business and the features you want in your commerce solution, spend some time and investigate your options. There are, for example, a wide range of shopping cart programs available - w ith price tags ranging from absolutely free to thousands of dollars. Would paying more money for a more fully featured solution help reduce your daily work load? Are you paying for features that you won't use or need? Will you be able to get the support y ou need if something goes wrong? The people behind the products are often as important as the products themselves.
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| Step #3: Get an Internet merchant account |
If you decide to use our real-time payment processing solution, you'll need to get an Internet merchant account from an Internet friendly merchant bank. If you're just starting your business, there may be other steps that you need to take first that you haven't yet taken - such as getting tax identification numbers, business licenses or bank accounts. Some of these steps can take quite a while to complete, so get started as soon as possible.
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| Step #4: Choose a payment processing solution |
When it comes to processing your orders, there are basically three choices. You can either take and process your own orders online, take orders online and process them offline, or pay someone else to do your order processing and fulfillment for you. Each of these options has its pros and cons, so consider the needs of your company and make the choice that's right for you.
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| Step #5: Build a store front |
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There are many ways to build your commerce enabled Web site, ranging from elegantly full-featured turn-key solutions to basic shopping carts programs. You can even build your own from scratch using a CGI programming language such as Perl, PHP, or C. If you want to start selling your products as quickly as possible, browse through our collection of recommended store front solutions.
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Friday May 09, 2008