Starting an online store

[gerryonline]

Hey I am looking to sell some items on the internet, can anyone recommend a good place to start, or a good product to use on a web host?

[AussieTycoon]

Hey Gerry,

Welcome on board!

There are a number of good online stores you can set up 'out of the box', here are a few I have used in the past;

osCommerce - http://www.oscommerce.com/
This is quite good, free, a reasonable community for support and mods.

ZenCart - http://www.zencart.com/
This is also free, pretty good, has been quoted to be more customisable than osc, has a good support community and following.

There are lots of other out there also, you might want to look at whichever host you choose, what type of online store they support, some hosts have their own.

Another thing you might want to look into is who your banking partner is and whether the software you choose to use will work with your bank. I do suggest paypal however as most ecommerce software supports PayPal these days!

[itycoon]

Those are some very good products. What type of products will you be selling? Depending on what you are selling I can offer you some advice.

[rosshill]

I like Shopify (http://www.shopify.com), they have a good template system for designers and have a very solid product.

[ecomm]

i would recommend joomla and virtuemart - its an unbeatable combo which will give you the flexibility to do just about anything.

with joomla integrated the sky is the limit. plus don't forget how important to be have an SEO friendly site, with joomla added you've got blogging, forums etc etc capabilities

cheers :D

------------------------------------
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[Hayley]

Oztion is another one. Anyone here use that?

[Brendan]

Isn't Oztion just like ebay? or can you set up your own store/auction and integrate it with your website?

[Hayley]

Yes, it is. I thought gerryonline might be interested in that sort of sales tool.

[crismarie]

Hello,

To choose for the right product is to try the software. You will never know if the software is good enough until you try it. So to remove all doubts, you should test a demo or download a free version if it fits the needs of your business. There are lots of shopping cart out there, the one I would highly recommend is the Avactis Shopping Cart.

[Hampers]

I really like opencart for heaps of products - it has an easy to use interface for updating and is really user friendly once online.

Have a look at some other opencart examples and see for yourself. Sometimes the e-commerce can be over complicated.

[PhillipDyhrHobbs]

If you want to go for a professional solution
then you should no doubt go with Magento!
have a wonderful day

Best Regards,
Phillip Dyhr Hobbs
CEO of Your Virtual Ninja Ltd.
--------------------------------
Black-Belts at solving your online business problems
http://www.your-virtual-ninja.com

If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.
Red Adair

[yhang1182]

Developing an online store does not have to be complicated or expensive. Before you can begin constructing your online store, you must find a reliable web hosting company that is affordable and can meet your specific needs. Look for hosting services that is optimized for e-commerce sites. You also want to find a web host that includes special features like shopping cart capabilities that will make it easier for your online store start-up. One cart that I can recommend for you is Avactis. They have an e-commerce hosting package that simplifies your online store needs.

[lancejeffersons]

You can post your products on Craiglist or Oodle..Good classified ad sites..

[IM Today]

If you've got any existing websites, take a look at the Amazon aStore option. It's really easy to customise and once you become an affiliate, you can generate a simple piece of code that can be pasted into a website as HTML and your store is live. It literally takes seconds to do and you'll have a fully-functioning model that looks really good. As you make more sales from your aStore, your commission levels will increase. I'm pretty certian you start off a 4% on all sales made and this rises incrementally as you pass specific milestones.

There are more profitable options out there but for simplicity, I've yet to find anything that can be up and running so quickly.

[cajun0518]

I've been using avactis on several of my sites and have endorsed to a couple of my friends also. Avactis lets you make a powerful online store, import all your products, accept any payments, even add store elements to your old site, blog, forum ....you can try it for 15 days free

[Phillip]

I've been using avactis on several of my sites and have endorsed to a couple of my friends also. Avactis lets you make a powerful online store, import all your products, accept any payments, even add store elements to your old site, blog, forum ....you can try it for 15 days free

hahah really now?

[Dubbo Pete]

hahah really now?

Little bit sceptical of his claims Phillip? Do you know it? Is it crap?

[cajun0518]

hahah really now?

w w w .kianmatthews.com nuff said!

[Dubbo Pete]

w w w .kianmatthews.com nuff said!

Link goes dead cajun. Not nuff said.

[cajun0518]

how about this w w w.kianmatthew.com

[Phillip]

how about this would take magento 10 min to install a theme....

[EarlSarsuelo]

I am into online selling myself :rolleyes:. Thank you for sharing your opinion.

[PhillipDyhrHobbs]

Why do you bother spamming us Earl?
Why not provide some value??:mad:

[Amanda - AT Forum Admin]

Hi Phillip,

Merry Christmas.

I agree. As an Australian based site I haven't yet banned this user however they are getting close.

As my Mum used to say, if you haven't got anything good to say, don't say anything at all.

Amanda xxx

[OnefortheMoney]

Beware of the one-click installation stores that some of the major vendors offer. Although they have major benefits (such as integrated shopping carts), the commissions are usually ridiculously low and you have to sell in high volume to make decent money.

I find it's better to build a standalone website where you can display your own products (or those with a high commission value) and offer a PayPal option. I'm getting 75% commission on some of my store products. The likes of amazon only offer 4% commission to begin with and it takes an age to build a half-decent income.

Be as independent as possible. The less you have to pay the middlemen, the more money there is for you.

[HWT]

If you're selling your own products rather than running an affiliate store, commission doesn't come into it at all so that's a bit off-topic for starting an online store - should be under making affiliate income.

I wouldn't recommend most people start a standalone website though, it is SO hard to rank higher than dedicated sellers (usually with affiliate sites) with very high budgets (and low morals) for SEO. Better to start on eBay, build a reputation, then run your own site in parallel with eBay.

[OnefortheMoney]

If you're selling your own products rather than running an affiliate store, commission doesn't come into it at all so that's a bit off-topic for starting an online store - should be under making affiliate income.

I wouldn't recommend most people start a standalone website though, it is SO hard to rank higher than dedicated sellers (usually with affiliate sites) with very high budgets (and low morals) for SEO. Better to start on eBay, build a reputation, then run your own site in parallel with eBay.

Apologies if I wasn't completely clear here. I often place individual affiliate products on my own stores that take my customers back to the original point of sale. Naturally, I'm very selective about the way I do this but I've had some significant levels of success selling affiliate products as a supplement to my own. I wouldn't recommend it to everybody and in most cases, I'm very clear about the fact that I'm sending my customers to an external service. it helps to maintain levels of trust and as I've mentioned here several times, I only work with people that I can trust implicitly.

I tend not to use eBay much as many of my products are more geared towards Amazon. Literature, especially, has a higher conversion rate for me on Amazon because it's one of the first places consumers are likely to go for books and other publications. The growth of Kindle has certainly helped in this department.

[HWT]

Definitely worth starting a new thread on :) Amazon affiliates is its own beast, not so much use to Australians of course other than those lovely e-books ..