Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Open Source CMS, is it right for you?

Coming Soon! OPEN SOURCE CMS: Is that what you need?

Monday, December 3, 2007

E-Commerce Solutions

Need to sell your stuff online? There's so many options available, I thought I'd share some of my experience.

Depending on:
1/How many products you have to sell
2/Your budget
3/Your hosting arrangements (do you already have a website hosted?)
4/Your reporting and management needs

I have several systems that I've worked with now, that I can categorize to best make a suggestion to how you should choose.

If you are looking for great reporting and support, as well as a hosted solution (that is, you don't have a dedicated host for your website), I highly recommend Volusion, a hosted e-commerce solution that is fully customizable, with GREAT support, and GREAT reporting. With Volusion, you'll pay for hosting, and (maybe) your domain, and you can also sign up for a SSL certificate (Secure Socket Layer) and a merchant account + gateway (to accept credit card payments) all in one swoop. With this solution, you'll choose different packages depending on how many products you sell.

If you already have a hosting account, and you're on a tighter budget, you can always opt for an Open Source (Free, under the GPL License) product like Zen Cart, or OS Commerce. Another option, is to go with a CMS (Content Management System) like Joomla, and install a shopping cart component to go with it, like Virtue Mart. All of these options are 'free', but since they are so, the support is more of a 'community' of people who work with these applications. While they all work great, once installed and configured, they do require a little more learning on your part, as the end user. They are also customizable with template structure, and can be managed by you.

There are thousands of other applications and programs out there, but these, so far - have proven the most efficient for managing and selling products. If you can afford to go Volusion - I do recommend it highly because of their awesome support staff.

Please don't hesitate to contact us with any questions or concerns - we'll be happy to be candid with our experiences in this arena.

Happy Selling!