Affordable eCommerce Solutions

What They Don’t Tell You About Most Shopping Carts

eCommerce, also known as e-commerce, has evolved from being a highly complicated and expensive venture, fraught with risk to the vendor and frustration for the customer to a relatively pleasant experience that many people can add to their websites.

Why you need an eCommerce solution

Electing to not have a shopping cart is still an eCommerce solution.  It is the recognition that your business does not seek to consummate a sale via the internet. With that understanding, the job your website performs can shift towards one of helping the client contact you and build a structure for on-going communication.

For many businesses, however, a well built cart can facilitate everything from product purchases to reservation transactions, bill payment, donations or good will distribution systems. For example, sending customers discount coupons on their birthdays or anniversaries shows an awareness of their lives and a willingness to share good moments.

For some people, adding an “Add to Cart” button and a credit card processor is all they need.ProVetLogic But if you expect to service a clientele that will visit you often, wants you to be available to handle their purchasing problems and would be happy to know that you occasionally send them offers that reflect their buying preferences, then the simple e-commerce solutions don’t get the job done.

And if you need to offer them more than one shipping solution, then you are ready to graduate to a real e-commerce product that includes not only a shopping cart but a relational database.

We can show you ways to build an on-line rapport with your customers that will lead to repeat business.

E-Commerce not only includes transaction processing, but also high quality email confirmation, prompt dispute resolution, follow-up marketing and easy back office administration.

The good part is that you won’t spend a fortune getting things customized to your situation.  We are experts at building eCommerce platforms. Our interactive websites integrate with merchant accounts for any type electronic transaction.

Depending upon which of our content management systems you decide upon when speaking with us, we can offer you time tested security and dependability.

5 Questions to ask Your E-Commerce Developer

  1. Will I have an administrative back-end view of all clients, transactions, orders and cancellations?
  2. How does you cart protect me from problems such as “middle-man fraud?”
  3. Can your cart track my inventory and prevent people from purchasing items when the inventory is gone?
  4. If we want to offer a coupon, can you track it and prevent people from abusing it?
  5. Can you custom tailor the shopping cart to the way we want to do business or is it a “one size fits all” cart?

What if I can't afford a $3,000 cart?

Can’t afford an expensive cart?  Ask about a basic model.

The cost of a good cart varies depending upon the number of SKU’s (stock keeping units), the number of orders you process daily, the size of your order promotional items, such as copy and images and whether or not you want to keep everything on your computer or are willing to use a good merchant account.

Websites with less than 10 skus can usually get by using pre-programmed buttons from vendors such as PayPal.

The important mistake to avoid involves putting your business and clients at risk by not

Shopping Carts for WordPress and Joomla!

WooCommerce

WooCommerce Shopping CartThe cart of choice for WordPress is one by WooCommerce.  Like Virtuemart, it requires a number of of plug-ins that can be custom tailored for functionality ranging from variable item purchases to a myriad of payment choices.  Whether you choose, PayPal, Authorize.net, Stripe or other clearing house choices, WooCommerce offers speed, dependability and a large base of support. We support a number of advanced plug-ins and have written custom applications for WooCommerce.

WooCommerce Is Scalable

We depend upon several products from WooThemes to enhance the functionality of WooCommerce.
We have one client that has over 100,000 SKU’s in the WooCommerce Shopping cart.

You can read about much of the WooCommerce functionality in their support documents.

Our Services include:

  • Support personnel available for 24/7 business/payment transaction monitoring
  • Customer peace of mind from the improved credibility that your on-line presence offers.
  • Middle-man fraud exclusion 
  • Automated payment transactions executed via secure payment gateways 
  • Coupon distribution and adjudication systems to prevent coupon fraud while offering added benefit to your clients

Payment Gateways

Regardless of the shopping cart you use, your site will also require a payment gateway. 

We support most of the major ones including:

Which solution is right for your situation?

Our shopping carts vary in their complexity and cost.  When integrated with a content management system most carts offer:

  • Search-engine (SEO) friendly product categories and listings tailored to your inventory control needs.
  • Complex levels of categories, subcategories, services, products, shipping and payment options.
  • Secure payment processing (Visa, Discover card, Master Card, Amex, Google Merchant, PayPal and others)
  • Cross site scripting and middle-man fraud and prevention 
  • Website control of inventory availability and order management
  • Fully automated invoice generation, order and shipping tracking with Instant Payment Notification (IPN)
  • Multiple vendors for Shipping and tax calculations
  • Return customer tracking and coupon reward programs
  • Back-end Order administration for history, SKU, cancelled sales, etc.
  • Customer Order history available for customers per login.
  • Displays of featured products, sale promotions and customer comments.
  • integrated payment gateways
  • Search Engine Optimization
  • State, Country and VAT tax calculations

Since discovering which cart will best fit your situation is so important, contact us to discuss your needs.