Recommendation for complete DIY eCommerce site solution?

[jeffbrown9]

Hello,

I know that website stuff has been discussed here and there on this forum, however I was hoping we could start a discussion about complete do it yourself (DIY) eCommerce solutions for NEWBIES!!! I'm not all that tech savy, and would like a nice looking site (not cookie cutter), the potential for an online catalog of products, and easily be able to have the orders directed to a fulfillment center of my choice - ALL FOR NOT A LOT OF $$$! In other words, a solution that takes me out of the loop!

I've used Yahoo small business and it is OK, Microsoft Live is free but a little too cookie cutter for me - I just thought that by now there would be a much better option for us? Any suggestions?

Thanks - Jeff

[dsharpe]

Jeff, Hostgator, (and other hosting providers, I'm sure) has several high-powered ecommerce scripts available with their hosting packages (starts at $4.95/mo, and is quite reliable.)

They use the Fantastico interface, so installation is very easy--click a couple of buttons, then start customizing and entering products.

I believe that it's fairly easy to customize the look-and-feel of these solutions, and they all work w/paypal and other payment systems.

I'm a firm believer in starting small to prove market demand, then upgrading if needed. I can't tell you how many companies I've seen and heard of paying $10,000 or more for a website--and they end up with something that can't even pay for it's own development costs.

Dave

[italian_job]

Hi there,

One of my strongest muses is using a yahoo store. Powerful, powerful tool, above all if you combine it with yahoo search marketing (pay per click), track your sales, know from which keywrod your sales came from, add 2 aweber autoresponder on the front end and the back end of your sales process.

Also, you can add one of the yahoo-authorized logos on your site, which makes your site instantly more credible.

Then what you get in the stats on the control panel is nothing short of amazing.

Also, another the yahoo tech support is absolutely fantastic, both the email support and the telephone support.

If you then also join the yahoo directory (actually, if they accept you!), your site will get a nice boost and your pages will have a better chance to rank well in the search engines.

I have a yahoo store PRO, so there are some extra features that I love and use extensively to bring cusotmers back to my site, like the coupons. They are simply amazing, also to do some extra marketing activies so that you can (again) track with a coupon where your sales come from. I have coupons for my direct mail advertising, for my email autoresponders, for my call centre activies, for my PPC advertising etc. And I know EXACTLY how much every single activities' ROI is. First class!

Ah, I nearly forgot, if you ship using UPS or FedEx, then a yahoo store is also fully integrated and sending a post sale tracking code is just a breeze.

If you need it, I have also an extremely reliable Indian web developer who specializes in yahoo store design.

There are also other features that I love about Yahoo Stores, but for brevity I wont discuss them here.

Yahoo Stores for me is a 5-star web solution. Nothing beats it.


Hope this helps!



Danny


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