eCommerce Solutions for Small Businesses

What do you need to have an eCommerce or online store and what exactly is a shopping cart?

To have or start an eCommerce or online business it is best to find a niche product that consumers have difficulty finding in malls or department stores or offer pricing that is better than local providers.  You then need an eCommerce enabled website to market and sell your products or services.  This can either be a new site developed from scratch, or an existing site to which you add eCommerce shopping cart capabilities.  Once you have a store, the next step is to acquire a means of accepting online payments. This usually entails obtaining a merchant account and accepting credit cards through an online payment gateway such as Google or PayPal.  Lastly, you need a marketing strategy for driving targeted traffic to your site and a means of enticing repeat customers.

eCommerce can be a very rewarding venture, but you cannot make money overnight. It is important to do a lot of research, ask questions, work hard and make business decisions based on facts learned from researching eCommerce. Don’t rely on your “gut” feelings.  If you are new to eCommerce keep things simple and know your limitations and don’t be afraid to ask us questions.  We are more than happy to help you.

The first sentence on this page talks about, “What do you need to have an eCommerce or online store and what exactly is a shopping cart?”  A Shopping cart is software that is used to allow consumers to purchase goods or services, track customers, and tie together all aspects of eCommerce into one cohesive package.  While there are many types of software that you can use, customizable, turnkey solutions are proven to be a cost effective method to build, edit and maintain an online store.  We recommend Shopp if you are just starting out, Magento if you are a mid-to large store, and Business Catalyst if you want a complete marketing & eCommerce solution.  All three are robust solutions that can be integrated with your existing website or be operated as stand along stores.

We recommend starting off small and then working your way up through the different eCommerce solutions as your small business grows. Our eCommerce solutions offer step-up pricing allowing your small business to grow to the next level without losing your previous investment. Stated simply, if you buy the $300 package and then need to upgrade into the $600 package, you will only owe us the difference of $300. We will never charge you the full price for the second package when you are already a Green Apple Webs eCommerce customer.

Please Note: All the eCommerce solutions below assume you have already obtained pictures of your product(s), descriptions, pricing, shipping, sales tax, etc. for each item. If not, you will be asked to provide this information to Green Apple Webs before we will begin building your eCommerce solution.

Small eCommerce / Online Store Solution

This eCommerce solution is for small businesses that want to “test the waters” by selling a few products or services online. We will begin by creating an online store front for your small business with up to 10 products / services / subscriptions which your customers can purchase using either a credit card or direct payment from their bank account. This solution will use PayPal as the merchant gateway and your customers will not have to sign up for PayPal in order to pay with their credit card. There are three requirements for this solution.

• First, you must have a PayPal Web Payments Standard Account (Free)
• Second, you must link your PayPal account to your Business Bank Account to transfer the money from PayPal to your account (Free)
• Third, you must provide Green Apple Webs access to your account so we can create encrypted payment buttons on your behalf. (PayPal has a feature which allows you to create us an account that keeps your banking information secure.)

With this eCommerce solution, your customers will be taken to PayPal’s secure ordering pages which we will customize to match the look of your website. One of the primary benefits of this solution is PayPal will manage the credit card / online payments ensuring your customers personal & credit information is protected at all times.

Medium Sized eCommerce / Online Store Solution

This eCommerce solution is for small businesses that have successfully “tested the waters” and are ready to sale additional products online (up to 50 products / services / subscriptions) and want to offer their customers a shopping cart so they can buy more than one item at a time. You customers will be able to use either a credit card or direct payment from their bank account just like solution #1. This eCommerce solution will also use PayPal as the merchant gateway and your customers will not have to sign up for PayPal in order to pay with their credit card.

With this eCommerce solution, your customers will have options to add items to their shopping cart and continue browsing your other products or they can go directly to PayPal’s secure ordering page. We we will customize the shopping cart & ordering page to match the look / feel of your website. Two of the primary benefits of this solution are the shopping cart which allows your customers to purchase more than one item at a time plus PayPal will manage the credit card / online payments ensuring your customers personal & credit information is protected at all times.  You can also use other Merchant accounts, like Google, Authorize.net, etc.

Full Featured Small Business eCommerce / Online Store

This full featured eCommerce solution is for small businesses that want to offer a retail store front on the web allowing their customers to buy from their store 24x7x365. We will begin by creating an online store for your business with up to 300 products / services / subscriptions which your customers can purchase using a credit card. This solution has numerous features including:

• Ability to add / remove products using the web based administrative interface.
• Download sales data into QuickBooks
• Integrate with UPS, Fed Ex, and UPSP to generate real time shipping rates
• Back-End Order Entry (Allows you to enter phone orders directly in the online store)
• Order Editing Capabilities (Save time by modifying an existing order in real time. Add or remove products, update customer information, etc)
• Off-Line Payments Options (Accept offline payments including checks, money orders, customer accounts, cash on delivery, purchase orders, and in-store payments.)

This solution will require you to have a dedicated merchant account with a compatible supplier (we will provide you a list).

Advanced Small Business eCommerce / Online Store

This eCommerce solution is for the small business that wants to take their online store the next level. This is a very complex solution with the ability to add up to 100,000 products, cross promote items, offer promotions, coupons, and discounts as well as use advanced shipping and inventory tools, create customer mailing and shopping lists, etc. You also get all the features of our Full Featured Online Store plus:

• Ability to add / remove products using the web based administrative interface.
• Download sales data into QuickBooks
• Integrate with UPS, Fed Ex, and UPSP to generate real time shipping rates
• Back-End Order Entry (Allows you to enter phone orders directly in the online store)
• Order Editing Capabilities (Save time by modifying an existing order in real time. Add or remove products, update customer information, etc)
• Off-Line Payments Options (Accept offline payments including checks, money orders, customer accounts, cash on delivery, purchase orders, and in-store payments.)

Ready to Get Started?

Prices start as low as $300 – please visit the pricing page to learn more. If you are interested in one of these Small Business eCommerce solutions please give us a call at 618.409.5450 to discuss in greater detail …or you can fill out our contact form to begin the Small Business Website Design or eCommerce process.