EKM Powershop

OK...try again....anyone use EKM powershop?

Any good?

Chris

 

[UK2004]

Used one and was crap, was only the basic one though I did see one site that looked quite good. In my experience of these shopping cart things avoid them lik eplague get a custom site built.

 

I have been experimenting with Cubecart but for a non techie, it's a bit fiddly.
Can't afford £0000's just yet to pay for a site.... :-(

 

I have been experimenting with Cubecart but for a non techie, it's a bit fiddly.
Can't afford £0000's just yet to pay for a site.... :-(

Is there no commerical themes you can purchase or something?

What is it you are trying to do with CubeCart?

 

[UK2004]

Where's your other site the links in your signature arent showing up, the one I saw before looked good.

I'm so pissed off with my site tonight I feel like throwing the screen out the window.

 

Where's your other site the links in your signature arent showing up, the one I saw before looked good.

I'm so pissed off with my site tonight I feel like throwing the screen out the window.

What's wrong with it? Your site looks really nice.

 

Well, in a nutshell. I want to build a website that doesn't look like a duplicate of all the others using the same package but without having to use too much brain power ;-). Most off the shelf ones don't allow much customisation of the templates. Actinic Express and EKM seem to be a bit more customisable.
I want to use Cubecart for my other site littlehoglets.co.uk but i think the hedgehogtoys needs something better.

 

[UK2004]

I don't like it and not getting enough traffic, I know I've been told gotta be patient with google and stuff but I get very impatient. We have soem features coming up in Loaded mag, Stuff mag and couple of others so that should drive orders up but at moment am just very cheesed off with it.

I want a site as lively as www.iworld.co.uk !!!!

 

hedgehogtoys is offline while i try to figure out which package to use.
littlehoglets is going to use cubecart on CSN Carls hosting servers and merseyaccess is not an ecommerce site and is currently only a pile of notes on my desk

 

[UK2004]

Hedge, just looked at EKM site some of the sites look good. My EKM was www.topbrandclothing.co.uk should have a page there that says this EKM was closed down. Couple of impressive ones on there.

 

Yeah, I like your site UK2004, it's clean and works well.

 

Thats what I thought. I was paying £15 a month for the Shopmaker site but it wasn't very customisabel but looking at the EKM website their seems to be a lot more you can do to the 'templates' to give it less of the clone look. OK, its £20 a month but I can cope with that for the next 12 - 18 months until I can afford a bespoke site.

 

[UK2004]

Cheers for the compliments of my site I just feel it lacks a certain punch value when you arrive of looking realyl interesting.

Speak to EKM about the designs you like on the customers page as they tried to get me to build a custom site for 1000 pounds but I had made mind up to shut down and start MP3 Additions.

You come across as very tenacious so I am sure you will hit jackpot within a few years!

 

Yep, i'm determined that my lack of start up funds for this business is not going to hold me back. If it means taking small steps to get were I want then so be it

 

[UK2004]

Are you putting that othe site you had back up, was it the yellow background one?

 

[cubzworld]

Hedghog

I'm in a similar business as you and I have just set up an EKM shop - it is good to custom - you can copy the source of a template, add and amend it and then load it back up. I'm still playing with different templates at the moment cubzworld.com.

I too am impatient about it's visability and lack of sales but it is early days and the wrong time of year so I will wait and see before deciding whether it is a profitable site or not.

I also have my own website cubzworld.co.uk which desparately needs redesigning but gets the sales because it gets the traffic!!

Once you decide on a website do stay with it a while to give it time to work.

Good Luck
Tracy

 

[She Says]

Hedge, Have you had a look in the cubecart.org forums as there are many people there who do all different types of skins.
eg http://www.cubecartskins.net/

http://www.cubedesigns4u.co.uk/

http://www.cartdesigns.net/

Just to name a few!

hth
Sharon

 

I had thought about the skins for both cubecart and OSC and most of them only accept payment by Paypal. I can't use Paypal as I had a problem with them a couple of years ago and I can't use my account anymore.

 

[GNU]

I had thought about the skins for both cubecart and OSC and most of them only accept payment by Paypal. I can't use Paypal as I had a problem with them a couple of years ago and I can't use my account anymore.

The skins applied to OSC do not affect the payment module being used, I imagine its the same for cubecart. All skins do is affect the look of a site, not its functionality.

 

[Robsta]

I had thought about the skins for both cubecart and OSC and most of them only accept payment by Paypal. I can't use Paypal as I had a problem with them a couple of years ago and I can't use my account anymore.

The advantage of PayPal is that is accepts payments on a global basis.

CartDesigns.net is a UK business and therefore can accept other forms of payment other than PayPal from other UK businesses.... you only need to ask

 

[neilly_smiff]

I have heard terrible things about EKM also. It's not the first time I've heard about them removing negative posts off their forum either... They had serious checkout problems just before Christmas '08 and did their best to cover it up. This seriously isn't good practice (and almost morally wrong) - if you've got a problem, you should fix it and then reply back to the forum post saying it's sorted and apologies for the inconvenience.

I think these guys are going to struggle moving further into the ecommerce age. I wouldn't put my online business in their control... it's just too risky!

 

[AccstonTrading]

We use EKM and have had a couple of problems previously but always found the support staff helpful. Any problems we've had have been sorted quickly.

You can customise pages etc and some of this is reasonably easy to do yourself. Others perhaps a bit more complicated.

All in all we've found them alright and they do keep adding new functionality etc.

Hope that helps.

 

[Petfriendlyrentals]

We use EKM and have done for then last 2 and bit years, sales are really good right now, sites are very seo friendly and even a novice person could work with the templates. In my opinion great place to start when building your online business.
Many new features being developed.
Any issues others have had, well cant comment on them.
I'm happy
here is my site PetTastic Pet Supplies - sorry not done enough posts to have a link

 

[ColinR]

You don't actually need to pay any monthly 'ecommerce' fee if you don't want to. I build all of my stores using ecommercetemplates.com and before anybody asks, I don't have an affiliation with them but I have built dozens of sites based on the shop 'code' because it is so easy to use.

The 'store' can be generic or full colour design, the difference is that the generic type can be moulded quite easily to fit a themed template for which there are literally hundreds free on the internet or you can use your own design or pay to have a professional design ready made sent to you to mould the code around. You only have to look at the 'live' sites section to see how easy and variable this is.

The costs for the store depends on the store facilities but even the most expensive store is less than $300.00 with no monthly fees.

All you really need to set up your own store is a good hosting website (this one you can'r get round, you have to pay monthly fees) and one of these templates.

Yes you have to learn how to put stuff on the site and yes it does take some work on your part but even the very best chargeable ecommerce site requires this from you anyway so why pay a monthly fee for something that can be obtained for a one off payment?

I am not going to post my websites because I don't want this post to be seen as advertising, its not, its meant to show people that money can be saved.

If anybody wants to see my sites send me a pm and I will email them to you.

 

[emerchant]

I have heard terrible things about EKM also. It's not the first time I've heard about them removing negative posts off their forum either... They had serious checkout problems just before Christmas '08 and did their best to cover it up. This seriously isn't good practice (and almost morally wrong) - if you've got a problem, you should fix it and then reply back to the forum post saying it's sorted and apologies for the inconvenience.

I think these guys are going to struggle moving further into the ecommerce age. I wouldn't put my online business in their control... it's just too risky!

is this morally wrong?

 

[PrettyPaws]

We use EKM for our 2 stores www.prettypawsaccessories.co.uk and www.coolcatcollars.co.uk/ and have been generally very happy with EKM.

 

We use EKM for our 2 stores www.prettypawsaccessories.co.uk and www.coolcatcollars.co.uk/ and have been generally very happy with EKM.

Cute sites Pretty Paws - although I struggled a bit with the back to front layout on the cat collar site, nav on the right always feels wrong to me, but I think thats personal choice :redface:

 

[PrettyPaws]

Cute sites Pretty Paws - although I struggled a bit with the back to front layout on the cat collar site, nav on the right always feels wrong to me, but I think thats personal choice :redface:

Thanks and yes I agree, it's a personal choice. The point of having two stores selling the same cat collars was to display them in a very different way including design, layout, price etc etc.

Interestingly CCC converts much better than PPA

 

[occasionology]

OK...try again....anyone use EKM powershop?

Any good?

Chris

FACTS: I can only have insults for EKM, so I´d better keep my tongue tied and report the facts.

I decided that EKM was too expensive, so I migrated my shop to Merchantmoms (brilliant, great service and friendly staff). I still had a year before I needed to renew my domain, so I said we´ll go through that when the renewal date was due. They did not contact me, Nominet was asking for a silly high fee, so I ASKED EKM TO RENEW WHEN STILL ON TIME, BUT THEY DIDN´T, they simply freed my domain. As an expired one, I lost total control of it. My domain was lost, all the products, photos, descriptions, prices and long hours I had put into it. Never a sorry, EKM even kept the keys that they were being sent and made even more difficult for me to get my shop and name back.

TERRIBLE SERVICE, completely useless, they simply got rid of my shop as I was not paying them the monthly fee and had not trouble in destroying my shop, and even put obstacles by keeping the keys. I only got my name and shop back after the "limbo" period expired and nobody bought it before I did. Now I only have to put everything back!!! At the moment the content is from my Spanish site and will have to translate everything and plan prices again.

I would like to contact a lawyer and see if I can sue them, as I had put hundreds of hours developing my shop, and the worst thing is that I did not even got a sorry from them. If any has a contact for this please le me know using the contact from my shop.

My advise? Stay well clear of EKM, they will not have any trouble in destroying all your hard work and will not even apologise. Do not waste your money on them, there are much cheaper and very good ecommerce hosting services.

Eva Hudson

 

[Hedgie]

FACTS: I can only have insults for EKM, so I´d better keep my tongue tied and report the facts.

I decided that EKM was too expensive, so I migrated my shop to Merchantmoms (brilliant, great service and friendly staff). I still had a year before I needed to renew my domain, so I said we´ll go through that when the renewal date was due. They did not contact me, Nominet was asking for a silly high fee, so I ASKED EKM TO RENEW WHEN STILL ON TIME, BUT THEY DIDN´T, they simply freed my domain. As an expired one, I lost total control of it. My domain was lost, all the products, photos, descriptions, prices and long hours I had put into it. Never a sorry, EKM even kept the keys that they were being sent and made even more difficult for me to get my shop and name back.

TERRIBLE SERVICE, completely useless, they simply got rid of my shop as I was not paying them the monthly fee and had not trouble in destroying my shop, and even put obstacles by keeping the keys. I only got my name and shop back after the "limbo" period expired and nobody bought it before I did. Now I only have to put everything back!!! At the moment the content is from my Spanish site and will have to translate everything and plan prices again.

I would like to contact a lawyer and see if I can sue them, as I had put hundreds of hours developing my shop, and the worst thing is that I did not even got a sorry from them. If any has a contact for this please le me know using the contact from my shop.

My advise? Stay well clear of EKM, they will not have any trouble in destroying all your hard work and will not even apologise. Do not waste your money on them, there are much cheaper and very good ecommerce hosting services.

Eva Hudson

Only 2 posts and having a go at EKM !! Careful now

 

[awebapart.com]

My domain was lost, all the products, photos, descriptions, prices and long hours I had put into it.

Although this is a double post, I think it's worth reiterating the following...

Whichever web supplier a business goes with, ideally a business should register and be in control of their own domain, preferably using an established domain registrar company. Unfortunately businesses do try to cut corners and "save money" and they get attracted to web supplier packages that include free domains as part of the package, in which case you have to carefully check your supplier's terms and conditions, or better still forego the freebie and purchase it yourself if your web supplier allows this (if they don't, find a supplier who does). It should be possible to use EKM and still be in control of your domain by purchasing it elsewhere and just pointing the domain's name servers at EKM (and avoid the physical domain transfer).

Most ecommerce systems, including EKM, also have backup or export features, so in most cases there is no need for anyone to be in the position where they have lost all of their data. Have a look at the online demo at EKM, view as shop owner, select settings, advanced settings, import export data. Most ecommerce systems allow data export, which then leaves the product images, which you should have already (since you uploaded them from your PC), or if necessary you could export (maintain backups of) those images from the website using other software like HTTrac.

 

[occasionology]

Hi, as I said, I migrated to Merchantmoms, which are simply fantastic, helpful, friendly, never a problem with them. Have a look at my Spanish website, also hosted with them and with the same cart. ocasionologia dot com . It´s not "out of a box", and it took me many hours to get it done, just as occasionology co uk did.

The simple thing that EKM had to do was renewing my domain when I told them to, and they said they would. Instead, acting against my instructions and on their own account, they freed it and everything was lost, including my right to renew the domain without the risk of other people buying it. I was just lucky nobody did while it was in limbo.

Merchantmoms were unable to do anything at all, as EKM was still the register. EKM refused even to forward the latest key and what really got me is their refusal to even deal or recognise the chaos and damage they so lightly created.

They have no shame and obviously are not interested in their customers or in anybody unfortunate enough as to be linked to them. I was not in their monthly paying list and for them that meant that they could destroy my shop.

Nothing would have happened if EKM had done as requested and as they said they would do. If I do something against a client, I do take responsibility and offer a compensation. They simply washed their hands, looked to other way and pretended nothing had happened. WELL, IT DID!!!

If those are the kind of people working in EKM, that is the kind of company EKM is. People deserve to know, and I will make sure this goes as far as possible. This was not an error, but a deliberate murder of my shop.

 

[iworkfromhome]

Hi, ive just done my website using ekm, still adding products, its my first attempt and money is an issue, any feedback from more experienced guys would be a great help. Many thanks.carmats2u Try not to be too hard, im really trying hard to make it work, to no avail so far.lol

 

[sockpuppet]

EKM is fine for what it is, the bottom end of the hosted ecommerce market in the UK.

Its not the cheapest - its actually quite pricey - dont let them upsell you addons the email marketing and analytics are just a big rip off. Use Google Analytics and MailChimp both are far far better products and are free / cheaper.

EKM is not the best there are loads of better alternatives out there but if you really want to go down the hosted cart option they are ok, certainly better than using a big hosting company.

Protip - tell them you want to cancel and move to a competitor and see what they will offer go for free design / SEO or free use of the system. I have done this before and got quite a lot out of them...

Also Protip number 2 dont post your store details or real name here - they dont like their store owners posting here - they dont mind their staff posting with false praise however

 

[Ali-v-8]

Thats speculation.
Why would they object people posting about their websites?

I have a number of small business clients who i have set up EKM powershops for.
As an SEO i recommend them as a very good start up platform.

 

[silvermusic]

Also Protip number 2 dont post your store details or real name here - they dont like their store owners posting here - they dont mind their staff posting with false praise however

What an utter load of nonsense. Then again it's the kind of rubbish I'd expect from a competitor that's posted nothing useful on this site, just used it to knock EKM.

And yes I host one of my sites with them, have done for well over 2 years and am very happy with it.

 

[iworkfromhome]

Im actually happy, at 19.99 plus vat per month our websites are making money and so far we are happy, We didnt have any addons and we have just launched a new site using EKM too. We are not programmers or seo experts but also have found that the automatic tags etc have obtained us page one ranks, So i have to say we cant knock them to be honest.

 

[keepitsecret]

Here's my 2 pence worth...

I'm not a web designer but I know a thing or 2 about coding here and there and I tried out EKM for a while about a year ago but there templated system was just to strict and I could not get the feel/style I wanted to create. Also (I dont know if they have changed now but) there used to be a £5060 start-up fee only payable via Credit Card. Which put me right off!

We've now been with tiger ecommerce for about 10 months now. Really good feel to it, always updated with new things good forum community to help you out lots to customize without needing to contact the designers to get them to do it.

all in all I wouldnt use EKM personally.

Our site - www.keep-it-secret.co.uk

 

[iworkfromhome]

Hi ,Theres no setup fee, you just pay the first 19.99 and your away, I agree its templates arent the best in the world but it does work and you can get a good look, Or of course customise your own templates, But im not up to that im afraid. I have seen some ekm sites that are very good indeed though.

 

[carsupplies4u]

I have used both EKM Powershop and Tiger commerce. I have been with Tiger commerce for the last two years and iv never been 100% happy with the end result of my online store with them, so after speaking with a few people i have starting building a new online store with EKM powershop this week and after only about 5 hours development time my store is already looking more professional than it was with tiger. So from my point of View EKM Powershop is an excellent product and excellent Value for money. Also i find browsing of EKM powershop stores to be very quick compared to some others i have looked at in the past.