moving on from Bt eshops recommendation

[selectcase]

Hi

We have had an eshop package with bt eshops for around 6 months now and although the package is ok for £25 a month the support is awful, in fact non existant its so bad i dont mind closing before the end of my contract. I have been working on the site and have managed to modify it from the template as i know a little css, html etc.

Becuase of the awful support we need to change and I was looking for advice on where to go from here. I was thinking about another package e.g. ekm powershop or similar or I could go down the "invest time and do it yourself" but time is limited as is money, we are fairly new as as I am sure you can appriciate cashflow makes things tight.

I was going to leave the bt site running and in the meantime build/modify the new one

my basic requirements are as follows

can hold around 1000 lines of stock
naturally all ecommerce facilities e.g secure cart, payment gateways, etc which I have with BT Ehops
preferably not more than £25 per month
the ability to change the layout of templates to some degree, add flash banners, etc

In all honesty due to time commitments i will probably have to go with a package but any advice would be welcome

thanks

will

 

[WolfStores]

Hi Will,

I would recommend Prestashop (open license ecommerce platform - free to use.
In terms of the features that you are looking for:
1. You can upload an unlimited number of products and an unlimited number of categories
2. All standard ecommerce facilities e.g. cart, payment gateways, etc. are included free of charge in Prestashop
3. You can get a hosted Prestashop online shop for a lot less than £25/month
4. There is a large selection of free templates to choose from but also the possibility to modify the code for small changes. There are free templates available which already come complete with image sliders.
5. Yes it is a good idea to go with a package. As you already pointed out this would save you a lot of money and time.

Please feel free to PM me if you require any more help with this

Best Regards,

Tim

 

[Leo-InstallingIT]

Hi Will,

As Tim has suggested Presta Shop may be a good option. Another option I would recommend along the same lines is OpenCart.

These are both Open Source pieces of software so there is no costs for the initial software, and there are lots of cheap or free templates around to get a nice layout. There is also the option of getting a designer to do the template as well.

With these options you could get a standard Linux hosting package (and a domain) with a decent host for around the £45 a year mark (our price).

You would need to get a payment gateway arranged with these solutions, but this can be quite straightforward. Total Web Solutions, a member on here, have an extension for OpenCart for their payment gateway that some of our clients use.

There would then be no real limit on the number of products etc, just the space and bandwidth it uses.

I hope this helps.

Thanks

Leo

 

[selectcase]

Thanks for the advice - I like the look of the backend of OpenCart and have access to dreamweaver etc so could either design my own or purchase a template - we currently use streamline/worldpay - i imagine its possible to intregate this as well. i will need to investigate carefully as my current experience is limited

 

[Leo-InstallingIT]

You certainly can integrate Worldpay into OpenCart, there is a module installed as standard which allows you to do this pretty easily.

We actually have a store that does exactly this.

If you would like me to set you up a demo version of Open Cart you can have a play with just let me know.

 

[selectcase]

ok, thanks for the offer, I am looking at the opencart website and will have a play first with some of the demo options online and have a read of the documentation to get a feel for it.

 

[Leo-InstallingIT]

Great. My offer is completely no string by the way if you do want to have a go once you've gone through the online demo etc.

 

[selectcase]

Thanks leo I will more than likely contact you later