New Ecommerce Business

[quikshop]

Well its been quite a few years but me and the missus are back with a new online retail venture.

So have I missed anything from the checklist?

1. Buy domain name - done
2. Set up email account(s) - done
3. Set up accounts with suppliers - ongoing
4. Open PayPal account (merchant account to follow post-first order) - done
5. Commission responsive design for online shop - done
6. Dust off old Ecommerce software and integrate said design / PayPal account
7. Add categories, products, info page bumph
8. Add USPs, hooks / stickies
9. Open Kashflow account for book-keeping - done
10. Start advertising

99999. Order 160ft yacht and open offshore account to hide money from tax man

 

[Blue Annie]

9.5 Help people on social media, (twitter, FB, if it sells pretty things Pinterest/Instagram) and casually mention your efforts to open the new store.

 

[Alan]

11. Buy stock
12. Get progressively poorer ( well that was my experience )

 

[quikshop]

11. Buy stock
12. Get progressively poorer ( well that was my experience )

That's happened a few times but the wins make it worth the effort... and risk.

 

[Alan]

13. Buy packaging material
14. Set up account with courier

I like your choice of accounting system.

Hope you selected Google Apps as the email platform.

 

[quikshop]

13. Buy packaging material
14. Set up account with courier

I like your choice of accounting system.

Hope you selected Google Apps as the email platform.

I have a SmarterMail account which does everything I need, and I still rock with a Blackberry Passport that gives me visibility of all my comms channels. What would be the advantage of using Google Apps?

 

[Alan]

Main advantage of Google Apps over SmarterMail for just mail would be price if you have less than 6 users ( Google at £33/year a user (unlimited aliases) Smartermail at $299 - up to 10 users )

Also, it seems (I'm not a smartmail user) that you have to download software to use it, whereas Gmail is truely any device anywhere (including offline)

After that it is the extra functionality of the Google Tools that are attractive to businesses https://apps.google.com/learning-center/ along with default 30gb (extendable to 'unlimited' ) of cloud storage.

Not saying you should change, or need to change - just answering your question in summary.

 

[Joel Bissitt]

Make sure your website will work with Google Shopping, fastest growing area of PPC and get the right partner for PPC so you start low, build up, review conversions so you don't blow your marketing budget at the crucial early stages.

 

[benjaminjones]

Definitely think about marketing because ecommerce can be tricky to get the sales rolling in .

 

[Matthew Owl]

Could you tell me what platform do you choose for your new e-shop? What do you want to sell? Maybe a can give you some advices about marketing, ux etc.

 

[quikshop]

Thanks all for your advice. Alan I use HostingUK (have done for a decade) and they provide the SmarterMail service for less than a round at my local. Its a cloud service so nothing to download as a user.

Agreed Joel, it's been a while since I created an Xml file to upload to Google Shopping, but I find myself clicking on those links as well - its on my marketing to-do list

Thanks for your comments Matthew; I've got a very good designer throwing together a responsive design as I type. I'll then either try to wrap it onto a legacy custom Ecommerce system, or if that proves too difficult I'll opt for Open Cart or similar.

I'll keep the actual business idea secret for now, it's a market we've sold into before so we're busily working away sussing out the competition

 

[antropy]

Thanks for your comments Matthew; I've got a very good designer throwing together a responsive design as I type.

Just the design or the HTML too?

I'll then either try to wrap it onto a legacy custom Ecommerce system

Does it really have all the features of an open source solution?

if that proves too difficult I'll opt for Open Cart or similar.

You have to be careful if you've had responsive HTML created because most ecommerce platforms like OpenCart may depend on certain class names, it's often better to take a copy of the default theme and start coding around than from designs.

 

[quikshop]

HTML as well. It was industry-leading back in 2008, so I suspect things have moved on a little since then. I suspect it'll prove a fruitless waste of time trying to get the thing responsive, the only real advantage of it is you can clone a shop and run multiple selling the same products under different domains and designs all from the same stock control system.

 

[antropy]

the only real advantage of it is you can clone a shop and run multiple selling the same products under different domains and designs all from the same stock control system.

You can very easily do that in OpenCart too

 

[quikshop]

You can very easily do that in OpenCart too

http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=98202

That doesn't look straight forward to me, more a config hack than out-the-box behaviour.

 

[antropy]

You've misunderstood the post. OpenCart has multi-stores built in and they do indeed work out the box. What's difficult is making those work with the Plesk control panel, which doesn't surprise me because everything is difficult with the Plesk control panel in my experience. My advice is always use a host with cPanel instead.

 

[quikshop]

What about Parallels CP?

I have route access to my dedicated server, so I presume installing, skinning and multi-shopping is all fairly straight forward?

 

[antropy]

Parallels Control Panel *is* Plesk, so no that doesn't help.

Root access doesn't really make those things any easier.

To create another store in OpenCart just go to the stores page and click the button to add another one. You can then edit the settings for what URL it appears on, what theme it uses and what products/categories it shares.

 

[andygambles]

Buy SSL Certificate to secure website

 

[quikshop]

Toying with the idea of using a call answering / order taking service. I used one years ago and it had mixed results, any recommendations?

 

[santipatanti]

You will need SSL cert for google shopping - be warned with google shopping if you use make sure you set a cap per day otherwise cost's may spiral especially if your selling popular products.

Set you site up with Magento 2.0 --- 70% of the largest retail stores worldwide use it.

I would avoid PAYPAL - they are known to freezing accounts if there's a large shift pattern in sales ect. Also they can implement conditions on accounts i.e only let you have 30% of payment and hold the remaining 70% for 21 days from date payment received.

 

[quikshop]

I thought Google Shopping was a portal to actual online shops? Have they gone all Amazon!?

PayPal has come a long way in the last few years towards something that looks like credibility. I've never had account problems but obviously heard of plenty who have.

Magento sounds like the industrial strength option, and I've heard it requires an effort to set-up?

 

[santipatanti]

Google Shopping - Is now Google merchant center done via product feeds (you must have a ssl cert) and will only display your retail store if you have an adwords account set up and this is a pay per click service.

Magento is just like opencart but more powerful and can handle thousands of products once you get the hang of it the back end it quite simple.
It will even allow you to set up multiple shops (sites) selling the same products, or you can choose which products they sell from the back end.

 

[Stu33]

Toying with the idea of using a call answering / order taking service. I used one years ago and it had mixed results, any recommendations?

We offer exactly that here at Spark Response. We work on a simple cost per minute per call basis, so very flexible. PM me if you'd like more info.

 

[quikshop]

We offer exactly that here at Spark Response. We work on a simple cost per minute per call basis, so very flexible. PM me if you'd like more info.

Thanks Stu, we're a couple of months away from launch so I'll drop you a PM closer to the time, or if I've not been in touch by mid-August feel free to chase.

Email marketing used to be a powerful tool, what 3rd party services do retailers use these days? MailChimp? Any recommendations? I suspect the monthly volume will be in the hundreds for a while.

 

[santipatanti]

Email marking MailChimp is good BUT the best on the market at the moment is ActiveCampaign

I use Mailigen ..... has the basic functions and for me it's free for up to 10,000 subscribers with unlimited messages sent ..... (part of WorldPay benifits package) Mailigen are relaunching on the 7th July with loads of new features- Holding a live webinar to showcase the relaunch.

Just some advice with email marketing - after you have sent a few emails 4/5 delete everyone from your list that has NOT opened an email.

 

[Nathalie]

Take a product liability insurance.

 

[Pish_Pash]

Link step 6 (Ecommerce software) to Step 9 (accounts software) ....go old in the process establishing there are scant solutions out there, where you don't have to donate a kidney..

Seriously, the key to a time efficient/successful 'one man band' is ensuring from the moment a buyer clicks buy ...the stock gets deducted, accounts software gets updated & the buyer gets emailed with tracking number etc (without any manual keying by you whatsoever)

If you've got these aspects covered, then you may even have time to see your family once in a while.

 

[fisicx]

Translation please? That post makes no sense at all.

 

[Henry Simons]

Have you thought about stock storage if the items you're selling require that?

If your mailing list is in the hundreds to begin with I'd say MailChimp will probably be sufficient for now. Simple system to use and free