Online shop - paypal only?

[Penelope Pitstop]

I am currently researching options - looking to launch a small online shop selling childrens products (fairly low value but specialised). As this is a new venture I am looking for an initial low cost option which I will then upgrade if the response is good. I have been looking at Mr Site but wonder if the paypal only option will put off many potential customers? Any thoughts or alternative recommendations?

 

[wood1e2]

different people are put off by all the different merchant services, whether it is paypal, netbanx et al.

From your point of view paypal is possibly slightly higher expense, but it is only when you take a payment. So it certainly is the 'cheaper' option to start with, as there are no monthly fees.

In addition, it may be that you have no budget at all, but something like mrsite could be a bit of a let down, once you get going. Remember there are no 'free lunches' as such.

I would research some more through here and on Google to find out more about 'off-the-shelf' e-commerce sites. There are many e-commerce sites that you pay a low monthly fee for and offer most of what you might want and give you scalability.

You might end up spending so much time installing and then as your knowledge grows get a little frustrated that mrsite can't do x,y or z!!

And even specialised children products are possibly a highly competitive niche to get ranked high with search engines.

So you may have to spend money or alot of time obtaining a high ranking with the search engines, so you wouldn't want a cheap site that hinders your rankings. Or your conversions...and conversions are the key to any website.

Hope this is of some help and to be fair I have possibly answered more than you wanted

 

[aquarium plant food UK]

I have recently done a site with prestashop, using only paypal, seems to do OK, I have installed a quick checkout too, but no one has used that yet:|

No one has said to me that they are put off using just a paypal site, but in the longterm I will setup using another payment gateway for credit/debit cards.

John.

 

[wood1e2]

You can use Paypal for Debit/Credit cards...that what I thought the OP was asking?

If not then yes it would put people off, or more precisly it would put me off, as I associated using paypal to paypal accounts as something at the cheaper end of the market...which may be reflected in the quality of the service/product

 

[shopintegrator]

Hi,

>but wonder if the paypal only option will put off many potential customers?
Many of the merchants who have built their online shop using the Shop Integrator ecommerce toolkit are only using PayPal to accept customer debit/credit card and PayPal payments.

>Any thoughts or alternative recommendations?
You could combine a low cost of free web template (search google for plenty of websites offering this) and the Shop Integrator ecommerce toolkit to build a low cost online shop without having to compromising on features.

 

[seagalinvestigations]

I would advise looking at something that offers multiple options for payment, that way you are not restricting your customers payment options. We have a site that has the ability for visitors to purchase a few of the items we offer which uses Google Checkout. The reason for this is Paypal decided to close our business account during security checks, then we received an email saying all funds were suspended for 6 months... we are still baffled and searching for an answer from them despite completing the checks and passing them. Perhaps they don't understand our business and don't care to?

 

[zookx]

Have read things from several people unhappy with Paypal and its business practises.

That said we've used it on over a dozen projects and not had a problem. for small volume and people starting out it offers a good way to test the waters before investing further. Very rarely have we found people put off by Paypal, the incentive to look toward other direct payment options for our clients has simply been the fees are too high.

 

[Penelope Pitstop]

You can use Paypal for Debit/Credit cards...that what I thought the OP was asking?

If not then yes it would put people off, or more precisly it would put me off, as I associated using paypal to paypal accounts as something at the cheaper end of the market...which may be reflected in the quality of the service/product

Thats exactly what I thought - most frequent online shoppers are familiar with and often prefer paypal. But there are those (especially the only-at-christmas online shoppers) who I think may be put off - and not realise that you can use Paypal for credit and debit cards. Perhaps the solution is to make that point very clear on the shop homepage??

Thanks for the advice and recommendations all. The research continues....

 

[Timpane]

Well for small volume and people starting out it offers a good way to test the waters before investing further.

 

[logicfusion]

Well for small volume and people starting out it offers a good way to test the waters before investing further.

I agree. Give Paypal a go.

Do a little research on the problems people have had (accounts frozen etc). Just be aware of what does *sometimes* happen to businesses that use them.

Definatley a good solution for testing the water. You can always change provider etc.

 

[Big Pete]

I actually prefer to buy from paypal websites..so easy for the buyer..

so as a seller its a bonus ..

 

[360interactive]

I actually prefer to buy from paypal websites..so easy for the buyer..

so as a seller its a bonus ..

I agree, I will tend to go for a site that has paypal as an option, it's fast, convenient and I know I have some sort of protection.

Paypal is great for buyers, however hell for sellers! (apparently!)

 

[zabestof]

Never rely on PayPal as your first payment method. I currently use only PayPal on my store (still working to implement my own merchant) and I receive a lot of messages from people that want to pay with credit card. Also, when I look at the stats there is a lot of cart abandonment exactly at the checkout page where they choose the payment methods.

PayPal should be used only as a secondary payment method.

 

[tony84]

from a personal point of view, i would buy from a shop that only has paypal....however i prefer to use debit/credit card.

From my view as owning an ecommerce site, we dont get many orders as were still new but the majority of our orders are coming through sagepay. I would say at most 20% come from paypal.

One way of doing it would be to have your site online, get indexed and work on the site. At the same time apply for a merchant account - it can take upto 6+ weeks to get one.

Give it 6 months, i dont think any of the accounts make you sign up for a certain contract. For the sake of £50-60 (over a 5-6 month period) you will find out whether its worth having or not.

 

[Consistency]

I hate paypal and am absolutely put off by the paypal only option. I look for options first and if I see that paypal is the only method then I leave it.

I would much rather if debit or credit cards are too much trouble send a cheque through and accept that a seller can only send the goods on clearance of that cheque.

Failing that I think perhaps the BACS method.

 

[bdw]

Never rely on PayPal as your first payment method. I currently use only PayPal on my store (still working to implement my own merchant) and I receive a lot of messages from people that want to pay with credit card.

They can pay with a credit card using Paypal. I would suggest that it may be the presentation of the payment method on your website that is the problem.

 

[harrison8097]

your customer still can make payment via without a paypal account

 

[refinedline]

I don't think Paypal would put too many people off. It is a very well known and widely trusted way of paying for things.

 

[TotalWebSolutions]

Plenty of our Payment Gateway merchant customers have Paypal as an option for the customer as well as our EcomMerchant service. There will always be those who prefer to use PP and there will always be those who hate it. Having both gives you more payment options and thus decreases the chances of losing a sale from a PP hater