Ecommerce Setup
What style of Ecommerce suits your scope needs?
Do you have an existing website?
What is your Ecommerce experience level?
Do you have a SSL certificate for Ecommerce security on your website? Lets Encrypt
Simple Buy Buttons on your own website
PayPal can accept PayPal account funds transfer and credit cards.
If you have a PayPal merchant account you can make PayPal Buy buttons.
These buttons can then be embedded in your web pages.
Each product has to be configured at PayPal and a unique button code is generated.
The actual purchase process occurs at PayPal. You can configure which web page it returns to.
When a sale is made you have an email of the transaction including the customer name and address.
You can also add PayPal balance change smartphone notifications via SMS.
PayPal website is ranked approximately 66th globally and 27th in USA. PayPal
Shopify Store
Shopify is a fully hosted paid Ecommerce website.
You can buy a website domain name, create a online store, add categories(collections) and products.
There are Shopping channels for eBay, Amazon, Google Shopping, Facebook and other websites.
Payment gateways include credit cards, PayPal, Amazon, Bitcoin, cheques, bank transfers and cash on delivery etc.
Inventory quantities can be tracked within Shopify.
There are integrations available for freight company shipping labels and postage.
Accounting can be intergrated with Xero and Quickbooks.
Visual themes can be added for free, paid or custom made. Themes can include space for Social Media sharing.
Products can include variations like size and colour which show up as dropdown selections.
There are free/paid addons for Digital Downloads, Facebook Store, Google Analytics, MailChimp and Product Reviews.
Plugins can handle drop shipping. The order is placed at your site while another supplier does the product shipping.
Shopify Stores have a 14 day free trial to setup, then $30 US/month. Unlimited products. Domain names are extra.
Shopify stores can be built for you and then transferred to you.
Shopify's website is ranked approximately 500th globally and 250th in USA. Shopify
Ebay Store
List your products within a eBay store format. This costs $25 AUD/month.
Up to 600 fixed price products can be listed for free.
Transaction fees are 6-9%. There is a maximum of $400 in fees for a month.
There are integrations available with Australia Post for shipping labels and postage.
Social proof using customer Feedback is built in.
Ebay Australia is the 7th most popular website in Australia. eBay Australia
Google Shopping
Google Shopping uses an online spreadsheet to manage products and inventory.
Google Adwords is used as a advertising campaign to rank potential product listings.
Retailers pay for clicks that lead to your product sale page.
Fees vary depending on the competition for the product name keywords.
Retailers can control the maximum advertising spend per day.
Google Adwords reports can show the cost of clicks for various keywords/phrases.
Google Australia is the most popular website in Australia. Google Shopping is a tab from the search page.
Google Merchant
Amazon Store
Amazon website stores can be run from your premesis or from Amazon global warehouses.
Fulfillment by Amazon allows you to ship wholesale quantities to Amazon warehouses for retail sales.
FBA charges for storage space ($0.64/cubic foot/month Jan-Sep, $2.35/cubic foot/month Oct-Dec)
There are also handling fees per sale $2-4 based on weight. Postage is extra.
Amazon Stores cost $40/month plus referral fees.
Referral fees vary in percent depending on the product category. 6-20%.
The Amazon website is ranked approximately 11th globally and 4th in the USA.
Sell on Amazon
New website with physical product ecommerce
The most popular website store type is WordPress and WooCommerce.
WordPress (free) is the most popular website content management system.
WooCommerce (free) is a Ecommerce plugin for WordPress.
Look for website hosting that includes 1 click WordPress install, SSL certificate and self updating.
Payment Gateways include credit cards, PayPal, Alipay, Amazon, cheques, funds transfer, Bitcoin etc.
Sales and VAT tax can be calculated automatically depending on the customer location.
Products can have categories, tag descriptions and variations.
Product images can have a main image and product gallery of images.
Each product should have dimensions and weight included for shipping calculations.
Digital Download products are catered for. The customer gets an email with the download link.
Product bundles of multiple products can be sold for a single price.
There are premium paid plugins for subscriptions, shipping integration, accounting integration and many others.
There are free plugins for Google Analytics, Google Sitemaps, MailChimp and many others.
Email Newsletter subscription upon sale can be optionally automatic.
Style Themes can be free, paid or custom.
Discount coupons can be created with date ranges and conditions.E.g. Free shipping over $100.
WordPress , WooCommerce
New website with digital product ecommerce
A digital product website combination is WordPress and Easy Digital Downloads
WordPress (free) is the most popular website content management system.
EasyDigitalDownloads (free) is a Digital Product Ecommerce plugin for WordPress.
Look for website hosting that includes 1 click WordPress install, SSL certificate and self updating.
Payment Gateways include credit cards, PayPal, Alipay, Amazon, cheques, funds transfer, Bitcoin etc.
No shipping section is needed for digital products.
There are premium plugins for subscriptions, affiliate digital products, software licencing etc.
There are free plugins for Google Analytics, Google Sitemaps, MailChimp and many others.
The default price is free until its value is changed.
Banner shaped images and square style images can be added to product listings.
Product variations with different .zip combination files can be sold. E.g. Basic, basic + extras.
Large digital download files can be provided from Dropbox and Amazon S3 storage.
Software Licence premium plugin allows licence counts based on installs and date ranges. Updates are included.
Recurring premium plugin allows set price per day/week/month/year. This can include set payments for expensive items.
Style Themes can be free, paid or custom.
WordPress , Easy Digital Downloads
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