How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?...

Hi all

I am toying with the idea of having an ecommerce store set up online to sell products (yet to be decided).

Having scanned through posts here and on other forums it looks like the cost is very variable with quotes for the same thing seemingly ranging from a couple of hundred through to a couple of thousand.

Is there such a thing as an 'average' price for a small ecommerce offering, or anywhere that lists guidelines on this sort of thing?

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

Hello John,
Yes it is more of a headache these days to set up a shop on line than it use to be I can tell you.
When we set our first shop up you only had one type of software then, that being Shop Factory, which we still use today after more than 9 years.
But with some shops now you can like us buy the software to build your shop with that includes shopping cart, payment types eg Paypal/Bank/Postal/ etc, or you can get a firm to rent you a shop for anything from £29 per month to £69.
The only thing to remember is that if you have little money to pay out-right for your shop then rent it with a much smaller outlay, but remember it is on going, you stop paying then your shop dies.
Which ever way you decide to go, you certainly do not need to spend more than £400 to own your own shop.
Good luck.
David
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www.Alternative4u.co.uk

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

As David says, the cost varies depending on the solution that you decide to go with.

If you want to start off with minimal risk and make things easy, then you could consider simple 'buy now' links through paypal. Try that with a few key products and if signs look encouraging, then consider a more integrated shopping cart facility; there are free tools that provide this ability online so until sales are going well you can get away without paying anything if budget is an issue.
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Web Design

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

Start with the free options and see if the business is there to make it worthwhile scaling up to something more robust but expensive?

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

It is completly variable, I mean are you going to do your own art for free or hire a piccasso for a million dollars a banner.

I do everything on my website myself, with the exception of holding an art contest for the banner. What I do for my website is a full time job, it has so far cost me just over halve a years wages, I tended to make a fair bit for my work, so really its a small fortune.

I would really recomend if you just have a few products to test market them on e-bay, and see if there are buyers out there.

I would highly suggest doing as I have and learning the website development yourself, even if after a while you hire someone to then go through and improve your website, you should definatly know how to update yourself or you will be hiring full time people at high wages.

I mean as I say its totaly variable, you can go take a photograph of your product and list it for free on weebly.com with a paypal button in under an hour per product, but I doubt in an hour you can make your product look so compelling people would be willing to part with thier money.

Also getting people to your website isnt the easiest thing in the world, unless your going to pay per click with Google and make a profit from it somehow, you are competing with over 6 million webpages out there, its not like it would have been back in 87.
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Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

I agree with the above posts in that the cost should be dependent upon how much work you want to do or how much of the work you would like to be done for you. I know of two companies that target very different markets as there are lots of people who really want to do things themselves, but also those who need help and guidance every step of the way.

Storedeveloper http://www.storedeveloper.com/ ) is a company that does everything for you except come up with what you are going to sell. They design the store, set it up and send you on your way. The system and design work costs about £6,000 in total but they offer a good funding scheme through Business Link (who you should look at no matter what you go for) that means you'll only pay about 30% of the total cost.

Alternatively there is a company called Viono that basically rents you their system for £45 per month and you do with it what you want. Like David said, with this option if you stop paying, your store stops but I think it is a great affordable choice.
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Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

Useful stuff

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

You can spend as much, or as little, as you like.

I would reverse the question. How much are you prepared to invest in this aspect of your business? How much do you aspire to earn from it? Is this a main part of your sales plan?

If it is the centre plank of your business, do not go cheap. If it is a sideline..go cheap!
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Paul Norman OrangeTree Developmentwww.orangetreedevelopment.co.uk

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

John

How long is a piece of string?

As above, it really can be a little or a lot - a large company will spend an eye-watering amount whilst for a small business or individual the answer could be nothing!

Re : How much should you pay for ecommerce solution?

I would start with the free options, make sure that your idea is viable, then once you need the scale and more features go paid.
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