OT - E-commerce software recommendations..?

[Adrian]

HI All I've got myself talked into helping set up a website for some friends.

The web design side of things is no problem - but they also want to expand their site to allow them to sell items online. The last time I did this was quite a few years ago (Filemaker databases ! - anybody remember them ??) - and I'm aware that technology has moved on.

As I say - it's fairly OT for this group - but I know that there are those among our number who know about these things.....

So far the specification (ha!) is very loose -

'thousands of items' (their words, not mine) they will run the shop, update stock etc possibly need to link in with their existing merchant account - or maybe use Paypal ?

At the moment there seem to be two or three possible directions :-

a) open source software b) commercial software (CubeCart looks interesting) c) web-based services (like Yahoo Merchant Solutions)

With (a) the price is attractive - but what about support ? (b) would offer 'paid for' support - which might well be worth it (c) looks like it might be the easiest to set up..

Any comments / perspectives / war stories ? Email me direct if you'd prefer - the email works...

Many thanks Adrian

[Gordon Henderson]

First a wee disclaimer - while I don't do websites, I do run servers on behalf of a few small web design companies, so I'm going to suggest finding a local web design company who already has experience of developing online shopping systems and ask them for a quote. Find 2 or 3 and see what they can offer, if poissible. Look at their work - are they using an existing commercial package (eg. Actinic?), are they using an open-source package, or have they developed their own?

That won't be the cheapest, but it might be the easiest way to get going in the short-term, especially when it comes to integrating payment systems to take credit cards online, etc.

Second to that, I'd look at the open-souce solutions - but only because I'm a bit of an OS fan.. What to do here, as you're woried about support, is to find the forums, etc. for that "product" and see what others are saying... In terms of support, you should be able to very quickly get an idea of what problems might exist in the software and how fast they do get fixed just by reading the forums. This will be a costly process in terms of your time and effort, but the cheapest in £££ terms in the long-run. Also make sure you find out the requirements of the server for the software - is it tied into a particular database engine and so on, will your host give you support and access to error log-files, etc.

I'd probably avoid the commercial ones, but just because I like Open Source, but if you do look at them, again find out what they need in terms of the server side of things - a particular version of apache, mysql, php, or even postgresql, or some other database back-end?

The web-based ones - yahoo, ebay, etc. are all very good, I guess, but they come with a lot of extra "baggage" which is just unneccessary IMO.

Good luck!

Gordon

[Rod]

Adrian,

A few years ago (2? 3?) I was involved in making the same choice for an important (though not huge) German site. We went for oscommerce. The site worked, indeed works. (If you email me, I will happily send you the URL but I do not wish to publicise the information here.)

Support was effectively pretty good as there are so many users (i.e. sites). Most issues that we had were already documented and largely solved/worked round.

It is immensely flexible despite 98% of oscommerce sites looking similar!

No problem setting up payment connections with various parties (can't now remember who but not just one or two). I have a vague memory that there were difficulties in some other open and commercial products because, for example, UK-based software companies are not very good at supporting German bank interfaces or something like that. This might not be an issue for you.

Effective multilingual handling. (The site had to work in at least German and English.)

Someone very close suggests that you should definitely consider

- she says that their online support is "fantastic". (I have known her post and say that she has got a reply within next to no time.) Although commercial, the cost is low. She used their products and was delighted. I concur that she managed development of an attractive, professional, effective site. Very impressive for her first online shop.

I have no experience of the web-based solutions. But you might like to read this story:

what happens if you fall out with your web-based host?

[If you go for oscommerce, just make sure that you get rid of the 'rounded corners' feature asap. Although it softens the look nicely, it turns round to bite you time and again because it is based on static graphic files whereas everything else is css. This might no longer be the default. It was when I was involved.]

[Adrian]

HI Gordon

Many thanks for the reply....

Yes - that's an option (4) that I hadn't considered..... thanks !

Ideally, I'm looking for a solution that my friends can run themselves

- without too much intervention by yours truly.... so while the 'support via forums' thing is a great plan, I was leaning more towards a 'paid for' solution so that they could get 'support from a person' as part of the package....

Yes - I'd need to do some research.

The hosting co we're using does have some recommended OS solutions - things that they know work with their servers. That might remove one layer of doubt & undertainty.....?

What sort of 'baggage' are you referring to - built-in ads, that sort of thing ?

Many thanks Adrian

[Adrian]

Thanks - though it looks as if the 'ecommercetemplates' deal might just do the trick......

Now that sounds useful. This arrangement is a cross between a freebie for a friend and a mildly commercial deal - but there's not enough money in it for me to spend hours & hours on the learning curve.... (the curve seems to get steeper as I get older ! )

Yes - exactly...

OK - thanks... Adrian

[spuorgelgoog]

For something fairly small, I'd suggest Actinic. It's easy to deploy but its integration with their existing ordering system might be weak.

Otherwise look at OSCommerce and if necessary use the money saved on software to pay for some support. At least with OS software you always own your own data (as well as the application) and aren't tied to one provider.

Owain

[Gordon Henderson]

Sure - but I was suggesting using the forums to gauge how well the software runs - if it's plagued by bugs, or if if basically "works" and the forums are just full of hints & tips...

That would be a sensible move - find out which ones they are, then go back to the forums just get get a "feel" for them, and pick one. You mighteven get the web hosts to set it up for you, create the dabase tables, etc.....

Yes, and reliance on othe sites to make your site work - eg. ad. serving sites, images off another server, and just not having the site with your own name and brand all over it.

Gordon

[Adrian]

Ah - yes - I see what you mean.....

Like the sound of that

You're right - there's a lot to be said for having 'everything' on the same server - at least, that way, if any part of it is broken then the whole lot's inaccessible - rather than being 'partly functional'...

Thanks Adrian

[Adrian]

I don;t think they have an 'existing ordering system' - one of the questions I need to ask....

It's one of those jobs - started as 'let's discuss' then ends up as 'we're having 20,000 fliers printed and want the website address on them.... now....'

Perhaps we can agree a spec at the end of the job !

That's a point.... I'm thinking that it's a fairly simple shop they're looking for - but we ned to have that discussion. Step 1 is the 'static' site - so's the 20,000 fliers have somewhere to point to !

Good game, eh ??

Adrian

[The Natural Philosopher]

Thats the easy bit. Its when you point out that what they actually need is 1000 items, each with an accurate description, price, product shot, and specifications typed into a database,and that is THEIR job, that interest wanes.

I could probably say that 80% of all websites contain nothing more than

5 pages saying 'here we are, this is what we do*, call in or phone a salesman'

And that's IT.

• and that's the better ones: I have found websites that tell you everything about a company except why you might EVER want to do business with them at all!

Setting up a site framework takes at most a couple of weeks. Setting up a shop catalogue takes several months. No one wants to do it, so it never happens. They just had a dream that 500 quid would 'get their shop online'

Only if the customer understand the issues and is totally committed, or prepared to pay YOU to be a full time marketing person for 4 months.

[Adrian]

That's very true. I have already had this discussion with them..... and they're still keen. I think the key to it is to take it little by little - which is why we're going for the 'static' site first.

All depends on what you were aiming to achieve. If it's just to have 'a presence on the internet' then a simple sire like that _may- achieve this aim - or it may not...

Worse still is the 'simple' site which some design graduate has coded in bleeding-edge Flash - so it takes half an hour to load - and then only if you've got the latest player installed. When it finally loads, and you've watched all the revolving globes, animated bits and unnecessary frippery - it then reveals.... in all its glory.... the company's phone & fax number - with an invitation to 'call us'...

Probably looked great when demo'd to the MD from a laptop! - but rather misses the point (and the search engines!)

Too true

I suppose it's true - the shop part of the project may never get done... which is why we're going for the slightly easier target of the 'brochure' site first...

We'll see how it all pans out.... waiting for copy / rough layout for the static site right now...

Thanks Adrian