E-Commerce has come a long way from its earlier days when it was considered a major undertaking to set up an online shop. Companies used to spend millions of dollars and had to hire expert software developers to build e-commerce website. Nowadays you can buy, or even rent, software that provides all the functionality needed for online e-commerce store out of the box. The biggest decision you have to make is what type of software to purchase and how much customization you should do. For any online e-commerce software shopping cart is the backbone that provides the most critical functionality.
What is a shopping cart?
A shopping cart is somewhat similar in concept to what you are used to seeing in the grocery store – only this one refers to a software functionality needed for online shopping. Traditionally, the term shopping cart was used to refer to the payments processing system that online shopping sites required. Over time, though, it has come to include the entire software framework that online stores run on – content management system that displays your products, user review management system, the analytics that store owners use to study key metrics and the checkout and payments processing system.
What kind of shopping cart should you choose?
As I mentioned earlier, you can purchase shopping card software and set it up yourself. An easier route is to “lease” it from hosted service providers. There are number of hosted shopping card providers in the market – GoEmerchant and Yahoo! Merchant Solutions, among others, are popular. Choosing the right shopping cart provider can be a difficult decision because various software providers offer different functionality as well as pricing options. For someone who has never set up an online shop this can be a daunting challenge. However, you can look into several avenues to narrow your choices and find the one that suits your needs and budget.
- Go to industry websites or forums – Internet is replete with forums and websites dedicated to all types of industries. Look around to see if you can find an online forum that is suitable for your industry and study what other people recommend for shopping cart. Ask questions to experts and you are guaranteed to find useful information within days.
- Check out competitors’ websites – The best part about internet is that everything about competition is available for anyone to see. You can find out what your competitors are using for their e-commerce shopping cart and get initial leads. If they are successfully running their websites there must be something good about the shopping cart software they are using.
- Visit review sites – There are number of sites dedicated to reviewing all types of products. You will find excellent work done by experts whose job it is to test the software and provide detailed review about their functionality as well as pros and cons of various alternatives.
- Hire an expert – If you do not have technology background and are unable to make the decision yourself it is advisable to hire an outside web designer who is familiar with setting up online e-commerce stores. They do this for living and can provide recommendation on the type of shopping cart to use as well as build the e-commerce store for you rather quickly.
Paul Tibayan is an entrepreneur. He frequently writes about his best findings and tips on small business and e-commerce blogs. He recommends having shopping cart reviews for your ecommerce site.
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