Aug 22 2008
Os Commerce - An Intro
Os Commerce - An Intro
Executive Summary
eCommerce platforms are being commoditized. Enterprise level solutions are coming down in price and new open source solutions are being made available to anyone with an internet connection for free.
The most robust of these open source solutions is OS Commerce (OSC) ? a community driven eCommerce solution that is flexible, scalable, and user friendly. As eCommerce becomes even more a part of mainstream retail, OSC will provide businesses of all shapes and sizes with the functionality and capabilities of the big boys. This brief examines some of the advantages of OS Commerce and provides insights into how it can help your business.
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
Maybe so, but you CAN get an eCommerce platform for nothing. Offered for free at www.oscommerce.com, this eCommerce solution provides tons of bells and whistles and provides a user friendly interface to manage the administrative portions of the store. The code is based in the PHP scripting language and runs on the Apache web server ? a user also needs access to a SQL database to initially upload the files that manage the categories and products within the admin section.
Now that sounds complicated, but really anyone can do it with some concentrated effort. Much of the documentation online regarding OS is very thorough and provides step by step plans on how to get your store up and running. Any newbie to this type of work will likely come across some roadblocks, but the OS Commerce community forums are only a click away to start trouble shooting.
The solution is community driven, meaning that like minded OSCers are ready to help out their peers with answers to posted questions. Yes, at times this can be extremely frustrating waiting for an answer, but it is very rewarding to overcome a technology bug on your own.
Contribute to the Cause
The best part of OSC is the number of contributions that can be added to your site at any time. Again, there is no cost for these enhancements and upgrades ? just the need to be patient in your installations. In most cases, contributions are located on the OS commerce community section and are downloadable via zip files. After opening the file, read the ?read me? file which will walk you through the file additions, subtractions, and code changes needed to make your enhancement work properly. If you explore the OS platform be sure to upgrade with the following contributions.
Ultimate SEO URL?s by Chemo
This cool contribution allows the site owner to create static URL?s out of a database driven site. This will dramatically help in search saturation as more pages are able to be indexed. Its no secret that search spiders like traditional urls better than ones that are dynamic and this contribution helps achieve that.
Easy Populate
No need to input product data manually, this contribution allows you to import data from a basic excel file into your store. A true timesaver!
Featured Products
If you have an ecommerce store ? certain products are more attractive to sell than others. This contribution allows you to tailor the featured products that you want to showcase within both your home and category pages.
Final Thoughts on OSC
Myself, I am a marketer. But after learning OS I really feel like I have some programmer blood in me! This platform is easy to use and perfect for a small to medium size business in getting online. Yes, there will be headaches along the way but stay with it and you will overcome them and soon have an ecommerce store to bring you in a new revenue stream.
Craig Smith is the founder and managing director of Trinity Insight LLC. Trinity is a consultancy that helps online retailers sell more products within teh eCommerce marketplace. <a href="http://www.trinityinsight.com" title="http://www.trinityinsight.com" target="_blank">http://www.trinityinsight.com</a>
Checks Out At Check Out
As businesses providing services and goods that can be purchased online, ask yourselves this question: am I doing everything I can to enable my visitors to buy my products? Are you offering them a complete range of payment options? Or are you, like some many online businesses, making the mistake of assuming everyone has a valid credit or debit card? They don’t. In fact, over 11% of the population of the United States doesn’t have a credit or debit card and, of course, millions more are maxed out at any one time. Do you really want to ignore 30 million plus potential customers? No? Didn’t think so. The solution is to offer check payments to customers. With the increased availability of online check solutions for all sizes of business, problems normally associated with accepting checks - such as delays in receiving payment, bad checks and the additional banking time - are largely a thing of the past. ADVANTAGES OF ONLINE CHECK PROCESSING A complete online check processing service will include check verification, so you can determine whether an account is overdrawn or closed before dispatching goods; the ability to accept checks by fax and phone as well as online; fast, automated transfer of funds from the customers account to yours and even electronic check recovery. As well as increasing the number of potential customers, there are other advantages of such a solution for any online business. These include : Eliminates “the check is in the mail” syndrome. Allows faster access to funds than waiting for check payment by mail. Reduces labor costs associated with physical check processing. Cheaper than accepting credit cards and lower risk of credit card charge backs. Saves on expensive invoicing and mailing costs. CHOOSING AN ONLINE CHECK PROCESSOR There are a number of companies offering third party online check processing services, many of whom also provide integration with your current shopping cart. The smaller online business would be well advised to choose a service that takes a small percentage of the value of each check with no monthly minimum number of transactions. On the other hand, companies dealing with larger check values may find that a transaction processor offering a flat fee per check is a better option. Whichever option you choose, online check processing can both increase your customer base and streamline your current billing processes. It maybe time you asked your customers to get their checks out at checkout.
Jason Schwartz is CEO of Creative CashFlow solutions, a New York based company offering <a href="http://www.ilovechecks.com/ach/">ACH payments</a> and <a href="http://www.ilovechecks.com/internet/">online check processing</a> services. Learn more at http://www.ilovechecks.com/internet/
The Buy Your Own E-Store Scam
Here’s another one to watch out for if you’re trying to learn how to make money online. I’ve got personal experience with being burned by this one, I’m ashamed to say. It’s really quite ingenious. They offer to sell you a website containing a prebuilt online store that’s already stocked with inventory and ready to go. They’ll also allow you to sell the products on e-bay and they’ll even pack and ship them for you! All you have to do is drive traffic to your store and create your e-bay listings. Now, what you’re doing here is actually called dropshipping and it’s a legitimate industry ” just not the way these people package it. It is possible to find legitimate companies who will dropship for you if you sell their products on e-bay or elsewhere. That’s part of why this ploy is so effective. It sounds like it might be above board. So then they show you a list of all the brand name products that they carry and that will supposedly “sell themselves”. Sounds like a no brainer right? Well what they fail to mention is that all their brand name electronics are actually refurbished. I don’t know about you but I’ve always thought of refurbished products as the kiss of death for an online retailer. If I’m searching for something to buy and I come across a store with refurbished products I’m outta there instantly. They also don t let you see the so called “wholesale” prices until you’ve actually paid for the store. When you see their wholesale prices ” which are the minimum you’ll have to sell the products for ” you realize that they’re actually just as high, if not higher, than retail. How can you make any money if someone can just go to Amazon.com and get your products for less? And trust me - you re definitely not going to be able to sell them on e-bay which is one of the most highly competitive markets in the world. They also offer to give you a commission if you sell their crappy store to some other poor sucker. You see, they never really wanted you to sell any of their merchandise in the first place ” they just wanted to sell you the store. If you sold the merchandise they’d have to do a lot more work actually packing and shipping stuff. The only way to make any money is by helping them sell their store to other unsuspecting victims. All I wanted to do was to make an honest living with an e-commerce store ” not get involved in some disguised pyramid or multi-level marketing scheme. And of course when you finally wise up and send them an e-mail, guess what ” no response. When I realized they didn’t have a money-back guarantee I really started to feel stupid. There’s really not much you can do in a situation like this. Technically they did give you what you paid for ” a website prestocked with merchandise. It’s just completely useless because you can’t sell any of it. These jokers are treading a fine line here and managing to stay just this side of legal. They deliver just enough to keep from being shut down or forced to give you a refund. Take this lesson to heart: whenever buying anything in this business always check for a money-back guarantee and always use a credit card so you can do a charge-back if you need to. If not you will be S-O-L.
Matthew Carney is an internet entrepreneur and disgruntled former chef. If you found this article informative and would like to learn more about making money online you can visit his website: http://carmat.netsalaries.com. You can also check out his blog: http://myonlinebusinessreview.blogspot.com/.
