Wine Country Web Design Blog

In a previous article (Hosted vs. Custom eCommerce: Your First Big Decision), I discussed factors to take into account when deciding whether to have your own eCommerce host or to use a hosted service. To recap, if you choose a hosted service then your online store runs on their host. One big advantage is that they take care of the hardware and software. One potential disadvantage is that you're limited to the features they provide. This article provides some additional factors ... [»]

In our series on eCommerce Demystified, we went through your eCommerce options in detail. If you read that series, you might be wondering "Where do I start?". I'm glad you asked. The first major decision you'll need to make is whether you're going to have a hosted store or a custom store. Hosted? Custom? What Does That Mean? A ... [»]

We have just finished a comprehensive 10-part series designed to explain eCommerce in terms that a smart business person can understand. When publishing a series like this over the course of 10 weeks, each article needs to have some recap material to help the reader tie the discussion to previous weeks' content. Now that all of the articles in the series have been published, this type of material is redundant. To make this series more accessible, I have edited the individual ... [»]

We've covered a lot of territory. Now it's time to summarize and make some recommendations about how various businesses ought to proceed. Over the course of the 9 previous parts of the series, we described the major steps in a typical eCommerce process, identified the 4 major scenarios for how to divide the eCommerce functionality between the merchant's website and outside providers, and examined a number of different factors that you should consider when evaluating which scenario to deploy. We ... [»]

You've decided which of the four eCommerce scenarios you want to use. You've chosen an eCommerce vendor, and picked someone to design your store. So, you're all set, right? Not so fast! Having an online store is only the beginning. You still have a lot of work to do if you want a successful eCommerce business. In this installment of our series, we'll look at some other factors you need to consider. 1. Will they find you? How will potential customers find ... [»]

You've decided that you want an online store, but you'd like someone else to handle all of the details and host that store for you. There are many Hosted Store providers who offer such services. In this part of our series, we'll look at what you can expect. Overview In this installment, we'll cover the Hosted Store scenario (last on the right in our diagram). The distinguishing characteristic of this scenario is that, except for a link to your off-site store, ... [»]

You've decided that you don't really need an online store on your website, but you'd like to have full control over how your products are presented. Then maybe a hosted cart solution is what you need. In this part of our series, we'll look at what that takes. Overview The distinguishing characteristic of the Hosted Cart scenario is that your website is handling only the product catalog portion of the sales process. A Hosted Services Provider provides the shopping cart and ... [»]

You've decided that you want an online store on your own website, but you don't want to deal with a full PCI-DSS validation. Then perhaps an online store plus a hosted payment solution is what you need. In this part of our series, we'll look at what that takes. Overview The distinguishing characteristic of the Hosted Payment scenario is that your website is doing all of the processing except for collecting payment card information. This approach offers feature flexibility similar to the ... [»]