my head will explode

an ultimate complete newbie's experience

[urameatball]

I spent the last 5 days trying to figure out this whole thing about setting up a basic online store with all the basic functions needed for the 100 or so items I will have.

Someone recommended me to yahoo stores so I started off with that... but I can't even figure out a way to customize my yahoo site beyond their ugly little templates. I look at some of the other yahoo sites and they look all pretty while mine's so generic.

Then someone said OSCommerce! oh yay, free software! I download it and don't even know how to get the thing to open :( (complete newbie :().

so what do you guys think? should I (can I) just pay someone on this board to to make me a semi-good looking ecommerce store that actually works? And later on when my head stops hurting, I could go around playing with some of the options and maybe customize the store to my likings.

It's day 5 now and the only thing I think I know is to use paysystems for all my transaction needs. Apart from that, the whole site is back to square one.

background:
I only have basic html expertise and don't know much beyond the usual functions of MS frontpage.
no programming experience besides the stuff I vaguely remember from Gr.10 computer class.
Very good at using computers in general.

[ukgimp]

you sound like a candidate for actinic, simple to set up. Either that or get someone to do it for you. There are a whole load of pitfalls.

Different free carts will require different technologies (Oscom' = php, others will be ASP)

[jbinbpt]

I found a host that offered use of Miva Merchant. It's easy to use and setup. Lots of hosts offer Miva in packages.

[urameatball]

Hi, thanks for the help.

I've decided to let someone more professional to help me out with building and integrating the website with everything. (am I using newbie terms?)

I asked one guy and he wanted $1500canadian for the following:
- Template design for website
- Shopping cart (OSCommerce.com) intigration into website
- Three web pages - Homepage, products, and specials
- Dynamic listing of products using csv file
- Integration of payment system (Paysystems.com)
- No text, logos, or pictures (just place holders)
- delivery date of July 31

I know oscommerce provides a free cart but does customizing it a little and integrating everything really cost $1500? and is this guy providing all I need to startup working well running site or do I need to spend much more money on other stuff?

Can someone give me some ballpark figures and what to expect from these prices?

[urameatball]

btw, does anyone wanna setup an ecommerce site for a newbie (me)?

[urameatball]

last thing:

from what I know right now, I need to work with 3 companies.

hosting company: webhost4life.com [very affordable and recommended from someone who owns a shopping cart]

site builders: (please suggest someone... I'm desperate) the guys who will integrate everything and make stuff work

payment processor: paysystems.com (takes care of everything after a customer presses the checkout button)

Is that all? am I missing anything very very very important (or not so very important)?

[Reflect]

I know oscommerce provides a free cart but does customizing it a little and integrating everything really cost $1500?

I hate to say it but I've spent more on a cart system than $1500 before. I have also used OSCommerce for free on a $10 a month web host account. It all falls down to how much you can do on your own and also what your needs are.

Depending on his/her rate it sound like they are blocking off around 15 - 30 hours of work which is reasonable time allotment for what you stated they are giving you.

HTH,

Brian

[palmpal]

Hi,

I can offer my sympathy! I am a business owner and didn't have the $$$ to pay someone to make my site, had no knowledge of HTML, much less shopping carts! I work full-time at my day job so in my spare time I spent about three months designing and putting my site together. My site validates and it doesn't break in Netscape either!

I owe most of my success to Webmaster World. Everytime I got stuck I would surf the archives here and post a question or two (OK alot of questions!) Seriously, I owe so much to the people on this board. Many people here are professionals and not once did I feel unwelcome.

Good Luck with your venture!

[urameatball]

woohoo,
I found someone to do my site for $350usd :). And it looks like he'll do a better (more professional) job than those guys who quoted me $1500+. Looked at some of his passed cart sites and it looks promising. Best of all, it doesn't take him 2 days to reply to my e-mails (unlike some of the other ecommerce developers I've contacted)

Anyway, he's using oscommerce and customizing some of the options to meet my needs. It's going to be integrated with PSiGate, which is a little expensive, but it's the only good Canadian payment processor where the oscommerce module is designed by the core programmers. I would have gone with paysystems otherwise.

Anyway, I LOVE this forum! and this whole ecommerce thing is sllllooooooowwwly (but steadily) starting to make sense. Needless to say, I'll be visiting the forum more and more as time progresses. Right now, I'm still trying to fully understand what is said in that "shopping cart 101" thread :P

I really hope I can have my site running by the beginning of August. I'll post it up when it's done and maybe some of you can give me some tips and suggestions. I've been reading a lot of the past threads regarding what is considered good business practices in ecommerce and trying to apply it to my website. Hopefully, my site will be on par with the professional expectations of the members of webmasterworld.com *prays*.

[trillianjedi]

oscommerce is superb. And once it's setup (you will need professional help to do that if you're a newbie) it is very easy to maintain, and offers a good degree of design control.

TJ

[urameatball]

Few more questions:

I'm totally unfamiliar with those payment processing gateway and merchant account stuff.

Should I just take a blind leap of faith sign up with a random payment processor?

I was going to go with paysystems but oscommerce doesn't have a module made for it by it's core programmers. So I selected one out of the list (http://www.oscommerce.com/about/gateways).
I chose PSiGate because it allowed me to pay in Canadian funds which was a plus, they also allowed phone and fax orders and also had fraudshield (I don't know what fraudshield is but it sounds nice :)). They also charged a little more than the rest but their customer service was pretty good and that gives me peace of mind.

Then I found out I need to start my own American Express merchant account and link it to them. So in the end, I'll get charged the AE discount rate + Psigate discount rate + transaction fee... which doesn't sound very nice (grrr).

So now I'm searching for another payment processor to go with.

So out of the list provided by oscommerce, which one would you professionals think I should go with? I want to sign up by the end of today

[shmekkyl]

Check your sticky.