Make Money, E-commerce and Credit Card Processing Information |
|
|||
Six Components Of A Good E-Commerce Site
Businesses, which are still sitting on sidelines and not doing business on the Internet, should think seriously about their position! If you are one of them, chances are there, that you have to pay dearly for your indecision as you might lose significant market share to your more proactive competitors in a very short period of time. Apart from the fact that e-commerce is growing at the rate of more than 25 percent a year, the use of online features can bring efficiency to virtually every aspect of business process, be it supply chain management or customer support management. But, how can you build an e-commerce business and take advantages of all these great possibilities? After all, you are pretty sure that anything to do with new technology is complicated, time-consuming, and expensive. Believe it or not, this is just a misconception that most business owners have about the Internet technology. The truth is ? in order to run a business online and reap profits, like any new effort, you need to do a little homework, have patience and determination, and get going. Take the following steps seriously and in no time you will be able to embrace fascinating world of online business. Take your products online Getting your product online does not simply mean - having a nice picture and a product narration to go with it. Effective use of the Internet is based on standards. Standards, as you know, are created to facilitate common use of a technology. If you ever imported or exported a product or service, or if you registered your product with some kind of authorities ever; you certainly know that each product falls under certain subcategory according to the classification system that you encountered. Internet is the same thing. Since the emergence of Internet, several classification systems have been developed. If you think long term and would like to use same catalog with multiple e-marketplaces, you should adopt one of the prevailing classification system in the Internet. The best online catalog classification available from my point of view is UNSPSC. For one thing, many prominent e-marketplaces adopted this particular system, which allows you to post your products on multiple e-procurement systems and e-marketplaces. How do you do this? I would suggest you to become a member of one of the e-marketplaces, where you can aggregate your products using some kind of simple wizards or forms. E-marketplaces based on Commerce One's the largest B2B e-marketplace enabler, have this facility. Our own Rusbiz e-catalog system, which is also based on UNSPSC, also allows you to integrate your products using a very simple but sophisticated form. If you do not have time to do it by your own, you can use the service of a B2B exchange. Rusbiz also provides with similar service. Get an online presence What should be your next step once you have all your products transformed into e-catalog? Naturally, you need to have an online presence to sell the products. There are number of options how to do this. Become a member of an e-marketplace This could be a large geography oriented fairly large horizontal market or a vertical e-marketplace specific to your industry. The membership fees are in most of the cases not so expensive. But many of them charge some percentage on your transactions, usually, from 1 to 3 percent. If you expect big sales volume, you may think this might not be the best choice for you. However, if you get new customers, thanks to your mere presence in an e-marketplace, the percentage that you have to pay on the transaction you should consider as customer acquiring cost. Under any circumstances, it is good to become a member of at least one e-marketplace as you -automatically get exposed to thousands of new prospective customers. Build a website There are several ways you can construct an e-commerce site to your need. You can build a website in house by employing developers or you can hire a web development company to do this for you. The advantage is you can have a website with the look, feel and functionality according to your given specification. However, both of these methods could be way costly for a small business. Average cost of building an e-commerce website runs starting from US$ 600 plus hosting and maintenance charges for a miniscule site with limited features to several hundred thousand US Dollars for a powerful e-commerce website. Another option that you have as a small business is to build an e-commerce site from prefabricated templates. While this is affordable and easy, you considerably lose flexibility and customization possibilities in comparison to building a site from scratch. Build a web store All these above mentioned cases do not allow you to have the potentials and advantages that come with an e-business website integrated with a B2B exchange. Which means, whether you are a business to consumer company with occasional sales to businesses or you are a pure play B2B company, a Web Store merged into an e-marketplace is what you need. A web store from a B2B exchange gives you the best of both worlds. You are having a professional e-commerce site which incorporates all the features that an e-marketplace has to offer. And you build a site from simple and easy to edit templates. For a detailed information about the features that come with a web store and benefits that you can get from them, follow this link: Powerful E-business Store About The Author Nowshade Kabir, Ph.D., is the founder, primary developer and present CEO, of Rusbiz.com, a global business to business e-commerce portal with feature like storefronts, aggregated catalog, e-marketplace, trade leads, internal messaging system supply chain solutions, etc. With a doctorate in Information Technology, Dr. Kabir has worked an advisor to government projects and has over 12 years experience in International Trade. An author of many B2B and business related articles; he publishes a bi-weekly E-zine for online business community. You can subscribe to his newsletter free of charge from http://www.rusbiz.com.
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Does Your Shopping Cart Have a Squeaky Wheel? Have you ever gone grocery shopping just before a holiday? The aisles are packed with people pushing carts, shelves need restocked, all the checkout lanes have long lines...not a fun experience. The Census and the E-Commerce Wave Understanding business and product sales can sometimes put me in a whirlwind. My job tends to get me involved with loads of different opportunities dealing with all sorts of product lines. It is not my job to understand every single type of product, but it is my goal to assist my clientele with the broadening of their product market. Pitfalls of Doing Big International Brokerage Business Online Nothing has helped international brokerage business more than the internet: it enables a businessperson to do business with little or no capital and to make quick contacts. Yet nothing has made the brokerage business riskier. This comes from a broker unknowingly linking genuine or false buyers with genuine or false sellers. Other ingredients also exist to cook the broker an unpalatable soup. Why Ecommerce is Not Ready for My Daughter or Me As the mother of a teenage clothing fanatic I'm often at my local mall. It occurred to me that the shopping experience for my daughter is attractive to her not because she wants to spend my money, but because the experience of buying itself is so rich to the senses. The Plain Man?s Guide to Making Money Online I'm a plain man who uses plain thinking in devising strategies for making money online. Choosing an Ecommerce Shopping Cart Choosing an online shopping cart is a big decision. Unlike a traditional brick and mortar business, your website is your only chance to impress potential customers. It needs to project a professional image to capture the trust of your visitors. The shopping cart is a particularly important part of your website because it deals with people's personal information and credit card numbers. People are nervous about online purchases and need to be assured that they are giving their credit card numbers to a reputable company. Stakeholder Analysis and Stakeholder Management What is a Stakeholder? 10 Second Internet Person, sound familiar? Some people do not understand the Internet idea of online commerce, but then again some people do not understand themselves either. To fully understand Internet Commerce you really only need to monitor your "clicking habits" for a few days to see where you are going and what if anything you are buying. The modern Internet Consumer is there and gone, in a click of any eye, if you do not grab us with good stuff, SEE YA, we are out of here and the speed of light. However you can also make money on that fact and Google AdSense is just one way. Before you go hog wild on the Internet concept of making money in a virtual world you need to educate yourself a little; one of the books I recommend is: Saving Money On Your E-commerce Site After building and transferring many e-commerce sites it still amazes me that owners of e-commerce businesses are still wasting money in three basic ways. For fear of stating the obvious, saving money is the same as making money $100 saved is $100 added to your profit margin. Here are three basic ways to save money on your e-commerce site and increase your profits. While they may be simple we know they are overlooked time and time again resulting in thousands of dollars in lost revenue. Keep Your Customers Happy by Organizing Your Payment Options Anyone using a slow, or an awkward payment processor had better wake up! Website Marketing: 10 Resourceful Things You Can Do With A Product That Doesnt Sell Do you have any product that has not been moving well? Cheap Cigarettes, Discount Tobacco and Cigars Online - Is It Legal? Many people online today still believe that buying tobacco products via the Internet is an experience that is doomed to failure. Either, the package will go astray, or the HM Customs and Excise storm troopers will smash down the door and abseil from the roof to collect the pennies that they are allegedly due for "tax evasion". 10 Compelling Benefits of Having A 3rd Party Merchant Account If you have been wrestling with the idea of applying for your own 3rd party merchant account then take a look at the following compelling benefits of using a 3rd party provider to mange all of your credit card processing needs. Shop: Is Shopping Online Secure? Is shopping online becoming popular and safe enough for you and I to do the vast majority of our shopping on the Internet? Projecting Your Image Whether you sell a product or merely sell time to your employer in your labor, your main product is you. You sell yourself with every move you make, every word you speak or write, every attitude you display. How far you go up the ladder depends largely on the image you project to others. Content Ever be Profitable? THE CURRENT WORRIES Shopping from Your Cell Phone with Froogle Wireless Many surfers already know about Froogle, Google's shopping portal that is still in beta testing. Google has now expanded their Froogle service so that it is available on WML-enabled cellular phones. Most newer cell phones that can connect to the Internet have this capability. The Internet and Customer Care: Aid or Anarchy? It was reported in 'Marketing' magazine this month, that Britain is becoming a "disaffected nation", with each adult apparently making an average of 12 complaints to service providers each year, based on a "Service in Britain" survey by ASR (Andrew Smith Research). In response to the rise of the 'assertive consumer', brands are endeavouring to make sure 'good customer service' is a recognisable characteristic in the form of testimonials, efficient call centre responses and empowering staff throughout the company to resolve problems. Most complaints were about power, utility or postal services at 42%, followed by supermarkets, telephone providers, TV or ISP providers and banks. Insurance companies were also in the top 10 with 21% of the articulate disaffected nation. Do Your Online Brokerage Business With Zero Down If you have little or no capital but you want to do big international business; if your small business is not doing so well; or your capital is low, why don't you turn to the Internet? The Internet is the fastest and most efficient method for the newcomer and the struggling businessperson to become an international broker of goods and services. Get Out of The Way Get out of the way and make it easy for your visitors to find what they want. |
© 2020. Online Media . Site designed and maintained by |
© 2020 |