Starting an online Web store is a great way to make your products available to the public. Whether you have a small start-up business or an established business, using the Internet to sell your product increases your pool of potential buyers. There are a few important things to consider in order to be successful at running your own online Web store.
Instructions
1. Choose a product to sell. The type of product you are selling effects how you set up your online store. Take note of a few important things when you choose the product. Is it a tangible product, a service, or do you deliver it over the web? Is the product handmade or are you a wholesaler? Do you have a large warehouse of products or will you make each to-order?
2. Set prices for products and shipping. You may want to start small to see what you can sell, the amount you can sell and how much people are willing to pay. If you are successful, increase your inventory or services over time.
3. Create a merchant account to enable you to accept credit cards at your site. Banks are able to set these up for a fee. Paypal is a site that allows consumers to pay for their products online and doesn't charge the seller a fee to set up. The money goes into your Paypal account and you transfer it to your bank account.
4. Choose a host for your online store and set up your account. Flying Cart and Vendio are general e-commerce stores. They provide a storefront and give customers the ability to have an online shopping cart and checkout. An ebay, etsy, or cafepress store are other options which allow the merchant to display their goods and provide easy online checkout. All these sites are available below in the resource section.
5. Design a website for your company which displays a logo and/or company name. A few things to remember when designing the site are keep the site name easy to understand and type, and make the site easy to navigate. If you don't have a lot of experience building websites, you can use a website template or pay a web designer to make and maintain the site.
6. Market your website and product. If you never tell anybody about your site, they might stumble upon it but you'll never get the traffic you need to support yourself. Make fliers and business cards and put them in places where people might need your services. Create a coupon to give out for use on your site. Place ads on related websites, or on social networking sites to get your name out there.
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