Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Easy Shopping Cart Software - What To Do Before You Start Paying Subscription

Don't you even THINK of signing up for a free trial before you have done the following actions.

Many times this happens to be the scenario. People will search for an easy shopping cart software that they can sign up for thinking that they can start building their store then. WRONG! The right way is to conceptualize your entire online business ideas first before you even start looking for any cart.

What Happens When You Don't Plan?

Guess what happens when people just start signing up to use a cart before even planning out their business properly? The result, they get stuck. They have the products they want to sell online but the pictures or images are not ready. They do not know how much to charge for shipping. Payment methods? Haven't signed up or created an account with any payment gateway much less discover how much these gateways will charge per transaction. Not enough market research done on the products they wish to sell. Or worse case scenario, the products that they want to sell are getting outdated!

What You Need To Plan

So to have some wisdom, please start to plan what you want to sell, how you want to sell it and who you want to sell it to. List down all your keywords ready to use for SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Find out how much shipping will cost based on the weight of your products and remember to include a buffer fee for emergencies in case shipping costs more than you anticipated. Draw out how you want your store to look like. Work on your logo and make sure it looks professional. If you're not the creative designer type, please look up a few logo design companies to get some quotations. If their rates and previous work portfolio impresses you, you may want to go with them. Make sure you set up a payment gateway by having an account with them and know the fees they charge.

Free Trial Season

After you have all that planned out, then only do you begin to look for several easy shopping cart software to try out. Since majority of them offer free trials, you need to allocate some time to test out their features to see whether they suit your needs or not. If the ecommerce shopping cart does not fit you, then move on to try other carts. In some instances, you may even try out several carts at the same time to compare features. While trying it out, please do ASK as many questions regarding the solution till you are completely satisfied. You do not want a cart that has poor after sales support when you need them the most. It also helps to see their range of client base to know how reputable and reliable their solution is.

Summary

Only when you are completely satisfied with the cart and have tested it out to the max during its free trial period do you consider signing up for it. Please make sure that you have also taken into consideration the monthly subscription fee for the solution as you do not want to just set up a hit and run online store. You need to think long-term when running an online business.

Harry Goldberg is a retired ecommerce entrepreneur who has built and sold over 100 online stores. He now shares his ideas and tips on what to do before you start subscribing to an easy shopping cart software which is an ecommerce shopping cart. Make sure you plan well and make full use of their free trial periods.







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