What is an ecommerce platform?

An ecommerce platform is a hosted online store. These platforms come pre-packaged with a variety of functions including inventory management, shopping cart, checkout, shipping and promotion options. Here are some important things to consider when choosing an ecommerce platform.

Functionality

Perhaps most important, the platform must meet your business requirements.

Make a list of all of the functions that you need. Consider your needs now, and also any future functions that you’ll need.

Ask yourself:

• Will you offer products in different sizes, styles or colours?
• Will you offer different shipping options?
• What payment methods will you accept? Will you accept coupons or gift cards?

Dependability

Dependability is crucial when it comes to choosing an ecommerce platform.

A key difference between an online store and a bricks and mortar store is your dependence on the server that hosts your store. A server crash can hurt sales and damage customer confidence. Ensure that your platform can handle the volume of traffic that you expect.

Questions to consider:

• Is my store located on one server, or many? Is there a backup server in case one fails?
• Will there be service outages for site maintenance? If so, is maintenance done at off-peak hours?
• How much traffic can the platform handle?

Customer support

Eliminating down time is critical to the success of your online business. When selecting a platform, ensure that customer support can address issues quickly.

Compliance

If you accept credit cards as payment, your customers’ financial data must … Read more

Sell your eBooks, music, software and other digital content online easily with VersaPay, Shopify and FetchApp.com

Have you ever wanted to sell a picture you took, song you wrote or PDF copy of that presentation you gave online? By combining VersaPay credit card processing, Shopify’s Online Store and Fetch’s seamless digital content delivery system you can easily setup an online web store to sell your creations.

How does it work?

• Customers can browse your Shopify ecommerce webstore and put a selection of your songs, books etc into a shopping cart
• Customers click checkout and are taken to a SSL secured checkout page provided by VersaPay and Shopify to provide their credit card information
• A customizable email receipt with instructions on how to download their digital content is provided automatically to the customer for you
• Customers can automatically download the digital content from a time-limited, fraud-proof temporary download location
• VersaPay deposits your money the customer paid by credit card into your bank account at midnight every day

How do I get started

1. Signup for Shopify — Build your website and online store easily. Shopify takes care of hosting, bandwidth and security so you can focus on creating and selling your digital content. Shopify is free to setup and only starts costing you money after your 10th order. You can build your online store in 5 minutes or less!
2. Signup with VersaPay — A merchant account bundled with a payment gateway from VersaPay allows you to accept credit cards. VersaPay

… Read more