Information I need to create your site

Online Ordering Sites (e-commerce) | Static-content sites | Database-driven content
For all sites, I need the following: Most small businesses need online-ordering to supplement their business.

Online Ordering Sites (e-commerce)

What you need to think about in terms of your business strategy:

  1. If you haven't already, you need to think like a mail-order catalog business. 
  2. Your existing merchant account (if you have one) probably isn't internet-enabled.  That is something they charge extra for. Paypal is very inexpensive option.
  3. A return policy.
  4. Bulk orders:  Do you offer a price discount for orders of a certain quantity?  Price breaks are often at the 1, 25, 100, 500, 1000, 5000, 10000.  Are your prices going to how different will shipping and pricing be if a customer orders in bulk?
  5. Is shipping all a flat rate regardless of quantity, or does shipping disappear after a certain quantity?
  6. Will shipping and handling costs be folded into the product pricing?
  7. Do you have the appropriate packaging boxes and materials for bulk ordering?
  8. Quotas for order quantities above a specified limit.  For example, If you can only handle 150 orders in a week, any order above 150 will be handled specially.  If a large company orders 10,000 as gifts to their employees. If they do, it would be a good idea to communicate your lead time.
  9. If you do receive a sudden large order, do you have a relationship with a manufacturer who has the capacity you require?
  10. Merchant accounts often have a startup fee (grand-totals about $700-$1000), monthly report fee ($10?), in addition to percentage-of-sales fees (2%) and per-transaction fees ($0.30).  If your product is less than $1, there probably won't be a profit margin unless you require a minimum order and package in bulk.
  11. Do you have professional-quality pictures or image files of your products?
  12. Brief and long product descriptions
  13. Do you have the text you require on a word processor for the main page
  14. Company logo in a file (not in print)?
  15. Images for any animations?
  16. Product categories
  17. Who is the audience for your site? Who are your customers, if you have a specific target?

  18. Please consider that an e-commerce site takes several weeks to put up. Site look-and-feel changes, textual changes, order/setup/verification of SSL, link editing all require time. Figure 1 week for SSL, 1 week web hosting setup, and site design is minimum 1 week simultaneous with the previous 2 items.
    Non-Recurring Engineering (NRE) charges include your hosting, SSL, merchant accounts, domain name registration, any associated setup fees for these items.

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    Copyright©2001,2002,2003 Jim Michaels