Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Hi there! I'm new to this, so please bear with me...

I am almost a year into owning my own soy candle company and have had a website for about the same time. However, I have not had 1 internet order and I'm not sure why. I get on average about 10 hits a day, sometimes as many as 70+ a day. I do have a contact form on the site, but thought maybe it's because I do not have a shopping cart. Any suggestions? As a consumer, would you prefer to be able to shop online?  Any suggestions or feed back would be greatly appreciated! Thanks so much!

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Thanks so much for the feed back. I have added a Google shopping cart to my site and have received 1 new online order so far. I know it will take time to build up my business as well as building up online orders. I appreciate the info given! Thanks again! -Julie

What do you mean by a Google Shopping Cart? Are you referring to Google Checkout?

Google Checkout is good, but generally works best as an alternative to your main shopping cart (not everyone has a Google account).

What website software are you using? There are some great hosted eCommerce solutions out there (such as 3dCart and Volusion) that provide full websites, shopping carts, and more, but they can be pretty expensive (around $100 a month). 

Have you tried WordPress? There are a lot of great WordPress eCommerce themes as well (check my signature for some) as well as several great free shopping cart plugins that integrate with other WordPress themes.

There's always Paypal as well, which I would recommend over Google Checkout, as customers can checkout (using a credit card) through Paypal without having a Paypal account. Also, Paypal's fraud protection/prevention is outstanding.

There are some other open source shopping carts like OSCommerce and X-cart, but I'm personally not a big fan of either of these. Magento is great, but requires some technical knowledge to build a great-looking site.

You need t optimized your site and do seo promotion for you site. It will really help you.

Kingston

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Hi, I recommend you to try with zeuscart which is the best open source shopping cart software to create your store.

J-Bird, 

I admire and support your initiative to grow your business!  I am generally a supporter of everything DIY, so I think that it is great that you are attempting to take on the task of transitioning your website into a revenue generating tool.  It is a must in today's market, especially in the discretionary retail market like candles, to have an effective website. Customers need the ability to purchase these types of products spontaneously and seamlessly. 

Having said this, I think you should step back and evaluate what you want or need to get out of your business. Is this your main/only source of income? Is this a hobby? Do you need the income that you earn from this business? If you determine that this is a business you want to live off of, it might be worth investing in a professional website designer/consultant. 

A good website consultant will be able to set you up with everything needed to give your website the exposure needed to grow your business. SEO, search engine optimization, will help to rank your site on google and increase visibility to potential customers. An effective point of sales system will make purchases seamless. Aesthetics and design will make the website visually pleasing to customers and make you, and your business, look professional.  I am sure there are a multitude of other services an effective web consultant can provide (I am not one).  

Although the upfront cost might be high, there should be little to no on-going fees and the payoff to your web sales will be exponential. The bottom line is, it will allow you to focus on your core competencies, making great candles, and allowing you to stop stressing over the website.  

Good Luck!

inovoconsulting.com

Shopping cart software is software used in e-commerce to assist people making purchases online, analogous to the American English term 'shopping cart'. In British English it is generally known as a shopping basket, almost exclusively shortened on websites to 'basket'.

Hi JBird,

In order to encourage sales you will most certainly want to add a shopping cart / checkout feature to your site.  Payment processing is one of the biggest keys to e-commerce and by adding that feature to your site should really help increase sales.  On top all the good advice above here are some other resources you may want to do some research.

https://samurai.feefighters.com/

stripe.com

http://www.bigcommerce.com/

http://www.woothemes.com/woocommerce/

http://www.shopify.com/

http://goodsie.com/

https://www.okpay.com/

Shopping cart has a great importance in shopping online..a good online shopping cart gives a good conversion rate..

Sarees online