Opening an e-commerce online store is not as complicated as some people think. It takes some time and money but not much. If you understand the process, then you’re going to have a much easier time when you actually go through it.

The first step in opening an e-commerce online store is getting a domain. A domain is the name of your store on the Internet. For example, Youtube.com. You need to get the name and register them at a trustworthy registering company. It is highly advisable that you do this yourself instead of having someone else do it for you. That way, you know you are the owner of the name. Another recommendation is to prepare several versions of the name you want in case your first option is taken.

Next, you need hosting for your e-commerce online store. Hosting is the service of renting storage space on a computer that’s always connected to the Internet in order to put your e-commerce online store (or rather, the files that compose it) there and make it available to the public. While there are some free ones, I don’t recommend you use them because they often disappear without previous notice.

Now comes the hard part: designing your webpage. To be honest, if you don’t know how to program or you have never been interested in computers, you’re much better off hiring a programmer to do the job for you. Even easy programs that are used to create webpages require some learning and dedication. So, unless you have the disposition, the time, and at least a minimum degree of creativity, just save yourself time and hire someone to do it.

However, before you do, it’s important that you select a shopping cart. A shopping cart is a program that handles the commercial aspect of your virtual store. Because of its importance, you should select it yourself instead of the programmer.

Lastly, you have to promote your site. There are many types of promotion. Some of them are very conventional, like placing ads on certain sites, and some of them are unique to the Internet, like SEO, the process of making your site rank higher on search engines such as Google.

That is, in general, the process required to open an e-commerce online store. Obviously, each step requires a complete analysis that goes beyond the limits of this article, but at least you now understand the basic steps of the process.

When people want to build an e-commerce website, the first decision they have to make is whether they do it themselves or hire someone to do it.

A third alternative is having one of your employees or your team to build it. Having such a person build an e-commerce website is usually cheaper and practical, but it doesn’t guarantee a good site. Many people think that “computer guys” can do everything related to computers, but this is not true. They have their areas of specialization that require different sets of skills and knowledge. It’s like expecting a neurosurgeon perform heart surgery. In the same way, your local “computer guy” is probably very good at setting networks, fixing computers, installing printers and other hardware, etc. But that doesn’t mean he’s good at graphic design, marketing, and website building, which is what you require to build an e-commerce website. On the other hand, of all the people on your team, he’s the one that will have an easier time doing the job.

If you don’t have any experience with computers beyond using common applications such as Word and sending e-mails and you don’t have anyone on your team with such experience, then do yourself a favor and hire a company to build an e-commerce website for you.

On the other hand, if you have some knowledge of computers, you can buy a good web building software and do it yourself. Don’t get a free or a cheap one. Commercial ones are much easier to use and have very good tutorials and customer support in case you run into trouble.

Even if you don’t know much about computers, if you have an artistic ability that allows you to create something, you should consider trying your hand at doing the website. If you like painting, drawing, blueprinting, decorating, and even architecture, then you’ll probably enjoy the process of creating a nice looking and attractive website. At the very least, you will have a good aesthetic image of your future website to show the person that you hire to build it.

Unfortunately, there is no clear way to tell if you should hire someone to build an e-commerce website for you or to do it yourself. It all depends on each case and according to the needs of each person or company.

There are many types of shopping cart systems in the market. Some of them are open source and some of them are closed source. If you don’t know what that means, it basically means that you can get and use open source shopping cart systems for free, whereas you need to pay to get and used the closed source programs. There is more to that than just the payment, but for the beginners, that’s all they need to know for practical purposes.

Choosing one of them for your own website is important, since your sales will depend on it. Because there are so many to choose from, the first step is to narrow down your options. The easiest way to do this is to decide to go for open source or closed source shopping cart systems.

Open source systems. The most obvious advantage of open source shopping cart systems is that they are free, and thus they are attractive to people with very little money or who don’t want to risk a lot of money on a website. Because they are free, they don’t have customer support. However, there are usually many forums and sources on the Internet where you can learn how to use them and update them. For the most popular ones, you can find modules with nice features for these systems that were developed by people for free. In theory, they have the best and most up to day safety features, as long as you are willing to monitor safety developments and install them as soon as they appear. These systems are as good as commercial ones, if not better, provided you are willing to dedicate quite a bit of time to learning how to use them.

Closed source systems. While you have to pay to get these systems, they are designed to save you something that might be more important to you: time. Commercial systems in general tend to make the installation and running of an online store as easy as possible. They also have customer support, so you have someone whom you can go directly and ask a question and expect the question to be answered in a reasonable amount of time. While security is not as high as if you took care of it everyday, it is still very reasonably good and updated automatically.

In conclusion, if you are starting selling on the Internet and have a low budget but plenty of time, go for open source shopping cart systems. If you don’t have the time or the skills and you want to open an important sales website, then go for closed source ones.

A shopping cart is crucial to the life of a website. Since it will be the program that handles all your sales, and thus your online profits, selecting one is central and it pays to devote some time to it.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a single shopping cart that works for every website. A shopping cart for a website might give good results, but it might not be good for a different website.

So, the selection of a shopping cart for a website depends on the type of website that you want it for. And the type of website will depend on what type of business it is and the products it will sell. Here are some things that you need to know beforehand:

• The products and services of your business. Will you sell just one product or several ones? How many products exactly? Are they related and can they be easily categorized? Are they perishable? Are they used by children or adults? Are they physical or digital?

• Shipping and delivering. How are you going to get the products to your clients? Do you offer just one type of shipping or several? Do you need a minimum order in order to ship? Do you need a minimum order to ship for free? Can you ship to other countries? Can you deliver your products or services electronically?

• Price. What is the price of your products and services? Is it a standard price or do you make quotations for each client? Do you handle different currencies? How will your clients pay you?

• Promotion. What type of Internet marketing you will need? Do you know what your options are? Do you have an Internet marketing budget? Do you offer discounts or special offers and what are the requirements for those?

Once you understand what you need, you will be better prepared to select a shopping cart for a website that will adapt to your needs. You’ll understand better what features you will need and whether features that you haven’t heard of before will help you or not.

One last piece of advice. After selecting a shopping cart for a website, you may find out that it costs you some money. While it might be tempting to go for a free one, the price of such software usually is worth it if it has all the features that you want. If a shopping cart for a website has a few extra features that you don’t want, buy it anyway. As you grow and expand, so will the needs of your website.