TECH Thoughts on what to use to sell products of a small company?

[TheOutlawTorn]

I've been brainstorming quite a bit and Google Checkout or Paypal Shoppingcart seems the most viable to me. I have less than 30 items, and it is a very focused market.

I've established myself on Etsy already (a storefront for vintage and handmade items), and right now the domain points to my shop there. I do pretty well, and make enough money to keep going and fund my r&d for other items. So overall, it wouldnt be worth setting up a whole storefront install, time and money wise since I already have google checkout and paypal accounts.

But I am looking for experiences and new ideas besides those two if anyone has any.

Thank you for just reading my ramble.

 

[phrozenlikwid]

Shopify, Magento lite (or whatever they call it), and Amazon all have pre-rolled simple cart setups.

Wordpress + WP-Ecommerce looks fairly easy to use/set-up too, and that community is huge.

 

[2ofdem]

Yeah any of the above or Drupal and its ecommerce plugin.

 

[komplex]

I absolutely love and highly recommend Magento.

 

[phrozenlikwid]

I absolutely love and highly recommend Magento.

For 30 products though, do you think Magento would be kinda "heavy"?

What are hosting options for something like that? Will it even run ok on a shared setup?

 

[blinger]

what type of products? have u looked at big cartel? big cartel + an iframe ftw

 

[komplex]

For 30 products though, do you think Magento would be kinda "heavy"?

What are hosting options for something like that? Will it even run ok on a shared setup?

Just use shopify then. http://www.shopify.com/

 

[blinger]

Just use shopify then. http://www.shopify.com/

are shopify and bigcartel pretty much the same? Haven't looked into shopify much.

 

[TheOutlawTorn]

what type of products? have u looked at big cartel? big cartel + an iframe ftw

The name is Recycled Retro. I take vintage gaming gear and mod it into stuff. Keychains, flashdrives, harddrives, lamps and clocks. I've got a lot more in the prototyping phase too.

Right now I am using Etsy to sell. They have integration options, but it just isn't cutting it. I'll continue to sell through Etsy, but I want the website rather able to stand on it's own.

How is Big Cartel's integration with WordPress?

 

[komplex]

are shopify and bigcartel pretty much the same? Haven't looked into shopify much.

Shopify:

Easy to setup , hardly any html/CSS knowledge needed
Payment is only 3% plus 2.9 of what paypal charges you + .30 per transaction.
Keep track of stats
Professional looking
You can use your domain and link it back to your shop.

Bigcartel.com

Advantages:
Easy to setup , hardly any html/CSS knowledge needed
Keep track of stats
Lack of customization
charge extra for additional pictures and to add more merchandise to the site.

"Both services are great. Big Cartel is more suited to smaller business with fewer SKUs, and who don’t mind using PayPal exclusively. Shopify allows a range of merchant gateways, has a much higher SKU limit, SSL admin/cart. Both services offer stats, use liquid for their templates, and have bolt-on services/modules for selling downloads."

 

[Miesha Taint]

I've been using ecwid + wordpress lately and its super customizable + easy at the same time

the knowleadgebase and idea center are great, theres a ton of support guys on the forums 24/7

 

[TheOutlawTorn]

You guys kick so much ass. I've had so many choices to go through, and I'm still researching, but I think ecwid is going to be the best solution for my needs.

I have experience in wordpress, and this seems simple enough to integrate and manage. More time to work on my projects.

I'm still checking everything out though. I just wanted to thank you all.

 

[TheOutlawTorn]

What are the main differences in just regular ol' paypal and paypal express? I have ecwid set up for paypal, money orders, checks, and google checkout. Credit cards are defaulted to paypal, as are echecks, but you can pick google checkout as well.

There is another tab to set up paypal express and it just confuses me. May be because it's late. I already use regular paypal. Does express need to be there as well?