When purchasing a domain name or signing up for hosting, make sure the accounts are in your name.  Frequently clients of mine ask me to do it for them and I always try to push it back on them.  It isn’t because I don’t want to be helpful or am shirking some responsibility.  It is because that is the best for everyone.

Your website is a crucial (or THE crucial) part of your business.  Why would you ever want something so critical as a domain or hosting account setup in someone else’s name?  If that other person was ever hit by the proverbial “bus”, you would have difficulty gaining access and control over your website.  Not to mention that if you and this person ever parted ways, they could create havoc on your website.

Any reputable person would not have a problem with you maintaining your own information.  Granted, you may need to create an account for that person so that they have access to the account.  However, you can turn their access off easily if ever needed.

Choosing colors for your website can sometimes be a daunting task…especially when you have more than one person doing the choosing.  One resource that I have found incredibly helpful is www.colorschemer.com.  This website is geared towards designers that use a color scheme tool that they sell.  However, as a user on their site you can browsth through the different color schemes. 

What makes this site particularly useful is that when a color scheme is uploaded, the creator assigns adjectives to it.  This enables you to search for “manly” or “pastels” and the search tool will pull up color schemes that have that adjective attached to it.  This allows you to have a starting point instead of starting from the ground up.

Have fun using this great tool!

Recently, a client of mine needed some custom illustration done for her website.  Throughout the course of the project, the illustrator, the client and I had many conversations about who owned the artwork and who had the right to use it.  It was very clearly stated that the client would retain ownership of the designs.

Unfortunately, the illustrator took it upon herself to use the discarded revisions and use them for something else.  Apparantly, she felt the ownership discussion only applied to the final designs.  Although the designs she reused were discarded, they were “oh so close” to what the final design ended up being.  Needless to say, this made the client a bit upset. 

 Regardless, please consider the following when have custom artwork done:

1. Clearly state in your contract that unused revisions cannot be repurposed for something or someone else
2. Copyright the images specifically - not just the website they are used on.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much that we could do other than copyright the final designs.

Most people are scared or overwhelmed about Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  There  is a lot of mystery around what is or isn’t helpful.  In the end, there is only so much that you can do.  Below are some simple steps to help you with your search engine optimization.

1. Get rid of your flash or image only home page…your users don’t like it anyways.
2. Write content geared toward the user you want to find you.
3. Use text links on your website instead of images
4. Use heading tags instead of just change font size and weight - be sure to include the keywords you want to be found with in your heading tags.
5. Try to get your self listed on reputable directory listings that are related to your target market.
6. Optimize each page for particular keywords - you can’t optimize every page for every thing.

DON’T DO THIS:

1. Don’t write hidden content (putting content on a white page in white text)
2. Don’t buy into a service that will list your website with other unrelated websites (link farms).
3. If you already have a decent search position, don’t change the names/extentions of your web pages.
4. Don’t have a flash only website unless you have a mirror html website.

Although there is a lot more that can be done with respect to search engine optimization, the above techniques are certain to increase your position.

Knowing who your website user is going to be is one of the most important questions that you need to determine when planning your website.  So many website owners think of what they want for a website and content as opposed to what the end user wants/needs.  It is one of the biggest mistakes to make.  When structuring your website and writing your content, use the following as your guide:

1. Write down who your target users are and tape it to the wall in front of you 
2. Use terminology that your user uses.
3. Organize it in a way that makes sense to your user.
4. Don’t make your users “hunt and peck” to find information….make navigation logical
5. If there is something important to say, say it on the first page of your website.
6. Put the important pieces of information at the top of the page instead of the bottom.

Although these seem like fairly simple rules, many website owners don’t follow them.  Following these guidelines will help make your website successful.

There are hundred if not thousands of solutions out there to choose from for creating an eCommerce site.   There are also a number of factors that influence what type of solution you should choose.  Below are the major considerations when choosing an eCommerce solution:

1. The number of products you are selling
2. The type of product you are selling (do they need to be configured or downloaded?)
3. How much volume you intend to sell.
4. You technical abilities (i.e. HTML)
5. Your future growth plans
6. Your process for managing orders
7. Do you need to track inventory online

These are just some of the considerations that you need to think about when choosing a solution.  Below are 3 tiers of solutions that I recommend to my clients.

The Basics

This solution incorporates PayPal with a static HTML website.  This is best for someone just starting out with a small number of products (less than 50) that doesn’t expect to do a large volume of sales.  If you have highly configurable products, this is not the solution for you.  PayPal can only accept up to 2 options per product (i.e. size and color).

Pros:
Easy to do if you already know html
Can setup PayPal quickly and easily
Can have the website look and behave exactly the way you want – not the PayPal part though

Cons:
Need to know html to update your products or hire someone to update it for you
When the user clicks the buy button, they leave your site and go to PayPals
You can only customize PayPal to a small extent

Note: there is another vendor that you could use to replace PayPal.  It is a company called Mal’s eCommerce (www.mals-e.com).  It is a very simple shopping cart that you can tie into any number of credit card processors.  Their shopping cart is more customizable than PayPal, providing you with a more seemless look.  You can even get an SSL certificate so that the URL doesn’t have to alter much when the user leaves your site.  Another options it to not tie it into a credit card processor at all and just use it to manage orders.  This is perfect for someone with a brick & morter store that needs to confirm the item is available before accepting the order.

Hosted eCommerce Solutions

This solution is basically “renting” an eCommerce site from a company on their servers.  They have already written all of the code for you and you pay them a certain dollar amount per month to use the site.  They maintain the servers.  They provide updates for you.  This solution is great for someone that doesn’t have a lot of money to invest in their own servers and software, and/or doesn’t have the technical abilities to maintain their own server.  An example of this type of solution  is Monster Commerce (www.monstercommerce.com).

Pros:
Usually need very little technical skill (although it helps).
You can usually maintain all of your customer information, order information, inventory, etc through an admin panel.
You can change the look fairly easily through a template or by customizing the look.
You can get up and running very quickly.
They usually have a support number to call.
Usually have the full array of features that eCommerce sites need (coupons, gift certificates, etc.)

Cons:
You are usually limited to customizing the site within a set of parameters/areas.
If the hosting company goes out of business unexpectedly, you may lose all of your information if you are not keeping backups yourself.
You can’t customize the functionality if you need a unique product display or order process.

Purchased Software

This is when you purchase eCommerce software from a company, and install it on your own server that you host at your provider of choice.  The code has all been written for you, but you can usually customize it to your needs since you have access to the code.  An example of this would be ASP Dot Net Store Front  (www.aspdotnetstorefront.com).   I think this type of solution is overkill for your typical small business that is just starting out.  This is certainly an option for an established business that has outgrown their hosted solution.

Pros:
Complete control over your ecommerce website.
Admin Panel to maintain and update your website
Usually comes with predefined designs that you can choose from

Cons:
Higher start up costs than the other solution
Need to maintain your own servers, etc – this isn’t an issue if you have someone doing this already

The above vendors are just examples of the type of solution I am describing.  There are many other vendors out there to choose one.  It is important to research the company thoroughly by finding ecommerce sites that use their software and contacting the eOwners directly.

An eCommerce site is made up of 3 basic components: a catalog, a shopping cart, and a payment system.  The types of items you are selling, the number of items you are selling, and the volume of items you are selling will all impact what type of solution you need.  Lets look at each component separately.

Catalog

A catalog is a made up of items that you want to sell, grouped together in some logical format.  Usually the user is presented with a list of items.  Then they click on the item to view the detail of what it is that they want to buy.  If you have many items, say over 50, you may want a solution that contains a database and is dynamically generated.  It would be simple enough to hard code some HTML for fewer than that number.

Shopping Cart

A shopping cart is what holds or remember the items that the user is going to buy.  It keeps track of the orders and their status.  It may or may not be tied to a credit card payment system.  Many of my customers do not tie their shopping cart into a real time credit card system initially.  The shopping cart system will capture the credit card information and the merchant will manually run the credit card through a POS system at the store.  This is best when inventory moves quickly and is not in sync with the online inventory.

Payment System

A payment system is a method to get paid by your users.  There are all sorts of fees involved in accepting credit cards real time online.  You should expect a gateway fee (usually $15 - $20 per month), a statement fee (usually $10- $ 15 per month), a transaction fee ($0.30 +/-  per transaction) and a discount rate fee (2%  - 5% +/-per transaction depending on the credit card used).  There are many options out there.  In order to receive credit cards online, you will need to go through a credit approval process. 

Your solution may or may not include each of these components.  Think about how you expect to run your online business before choosing an eCommerce solution.  This includes how much you expect to change the items for sale, how much time you have to spend tracking orders, your technical skills, etc.