Cashing in: More retailers move to online trading
According to the IMRG, the industry body for global e-retailing, the online shopping market has grown more than 14-fold over the last eight years. One of the fastest-growing online retail sectors is electrical goods, which sold ?204m of items in November 2007 alone. However, according to the IMRG report, all retail sectors, from food and drink to travel, have seen an increase in internet trading. The upsurge in internet shopping is partly down to its sheer convenience; the fact the customer can make their purchases from home, at any time of the day or night.
In order to cash in on this growing trend and sell your products online, you must first set up a website. To do this you need to buy a domain name and some web space to house your website. You should decide whether to host the site yourself, which requires a certain amount of technical knowledge, or whether to find a third party to host it for you. For smaller companies, third party hosting is usually the best solution, since it allows you to concentrate on your business without having to worry about maintaining your servers.
Once you’ve bought a domain name, depending on your budget restraints and website needs, there are now a number of options available to you to set up your store. A bespoke solution can cost anything from a few hundred pounds to a few thousand pounds, depending whether you develop your site in-house or use third party specialists to do the work for you.
Next, you must decide how you’d like your online shop to look. You may wish to employ a web designer to create the site for you, or you might prefer to use a piece of software called a shopping cart, which will enable you to create an online shop front yourself. Shopping carts are generally simple to use and allow you to do everything with your store, from designing the look and feel, to handling stock and shopping transactions.
However there are many solution providers who provide competitive hosting or template driven shopping cart package solutions that provide you with a cheaper means of setting up your site and accepting payment. These solutions vary widely in terms of flexibility, service and cost; in fact some shopping cart software is free.
Most retails are now coming to realise the huge benefits of being able to sell online, so don’t get left behind — join the e-Commerce world and start making money with an online shop front now.
Disclaimer:
This article has been written for information and interest purposes only. The information contained within this article is the opinion of the author only, and should not be construed as advice or used to make financial decisions. Expert financial advice should always be sought and any links contained within this article are included for information purposes only.
