This is a list of tasks that a local brick & mortar retailer will need to do to start selling products on the Web. This guide aims to help you sell goods online and ship orders worldwide.
The tasks are labeled with 4 priority levels. The required tasks are the things every online retailer needs to do. The recommended and optional tasks will make your ecommerce life easier, but they're not absolutely necessary for selling online. The advanced tasks aim to create an efficient system for high volume sellers.
Have a question, comment or suggestion about this guide? Email me at onlinebusiness.guide@about.com.
11. Create an eBay Store (recommended)
Once you've sold a few items via auction or fixed price (buy-it-now) listings, you may want to create (or "subscribe" in eBay lingo) an eBay store. Starting at $16, an eBay store subscription lets you create listings that last for 30 days (instead of the 10 day max for auctions / fixed price) for a very low insertion fee (around 2-3 cents).
Sellers of all sizes can benefit from having an eBay store. It's like a hub for your listings -- your virtual store.
But make sure you keep creating auctions and fixed price listings. They show up much more prominently than store inventory on searches.
For experienced sellers who want to list their inventory for fixed prices, there is eBay Express.
12. Check Your Business' Local Search Listing (recommended)
Nowadays, when people are looking for a local business, they turn to one of the following online local business directories instead of a paper phone book.
Make sure your business information is accurate, and fill out as much additional information as you can (eg., your business hours, online store's Web address, pictures, etc). Also consider spending some of your advertising dollars at these local directories. All of them offer sponsored listings that put your business' name in front of relevant searches.
Here are the top 5 online directories for local businesses:
This step drives more foot traffic to your brick & mortar store, so you should do this even if you never build a website.
13. Get Web Hosting (optional)
Web hosting is useful even if you don't have your own website. You can self-host images for use on eBay listings, which lets you save some fees and improve your listings with more pictures. (It currently costs $0.15 for a second picture.)
Here are some articles to help you find a Web host:
14. Hire a Web Designer (advanced)
Even if you start out selling on eBay, you many eventually find yourself in need of a Web designer. Here are some articles to help you hire a Web designer:
15. Build an Ecommerce Store at Your Own Domain (advanced)
As your ecommerce operations outgrow eBay, you may want to start looking into running your own store at your own domain. Benefits include a lower transaction fee for each sale. Drawbacks include having to deal with the technical issues yourself (or hire a dedicated tech person).
Yahoo! Small Business Ecommerce is a good intermediate step between eBay and hosting your own software. For a higher fixed monthly fee ($40), they take a smaller transaction fee (1%).
For the largest volume sellers, you may not want to pay even 1% in transaction fees. In that case, you could install your own ecommerce software. Here are some self-hosted ecommerce applications:
- osCommerce (Also see its offshoots ZenCart, CRE Loaded, and OSC Max.)
- Magento
- X-Cart