Developing an e-commerce website can be a very tricky task. There are many different aspects to the process and each is equally necessary. The major components of an e-commerce process are the inventory catalog, the shopping cart, and the checkout procedure.
Designing any of these components is usually time-consuming, and for someone with limited or nonexistent programming skills it can be next to impossible.
This is where the content management system (CMS) comes in. Using a CMS makes website development much, much easier across the board.
Installing an e-commerce add-on to your CMS essentially does all the programming work for you. Now instead of spending your time trying to figure out how to create the components you can spend it tweaking an existing system.
This brings us to the three most important things that a CMS e-commerce add-on provides. Keep in mind these might not be included in all e-commerce add-ons. However, if one doesn't include these features, it's probably best to keep looking until you find one that does. Not only because they're necessary, but also because there are so many different add-ons to choose from that there's no reason why you should settle for one without these three features.
1. Inventory management - this is critical because it's the first part of the online selling process. If there's a miscommunication between your page and what's really in stock, you'll be setting yourself up for some problems. Similarly if one of your products is misrepresented on your page you'll be answering support emails all day. This feature gives the administrator a look at the status of products in a quick and accurate fashion.
2. Customized shopping cart - when shopping online, the shopping cart performs very similar to a real shopping cart you'd see in a brick and mortar store. The user is able to add and remove items from it, and when they're finished shopping they may bring it to the checkout counter to make their purchase.
The difference is, in the digital world, the shopping cart can perform other functions as well. They will total up the prices of the products in the cart so there are no surprises come check out time. Some will also suggest another product that goes well with the customer's current shopping cart contents, helping to encourage additional purchases. Of course, your shopping cart will most likely be customizable so it can take on the look and feel of the rest of your website.
3. Checkout/Billing/Invoices - many add-ons will perform the last step for you on as an automated procedure. However, it is extremely important to make sure that the payment gateway you're using is compatible with both your shopping cart and your checkout add-on. Otherwise there will be a problem getting the buyer's money into your bank account, which is never good. Once all the components can see each other and are working properly you'll be able to tinker with the extra features, such as automated billing, that can really make the revenue process run on its own.
With the help of these three features and a powerful content management system, building an e-commerce site has never been easier. They make it possible for someone with very few technological skills to sell their products on the internet, and to do so quickly and smoothly. Using a content management system to integrate online sales into your website is the best bet for novice and advanced webmasters. They make e-commerce website development easy enough for a beginner and powerful enough for an expert.
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