|
e-commerce
What is e-commerce and
what does it mean to my business?
e-commerce is the latest
buzz-word, it doesn't matter where you are you can't have missed hearing
about it, but what does it all mean?
e-commerce is simply a phrase
given to the ability to purchase products from your web site. You don't
need anything special to be able to sell your products on the
internet.
There are two models
for selling via the internet
- Business to Business
- Business to end-user
1. Business to Business
e-commerce can simply be a method of online order entry with
the order being forwarded to you when complete, for shipping and
invoicing in the normal way with established accounts, you can obviously
establish new accounts with new customers using your existing method of
establishing credit worthiness and terms and conditions. You may however
have smaller value products(typically up £500 but possibly as high as
£1,500) that you may wish to make available through credit card payments,
initial purchases before credit accounts are established
perhaps.
2. Business to end-user
is different in that credit accounts are not normally available.
In practice this means that credit card transactions are normally used for
this type of customer. You don't necessarily need to have online credit
card processing to use this model, you may allow end-users to place their
orders on your web site, then have an order form emailed to you allowing
you to process the order in your normal manner. You may find that it is
simpler especially if the volume of orders increases to have online
verification and transaction processing available.
Microplus are happy to discuss the
best method for your company to begin or move forward with online
commerce.
We have a number of
solutions available to enable online order processing
- Sage WebTrader
- iCat
- Demon Commerce
- Your own Internet server hosted by an ISP
- Your own in-house web and ecommerce server
1. Sage WebTrader is an
extension to their WebsiteCreator which ads the ability to process and
accept online orders, initially the scheme emails orders received directly
to you, in the near future WebTrader will allow online processing of
credit cards. For the future Sage are promising links directly into your
Sage accounting software.
2. iCat are a division
of Intel, they offer full order processing and the ability to accept
payments in a variety of methods Click Here for
Information iCat enable you to enable you to develop a new or even
upgrade your existing site to provide e-commerce facilities. It is so
simple anyone with a basic knowledge of web site design can add the
facilities in just a few hours. Microplus are iCat Commerce Developers so
we can advise or even complete the task for you if you wish. If you would
like aditional information on iCat, just click the banner at the top of
this page to go straight to the iCat web site.
3. Demon
Commerce
4. Your own web Server
5. Your own in-house web and e-commerce
server
Frequently Asked
Questions
What is e-commerce?
Our customers have accounts with
us, do we have to use credit cards?
How do I accept credit
cards?
| 
