So why didn’t I go with Zen Cart (or one of the other hundreds of similar shopping carts) for my online shop setup? I spent many a frustrating week researching various combinations of carts and payment gateways, some very expensive, some cheap, and some free (at least to purchase).

My needs: First time to the E-commerce scene; Very small home-based business beginning; Low ticket price on sale items; No cash resources; Absolute zero HTML writing skills; Low computer jargon understanding (what is MYSQL or PHP??); BUT… Good understanding and use of Microsoft FrontPage and Publisher; Familiar with QuickBooks and have run businesses before, including retail; Reasonable skills in design and desktop publishing; Have done several websites in FrontPage for various organisations.

I downloaded several shopping carts and tried getting them sorted (I got further with Zen Cart than the others), but always got stumped through lack of computer language skills and totally resented having to learn another area of the computer world that was simply a means to an end - which explains my love affair with Publisher and FrontPage. So I had no choice but to look to out-sourcing to get Zen Cart (the ’free’ software) up and running to a point that I could handle from there - at least several hundred dollars, if not into the thousands of dollars. Not such a free option after all!!

So then I searched for a cart that I could use WITHIN FrontPage and found PageVille. Cheap - just $129 per year, with zero monthly fees on the base plan. Easy - just an add-on to FrontPage that gives you the means to load up any buy button with the product details, which are automatically sent to your PageVille database when you upload the page through an FTP program. The Admin Page for your site on PageVille is also pretty straight forward (basic), though I have yet to resolve a few minor issues, but at least I am up and running. After some early panic, I have learnt to use PageVille to good effect and very much appreciate its simple approach without all the bells and whistles of the full-blown (bloated) shopping cart that seems to be the norm. I track my stock through QuickBooks, so I don’t need to do it online, same with all financial and delivery tracking.

The other side of an online shop is the order/payment gateway. Again, after weeks of research and deliberation, plus given my small start-up, I was pleased to find that PageVille could take the orders and credit card details without processing them, and that I could then retrieve them through a secure login and then process the payment in-house with my banks merchant facility - very cheap, easy, safe and flexible for refunds or amendments. So I’m very happy at this time and it is looking good at the point.

I hope to start trading on 1st September IF the rest of my stock arrives in time, which is another saga. So I will give an update on it all in a few weeks time. Cheers, Max. www.spiritland.com.au