Online Store???

[Geoff]

I knew this day would come.
I work as a web designer but my boss has asked me to setup an online store!
I have no Idea where to start.

I have had very limited experience with PHP, but I'm a web designer not a web developer!

Any help would be great.

[darkecho]

You might look into a premade solution. If you are going with PHP (since you mentioned it), you might try oscommerce, zen cart, cube cart, magentocommerce, etc.

[gorda001]

Can you elaborate? How many things are you selling? Are they physical items, services, digital items,...? The more information, the better.

[Geoff]

Thank you for your replies.
My boss wants to sell dvd episodes of a television show.
Basically, all I would need is a small catalog, simple shopping cart, and checkout. No login and no user profiles.
I don't know how to handle credit cards. My boss says he get a merchant account with his bank.
Would Php be able to do all that?
If so, know of any tutorials?

[tossy]

As per my knowledge I got some tutorials site, hope these could be useful to you.
http://www.w3schools.com/PHP/DEfaULT.asP
http://www.tutorialized.com/tutorials/PHP/1

[darkecho]

I suggest going with a premade one if you have limited PHP experience. For starters security is a huge thing when handling something like that.

There are MANY things one must consider when running an online store especially if they take credit cards.

a. Are the credit cards stored (anywhere server or computer) (there are guidelines that should be followed if this is the case) This can get expensive. While this isn't 100% required, for the customers sake this is wanted. If a hacker were to gain credit card numbers etc. Your boss can say goodbye to his merchant account.
b. What gateway are you using. Merchant accounts have to be tied to a gateway so they can accept payments. There are a bunch of them and need to be thoroughly researched. They all have their own rates they charge. Authorize.Net is a common one and pretty simple to integrate.
c. Is your boss going to buy an SSL certificate. He **** well should. These can cost between $15 - $x,xxx per year. Plus you have to have someone install it on the web hosts server. Usually they can do that (with a fee of course). Along with that fee from the web host generally comes a fee for a static ip address on the server which is needed for the SSL. That I have seen from $1-$8 / month.

Thats just a few

SECURITY SECURITY SECURITY
Not just in your PHP script but on the server and network the server runs on.

[gorda001]

I'd just go with paypal. Unless you're selling large quantities of items, it'll be cheaper and easier to set up.

[Geoff]

Once again, thank you for your responses.
Darkecho, you post was very helpful.
I will be going with a pre-made solution.

What are your opinions on a good e-commerce solution?
Price is a real factor.
We will need to accept all major credit cards.

[darkecho]

For the credit cards, if you use a Paypal business account you can accept the major ones without a merchant account or gateway.

MagentoCommerce is getting a lot of kick these days, but I would wait until they speed things up a bit. Last time I tried it, it was SLOW. A few other common ones are Zen Cart, Cube Cart, OSCommerce (hasnt been updated it a long time).

Or, you could even go with a shopping cart service (hosted on the service's servers) such as 1shoppingcart. I would love to throw in an ad for the one I am making, but it will (probably) be months before it even goes to "trial" mode. The "service" based shopping carts should generally have implemented the security and things I posted above. (however you will still need a merchant account, and gateway)

[Geoff]

I have wanted to use Paypal since the the beginning, but my boss read somewhere that 30% of online shoppers "will not" use Paypal.
He doesn't mind using it with another payment option though.
He is funny(and stubborn) that way :)

Anywho (yes I spelled it "any-who"), I downloaded Magento and have been making my way through this tutorial http://www.siteground.com/tutorials/magento/index.htm
As I am a designer, I eat up any tutorials I can get my hands on.

Magento is a little much for such a simple task, but if I learn it now, I will be able to setup stores for other clients.

I did notice that Magento is a little slow but my boss loves features and Magento seems to have plenty of those.

I really need to find a new job...

darkecho, thank you so much for your help. Be sure to let me know when you get your e-commerce program up, I would love to see it.