Accepting payments for online flower store?

I'm working on launching an online flower store, and want to get payment processing figured out ASAP. I haven't decided 100% on what software we'll be using for the store itself, but I'm currently leaning towards the free Magneto edition.

Now, I've never operated an online store before, so what do I need aside from a business bank account to accept credit card (and I guess PayPal, etc?) payments through Magneto and the like?

Is this something that I set up with the bank, or an online payment processor, or both? Please let me know how it works and which company I should work with.

Thanks team!

 

Hi, still a tad swamped but I am trying to sort out your search by zip scenario. There are no mods available I have found yet but you can certainly have that featured coded.

As for your question, you can take payment with magento using paypal, google checkout and so on. They are already baked in. At the end of the day, given fees and such, you typically want to start using something like authorize.net. The only real issue is they send checks monthly vs. getting funds right away.

It is possible your bank has a merchant gateway. Writing a driver for that is fairly trivial code wise.

I can possibly free up a bit of time tonight if you want to see a demo. I am working on a magento site this evening.

Nigel

 

Thanks, I assume you're referring to the Quick Order box - if so, I don't really need zip search, because we'll be starting with just one city. I just think that box would be neat to have because people can quickly and easily sign up and place the order, and also search for what they want ("roses" "funeral" etc) at the same time. What do you think it'd cost me to add this feature, and also are you sure that Magneto is the best software for all this? This will be my first online store, so I really have no idea what to use.

As far as checkout goes, what kinda fees are we talking, i.e. PayPal vs Google vs Authorize.net, and would there be any benefit to doing it through our bank, or will their fees pretty much be the same?

 

Also, have another quick look at the theme:

http://cms.template-help.com/magento_30318/

See the "New Products" box? Is it possible to create multiple boxes like that, showing top sellers in each category - same as honest florist dot com? Is that something that's built into Magneto, or does it need to be coded?

 

New, featured, latest, most reviewed and so on can be placed where ever you like basically on the home page. Just requires pasting code blocks in the admin panel usually. I think paypal fees are currently in the 3% range or a tad higher.

Nigel

 

3% of what?

 

Three percent of whatever you get paid via paypal.

Nigel

 

Are you seriously asking me for 3% of what will eventually be millions in sales in exchange for some relatively minor coding work?

 

you can try CC Avenue

 

Not sure where you got that. The fees for processing payments are in the 3% range. It has nothing to do with me. https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_display-fees-outside

I am simply referring to the processing charges for paypal to well, process your cart orders.
Nigel

 

Haha, I got confused because I thought it was about programming. I was like "holy crap, this guy must make more than Bill Gates!"

So with respect to adding the quick order box on the main page, and also more boxes as discussed above (quoted below again for accuracy), how time-consuming / expensive do you think that'd be?

 

By the way guys, I'm going to the bank tomorrow to set up a new business account for this company. Do I just set up a regular account or do I need something special for e-commerce? I've never used Google Checkout or had an online store before. Thanks.

 

If you're going to open a paypal or google checkout account. A regular bank account will do...I will advice you to go for paypal because google pays after 10 days for every order until your account reach 2 months old. Also paypal can be little bit annoying cause sometimes they limited your account for no reason at all.

 

Paypal or credit card is the best payment acceptance option for you. I would prefer to use paypal for it

 

If you run a flower store, you will need a shopping cart first before decide a payment gateway, I would suggest you use Romancart.com which is a reputable 3rd party shopping cart, it is very simple and also the Romancart has integrated with some payment gateways such as Paypal, 2checkout, Moneybookers ..... you could choose any available gateways in your country.