I'm a complete newbie both to this site and to web design but am hoping you can help. I'm in the process of setting up a new business which will include an ecommerce website. I've had some quotes from a few designer/developers and they mention that they'll be using HTML and CSS to create the site. However, they also charge what I consider to be quite a lot of money (£600) to create a simple blog on the site (which I assume could be done for next to nothing using Wordpress or something similar)? I'm basically looking to keep my costs as low as possible whilst creating the most professional site possible. I'm not trying to get out of paying for excellent web design and development, but at the same time I have to manage very tight budgets as a start up and want to save money wherever possible. Any advice on opensource software that I could use on my site alongside the more bespoke elements would be great (this also includes search faciltiies such as Google's free custom search engine)? Thanks!
http://www.oscommerce.com/ may be a good solution for you. Depending on your skill level you may need to get some help setting it up and doing some coding, but it shouldn't cost you too much to outsource that portion of it. Then you can maintain it on your own.
You could just use wordpress for blogging and when "store" or "cart" click have an oscommerce store (or another cart solution) installed there to handle the purchases. Alternatively you could just use wordpress plugins like WP e-Commerce, eShop, quickshop or if you are selling through a blog forum the paypal shopping cart which just adds cart functionality to your blogs. What you are selling, how you would like to sell it and the main requirements for the site should be agreed on before choosing suitable platforms/scripts in my opinion.
Thanks for the responses. I should have given a bit more detail - I'll be selling a range of clothing and accessories and as it's an online only business to start with, you're right that the website is really important to get right. I've made it clear that to the designers and developers I've spoken to so far that I'd like to upload really good quality images (ideally with multiple views of each product). i don't think a zoom feature is within my budget yet but would like to include it in future. In terms of the shopping cart, I obviously want it to be easy and intuitive to use (but also secure). A related question - so far, the people I've spoken to about this have advised that they'll be creating a bespoke site (as I'm aware they're not using any of the software solutions mentioned such as OScommerce or Wordpress). Will this cause problems later down the line, for example if I then asked a different web agency to update the existing site? Thanks
Hello again, bespoke solutions i personally think of suitable for medium - large enterprises or new startups with a reasonable amount of cash to throw at it, there are so many off the shelf solutions at a fraction of the price (and many free ones) that it can be really expensive to go bespoke for a new startup without sufficient cash or guidance. Secondly with bespoke, the contract between the developer and the owner becomes an issue (in my experience as a webmaster for 2 global companies in the past) as the original code copyright can be retained by the developer which leads to being either locked in when it comes to future updates or a refusal for you to move it for someone else to work on as the owners copyright only extends to the content and not the code. Off the shelf may mean you have to make some design comprimises to work around the commerce platform used, but these can be negated with good quality developers, plus as the core remains open source (assuming the off the shelf option is open source obviously) means you are not tied into any one developer but can shop around and source as you wish on a per project basis as your site grows. Also by using popular ecommerce when it comes to product zooming some of the carts have this built in, others can have it applied by using plugin code from companies such as magiczoom which is a very cheap way of getting thumbnail magnification (for product detail) and zooming. Sounds like you need a good project/ecommerce manager, im available at very good hourly rates heheheheh