Hey all, I am trying to build an ecommerce site to sell a few items that my friend has manufactured for him. I have a basic knowledge of html/css/php but not enough to build a professional site. More importantly, I have never dealt with shopping carts, paypal, etc... This is why I am thinking that starting with a "template" type of site would be best for me. I saw godaddy was offering some service for like 25 bucks a month. Can you guys recommend something? Thank you.
You can choose from many templates at templatemonster.com. The usual template price is $50 - $100. You can also search for web host offering website builder with some templates is you don't want to code the website in HTML.
Design a website first, once you've done, setting up shopping cart is not a difficult process if you choose cPanel hosting by which you can get fantastico script through which you can install oscommerce or zencart and you can easily integrate payment gateways.
Template Monster templates are horrible...impossible to modify, and always full of bugs. The last oscommerce template I bought from them didn't work at all, they spent 3 weeks telling me it worked fine after they 'spent more hours fixing it', and refused to give me a refund. Avoid them like you would a bitch with AIDS. But to answer the OP, start with OSCommerce, it's a free open source shopping cart program. Once you've gotten use to it, you can learn HTML/CSS to design a store that you like, or you have hire a web designer to do it for you.
It is interesting experience. It seems users should look for some reviews before they buy some template. Especially they should try to get some info about the author of the template (templatemonster lists templates from many authors). When I started my web hosting business I used templatemonster design and I had no problem to modify it. No bugs at all. But I understand that you may have another experience.