Miva Merchant or someone else?

I have never had an ecommerce store before but I figure it is high time I get into starting one soon..

was looking for some feedback about how easy or hard this is to do and what I need to do.. kind of clueless on this..

Should I use Miva Merchant? are they the best one?

I was thinking about signing up with Westhost.com since they seem to have miva merchant as part of the package..

 

I would say it all depends on what you want to do with your site. I have always been a fan of using databases and the last time I checked Miva out - it was a proprietary system and you could not really change over to another system very easily. Plus you always need to find a host that will support them as well

But if they offer everything that you need, it might be worth.

 

I've used Miva once and wasn't happy with it at all. The url's were impossible and it wasn't very flexible. OSCommerce is a friendly and free solution and there's a wealth of information and support available.

 

thanks for the tip corey..

I think I found what I needed... if anyone else is interested here is a little background on ecommerce setup with miva:

http://smallbusiness.miva.com/docs/merchant/getting_started/Miva_Merchant-getting_started.pdf

 

Here's a good hosted shopping cart software you may like to look at. www.smorty.com

 

I started with Miva a while ago, and was happy.
I would say that when it comes to custom work, you end up having to pay a higher price, because there is only a limited group that can help you. There are MANY php shopping carts out there, and lots of good choices. You mind find that as you grow and need custom work your costs are lower with a php solution. MIVA is definitely good for those starting out, and you can always switch later.

 

You know, I had experience with MIVA about 6 years ago..back then it seemed sub-par....today though it seems they want to focus more on their PPC product.