Another startup with payment questions

[Tin Bone Productions]

Hi all
Forgive me if this has been answered one way or another over time, but I'm really baffled by a few things.

Basically we have a simple html website and no ecommerce facility.
We're looking to start selling over the web. Now what?

Do we need a shopping cart and if so can that be incorporated into a simple html site without needing a php site (as our expertise is pretty limited!!!), or can we do something such as if someone wants a product they email us and we send them an invoice of sorts for them to pay online somehow...?

Again, sorry if this is sounding far from technical, we're just looking at what we can do (as funding is in short supply...non existent), and how we can sell online...

Many thanks

Kev

[RawRob]

Depends on how many products you have. You can create a basic shopping cart using PayPal (using a static HTML site).

Rob

[Tin Bone Productions]

Depends on how many products you have. You can create a basic shopping cart using PayPal (using a static HTML site).

Is that something they provide?

[RawRob]

Is that something they provide?

Yes. It's free (apart from the transaction fees). If you log into your paypal account (or create one), then click on "Merchant Services", then on the right you will see a box entitled "Useful Links", in this list click "PayPal Shopping Cart".

(It's not the best shopping cart in the world, but it is free and I think very easy to set up, although I've never used it.)

Rob

[Saltire]

If you can, avoid Paypal like the plague. They hold onto your money for up to 6 months. Log onto UK Business Forums under General Business section under Paypal holding funds.

[webpayments]

There are various e-commerce shopping cart solutions that you can use for your site ranging from free to low priced to expensive.

These e-commerce solutions will have payment gateway plugins to allow them to connect to your chosen payment service provider. Do you have an Internet Merchant Account? If not do you have a history of trading? If not then you are probably best looking at a Payments bureau such as PayPal or nochex or 2checkout.

If you do have an internet merchant account then you will have more options.