Is ecommerce right for me?

OneStopEcommerce offer a simple business tool allowing you to trade accurately and safely online. No crash courses in web design are required, the site is kept simple for the customer and site owner to understand. The aim of your site is to generate additional revenue for your business (but not to replace it or quadruple its size in 6 months like some ecommerce vendors promise). We encourage realistic online sales targets such as "in month 6 the site will pay for my business rates", "by month 12 it will pay for rates, gas and electricity" and so on. All targets are merely suggestions and are not guarantees!

In answer to the question "Is eCommerce right for me?", we need to ask a few questions:

1) Does your sales operation attract costs such as rates, rent, amenities, insurance, wages?
2) Are your products sendable by one or more means e.g., courier, Royal Mail, electronically etc.?
3) Do you have an Internet-enabled computer?
4) Would you like more sales?
5) Should you buy this sort of service from OSEC? What do they know about online selling? Or any selling for that matter?

The answer to at least one of these questions is Yes, but more likely the answer to them all is Yes. So, it sounds like eCommerce, that is - selling your goods through a web site - is right for you:

1) Yes, I have a shop. I pay business rates, rent, gas, electric and so on. There is no need for us to spell out what is happening to our economy, the squeeze has been firmly placed upon us all. Any additional revenue generators for businesses should be considered.

2) Yes my products are sendable, either through the post or by courier. In most cases it's likely your products can be sent by one method or another, allowing your business to accommodate mail-order sales. These transactions are of course governed by the laws of distance selling, but providing you apply the same diligence to distance sales as you do to face-to-face sales, there is no reason why you cannot trade online.

3) Yes I have an Internet computer, doesn't everyone? No, not everyone can be bothered with a computer, but the vast majority of people have a PC or Mac for one or more reasons. If you have an Internet-enabled computer, you can become an online trader, even if you type with just one finger.

4) Yes that would be nice, you can never have enough business. In the current economic climate there are very few businesses that can afford to turn down sales. Our product can only increase your turnover.

5) Yes you should because we're nice people. And we want to help. Seriously though folks, this is probably the most important question you can ask! What do OSEC know about the eCommerce process? Well, we've had a successful online music sales website for 3 years, we've worked in buying and selling for longer still, we understand the sales process from the stock ordering stage right through to delivering the goods. We draw on experiences (both good and bad) to provide a product made by retailers with retailers in mind.

On our travels throughout Essex promoting our business, we met a shop-owner who said, when we asked her why she didn't have an ecommerce arm to her business, "I don't shop online myself, so I don't expect my customers to."

We then asked, "But what if they do want to shop online?". She said they could shop elsewhere.

Imagine turning away business because you yourself don't like shopping online??!! Who is more important to the retailer, the customer or the retailer themselves?

The mind boggles...