# Creating an e-commerce site: do I have all the steps down right?



## tbiggs (Jan 26, 2007)

Hey Everyone,

I am working on building an e-commerce site and would like to know if I am missing any steps in creating one. Please see below for my course of action. These are in no particular order.

1. Buy Domain Name (godaddy.com)
2. Buy Hosting (godaddy.com
3. Design Website (myself with a program called Sitegrinder2)
4. Integrate shopping cart (cubecart)
5. Purchase SSL for security (godaddy.com)
6. Purchase merchant account (not sure who to use yet)

Is there anything else I am missing or overlooking to have a fully functional e-commerce website?


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

*Re: Creating an e-commerce site*

7. Would probably be setup your products if that's not already included in another step.

8. Advertise


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## silverstone (May 4, 2007)

get your domain name .... go to mals ecommerce...set up a free account with them. They use a SSL server so you dont need that either. Your out of your time and thats it. SItegrinder will work to build a css site using photoshop. mals ecommerce uses "buy now" buttons so your site will be pure HTML no need for shopping carts in php etc. Just a suggestion it will save you a lot of money and most likely a lot of headaches. 
good luck with it


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## jazzluvr (Aug 21, 2006)

In addition to a merchant account (which will require a Business Checking account generally), you'll need to have a gateway to interface between your shopping cart and the banks, you should see what gateways are supported by your shopping cart and start working on that now because it doesn't happen overnight. Additionally, check your local and state websites on commerce as you may need to get a tax-id number from the government and/or a retail license from the state.

Good luck!


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## tbiggs (Jan 26, 2007)

silverstone said:


> get your domain name .... go to mals ecommerce...set up a free account with them. They use a SSL server so you dont need that either. Your out of your time and thats it. SItegrinder will work to build a css site using photoshop. mals ecommerce uses "buy now" buttons so your site will be pure HTML no need for shopping carts in php etc. Just a suggestion it will save you a lot of money and most likely a lot of headaches.
> good luck with it


Domain: got it

Mals e-commerce: What's the catch? Setting up a free account, no problem. Do they provide the hosting of the website since they provide the SSL or can I use my current hosting with godaddy.com, and how easy is it to add to my site? Does my site get to keep the original look and feel or am I going to be redirected to mals-ecommerce everytime someone wants to make a purchase. How safe is it and were does my customers information go? How reputable are they?

Sorry for the million questions on Mals. It definitely sounds good, just a little skeptical.


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## silverstone (May 4, 2007)

Todd...mals is really an awesome service. I have used their shopping cart on a number of sites with good success. Skeptical is a good thing! 

The way it works is you have your domain (your website). The actual shopping cart is on their secured server. You put buy now buttons on your website pages that send the customer to the shopping cart which is located on Mals server. You can tailor the look of the actual shopping cart to match your site very easily. The only time your customer will not be on your site is when they go to the shopping cart. When you sign up you will get your own control panel which allows you to control the cart. They include example sites and examples of the coding you need to set up your store. There is no catch although they do offer add on stuff if you choose to purchase it you can if you dont thats fine too. Go check it out and see if its something you feel up to doing. Like I said it's free and works great and if you don't have 2000 items in your store it's perfect. Set it up and when your customer places and order the shopping cart sends you an email telling you the customer has placed an order. You can use and online processor or you can process the order offline either way. Best of luck to you ... check out propay.com for your credit cart processing its like 60 bucks to set up with them and we have had great luck with them too!


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