| What is Ecommerce ? |
What is Ecommerce ?Ecommerce is the use of specialist website applications to collect and process orders for products or services. An ecommerce website is one that displays products and allows visitors to select one or more, and then go to a checkout section where the shipping address can be input and payment made. Payment is normally by credit card but some software settings may allow payment by phone or by mailing a cheque.Another term for this type of application is a shopping cart. Because that implies a smaller class of program, it is commonly used to describe an add-on for another, larger program such as a CMS. There is no specific requirement for a small program to be called a shopping cart and a large one to be called an ecommerce application, but this is the current trend. How does ecommerce work ?The software is installed on a server that has databases and ancillary software available. The ecommerce software then creates a website. It uses a database to store all the product details, prices, and publishing data. When a visitor's browser connects with the website, the server software creates the relevant page, which displays products and prices, and a buyer may click on a product to add it to their list of required purchases, termed a basket or cart - eg 'add to cart'. On clicking the Checkout button, they are taken to a secure section where the credit card details are processed. The checkout may be in one of three locations:Type 1: within the website Type 2: off the site but within the host's secure facility Type 3: on a remote server run by a payment processor or merchant partner. Like a CMS and all other modern dynamic websites, there are no actual pages on the server, unlike the older HTML page system that hard-coded sites use. All 'pages' are created on-the-fly, in a fraction of a second. Therefore page content changes or other edits are fast to implement - a simple page edit can be done in 30 seconds and goes live immediately. No actual page has to be altered, simply some details in a database. What is a good ecommerce program ?Like any software, an ecommerce application must be chosen to fulfill a list of criteria. For ecommerce software those choices are:
Ecommerce costThe budget is always the most important criterion for software, which may be free / open-source, economy commercial, mid-market commercial or enterprise commercial. There are pros and cons to all choices here, so as long as the budget is there, other factors can be looked at to form a shortlist. For smaller budgets then open-source or economy commercial can be chosen. Normally, in open-source software, quality or functionality are not issues and choice is made based on other factors. However there is a restricted choice in good-quality open-source ecommerce applications.Class of ecommerce applicationThere are some well-defined groups these programs can be placed in:
Server typeAbout 80 - 90% of ecommerce software runs on a standard LAMP server, with the rest mostly on Windows servers, aka IIS servers. It is normally more economical to use a standard server. Some custom-builds and enterprise-scale solutions use IIS.Number of productsThe capability of ecommerce applications, ie their ability to scale up in size, is often determined by cost. However there are some open-source choices that scale well.Search-friendly ecommerceThis is an area where many applications fail dismally, as they are based on obsolete code and maintained by developers who never considered this aspect when the software was initially built. We restrict our choice to those that are proven to work well, since an ecommerce website only has one function: to make money. If it had some other function then we could look at other factors being more important, but since it only has one possible purpose then it seems sensible to prioritise for that. There is only one known way to run a successful commercial website at realistic cost and that is to succeed in search.Hosting and monthly costsAn ecommerce site has different requirements from other types. It needs several databases (one for the application, one for web analytics), a good level of security (which is due in good part to the hosting), efficient use of the secure https channel, good integration with a card processor, an SSL certificate, and so on. The host is a much more important factor than in other sites. A secure hosting service may charge a monthly fee for use of their services.ReputationThis is related to many factors such as security, capability, search success -and almost every other factor, of course. Many users have different opinions so it is a good idea to list your requirements and then check which software has the best reputation in those areas.Ecommerce securityIt goes without saying that security needs to be good, as the site will inevtably be the target of numerous probes and attacks. Customers' details must be secure, and all financial transactions must be protected in several ways. If the monthly fee can be afforded, it may be a good idea to sign up with the type of secure ecommerce host who offers the special on-site secure payment facility mentioned as Type 2 above - this is the most secure of all.
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