Alternative E-Commerce Solutions


Over the past several years, the Internet has emerged as a breakthrough technology that has and will continue to transform the way we live and communicate, and especially the way we do business.

No matter if you are selling a product or a service, the Internet is a means of reaching markets that had otherwise been unreachable in the past. And, it also provides ease of purchasing and selling almost anything online?also known as E-Commerce.

But, for many businesses, especially start up and small to mid size businesses, having a website that includes the usual E-commerce capabilities is just not in their budgets. Setting up merchant accounts and secure servers can get quite costly.

So, if you are really wanting or needing to have e-commerce capabilities on your website to sell your products, but your budget just won't allow it, there are a variety of alternatives to the expensive online route that you can consider.

Your first choice allows you to accept credit card payments but without a secure server. Some financial institutions, which offer credit cards, also offer Traditional Merchant Accounts. This allows you to manually verify credit card information from those that want to purchase from you. But, you should be aware, if you ask for credit card information from your website without the guarantee of a secure server, you may run into hesitation from potential customers.

Another alternative to the expensive merchant account is to accept cheque payments online. For this you will need to acquire software or a program that will allow you to print MicroPrint (the small numbers and characters at the bottom of a cheque? ie. routing #, account #, etc.). There are several cheque writing programs available, including those found at Checker.net and Checkman.com.

The procedures involved to use this payment method are to first set up a form on your website. You then send an invoice to your customer with direction to the cheque-form page, which they must fill out and submit, via your cgi program. You then verify the funds and information and then the software prints the cheque on special cheque paper, which you can purchase at most business supply stores.

You can also have the above type service online, via such sites as Paybycheck.com.

Another alternative, which is rapidly becoming the choice of many online product and service providers, is Online Payment Systems. There are several of these systems available but I have only found one that has features available to Canadians. Called PayPal.com, this service allows you to set up an account with them and they verify the credit information of those buying from you. Now, many features that this system has to offer are still limited for Canadian retailers but you are still able to set up an account, bill your clients, and receive payments into your Canadian bank account or credit card account with only minor service charges being applied.

Taking advantage of the expansive market of the World Wide Web does not mean that you have to go bankrupt. You can still get on the E-Commerce bandwagon and accept payments with the above listed services and other alternative payment systems that may be available. Actually, most of these services are all that the average small business, especially those in the service industry, really need. And they don't cost a fortune.

About The Author

Janice Byer is a certified Master Virtual Assistant and owner of Docu-Type Administrative & Web Design Services.


More Resources

Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting

More E-Commerce Information:

Related Articles

The Rise of Multinational Virtual Corporations
The virtual corporation is the emerging organisational form, which best combines, a fluid ability to adapt to rapidly changing markets and is able to leverage its skills with the complementary skills of other corporations.In the concept's purest form, each company that links up with others to create a virtual corporation will be stripped to its essence.
Online Payments Make It Easy For Your Customers To Buy
In the last column we discussed the process of credit card enabling your brick-and-mortar business. I pointed out that research has shown that accepting credit cards can help increase revenue and speed up cash flow.
Intranet - The Benefits Realisation Plan
The Millennium ExperienceA successful project is one that delivers on-spec ('quality'), time and cost. Right? Well consider these two projects?The Millennium Dome was delivered on time for the 31 December 1999 and safely within a budget (fixed in 1998) of £289 million.
Saving Money On Your E-commerce Site
After building and transferring many e-commerce sites it still amazes me that owners of e-commerce businesses are still wasting money in three basic ways. For fear of stating the obvious, saving money is the same as making money $100 saved is $100 added to your profit margin.
The Webmasters Assistant
There are many tools available to a webmaster to analyse website traffic allowing them to monitor the number of visitors, see what pages have been accessed and even the length of time each visitors spends accessing the website.However, despite the considerable data available what is missing is anything to tell the webmaster what the visitor was thinking.
Getting Started in ECommerce - Part One
In 2004, Enquiro.com conducted a study of the search behaviors of men vs.
Does Your Shopping Cart Have a Squeaky Wheel?
Have you ever gone grocery shopping just before a holiday? The aisles are packed with people pushing carts, shelves need restocked, all the checkout lanes have long lines..
7 Key Steps To Reduce Refunds and Chargebacks
One sure-fire way to loosing out big time on your business profits is from incidences of excessive refunds and chargeback requests. If the number is high in any period you could risk loosing your third party merchant account altogether.
Mr and Mrs Smith Go Online, as Internet Technology Moves from Fantasy to Normality
According to NOP World, 48% of all Internet users have researched or purchased financial products such as insurance and loans on the internet, or used online banking facilities. In April, NOP World had already recorded estimates of 28 million people online in Great Britain, with 13.
10 Compelling Benefits of Having A 3rd Party Merchant Account
If you have been wrestling with the idea of applying for your own 3rd party merchant account then take a look at the following compelling benefits of using a 3rd party provider to mange all of your credit card processing needs.1.
Using Drop Shipping for E-commerce
Thanks to the ubiquity of the internet, online virtual businesses have become very popular business opportunities. Online retail stores are gradually playing a more important role in our lives than the traditional 'brick-and-mortar' retail shops.
The Lowdown On ECommerce: Making All The Pieces Fit Together
The Lowdown on EcommerceEcommerce is truly the most confusing aspect of purchasing web design services. This is unfortunate since most (if not all) businesses online would like to provide their customers and potential customers with easy access their products or services.
Delivering Information Products Through Paypal Automatically
Paypal is one of the wonders of the web. Never has it been easier for individuals or small business to receive payments though the web & to be able to accept payment though debit or credit cards without having to own a merchant account.
The Plain Man's Guide to Making Money Online
I'm a plain man who uses plain thinking in devising strategies for making money online.I do not spend obscene mounts of money attending high ticket web conferences nor do I rush to purchase the latest collection of web casts at outrageous prices.
Are You Making These E-Commerce Excuses? (part 1)
A year ago, I had big plans to re-vamp my web site. I was going to publish my e-newsletter twice a month - every month, and I was going to upgrade my own e-commerce capabilities.
Tell Site Visitors What To Do
Your site visitors make all the choices when it comes to browsing the Web.No other medium gives users, readers or customers such control over their own experience.
Six Components Of A Good E-Commerce Site
Businesses, which are still sitting on sidelines and not doing business on the Internet, should think seriously about their position! If you are one of them, chances are there, that you have to pay dearly for your indecision as you might lose significant market share to your more proactive competitors in a very short period of time.Apart from the fact that e-commerce is growing at the rate of more than 25 percent a year, the use of online features can bring efficiency to virtually every aspect of business process, be it supply chain management or customer support management.
Electronic Commerce Tax Jurisdiction and Principles of Permanent Establishment
The principle of "permanent establishment" is very important for avoidance the conflict of law of matter connected imposition of taxation. In the absence of a permanent establishment, a country where goods or services are sold has no jurisdiction to tax the resulting profits.
The Art of Being Human
This isn't the first time I have written about the benefits of inserting a human voice or presence into your online communications. And I make no excuse for writing about this again.
E-commerce: Is It Right for You?
The birth of the Internet and the mass availability of personal Computers in the late 80's changed peoples life forever, Everyone now has had the potential to be their own boss whether you are mother at home looking after your children or a manual laborer there are opportunities in abundance . Just a search on Google for business opportunities will bring up more offers than your parents would have had in their whole life.