Shopping on the Internet is a booming business. It's a great way to offer your products to your customers 24 hours a day, totally at their convenience. While anyone can set up shop on the Internet as easily as setting up a web page, the responsible budding entrepreneur will want to set up the most secure storefront possible. We've identified three things you should implement to take orders and process payments online.
1. A way to 'go secure' and collect customer payment information securely.
Safety is number one. Your customers want to know their orders, and credit card numbers, are safe with you. Your customers also want to be reassured that you are who you say you are. Digital Certificates are the way to do that. A Digital Certificate is like a seal of approval that tells visitors that their personal information will be protected from unauthorized eyes.
You've got three options with Hostess Web Hosting to secure your customer's orders. First, you can use a service such as Internet Secure which processes credit cards and allows you to use their Digital Certificate for security. Second, you can obtain your own digital certificate from VeriSign (the method we at Hostess Web Hosting use to secure your hosting orders). And finally, you can use our VeriSign Certificate.
2. A place to collect and store the orders securely.
Where you store your orders is as important as how you collect your orders. You may have seen sites that collect customer information securely only to then send their orders through unsecure email! We recommend a different strategy. Our FrontPage users already have a solution built into the software; orders are written to a secure text file. Our Advanced Hosting customers are able to use the power of Cold Fusion or ASP to write orders to a database. But for customers who don't want to use FrontPage, and don't want to learn complex programming, there is our Merchant Account, which includes a shopping cart application that takes care of secure storage of your orders for you.
3. A way to process orders.
If you're already an established merchant in 'the real world' you probably already have a merchant account with a bank. You can still use that system, you'll just have to run the orders through your service as you would normally. If you would like a little more automation, you can sign up with CyberCash or Internet Secure. These services offer real-time credit card processing, authorization, and will even deposit the amount into your bank account.
Shopping Cart Options
We've given you a lot of options to digest. Knowing exactly what you need to get your online store up and running can be confusing. That's why we've written up a few scenarios to give you an idea of how different people in different situations would set up an Internet storefront.
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