Ecommerce

E-commerce is business activity conducted through some electronic medium. This is becoming an increasingly important method for business to be involved in and many businesses will have taken the opportunity of setting up a Web site as a means of establishing a presence - electronically.

It might be that this presence is merely to provide information to customers; it could be that the presence is part of the total presence the business has, i.e. it might have stores on the high street as well as a method of purchasing online. In other cases, the business might be just an online service only.

Whatever form it takes, an online presence and the opportunity to do business using technology is increasingly important especially as businesses grow. An effective online presence opens up your business to the entire online world. It is not just personal computers (PCs) that are the medium through which business can trade. The development of mobile devices such as phones, PDA's and Tablets also allows businesses to be in touch with their customers 24 hours a day wherever the customer might be.

The transmission of information and the range of services that can be provided are subsequently much greater and this can help a business expand.

It also has risks - the competition is much greater, the speed with which customers can access information about rival firms, prices and so on is that much more efficient and just having an online presence is no guarantee to business success. However with the right presence and working with the right company your chances of having an efficient and effective online success are greatly increased. Some of the key questions you should think about are;

• Payment systems - How will your customers be able to pay for the goods/services they want to buy?
• Security - How will you convince customers that buying from you online is safe and secure?
• Distribution methods - How will you get your goods to your customers - having an online presence may reduce some overheads but delivery costs can be very high especially for bulky items. Will you deliver internationally or just to the UK or Europe? If you do go international, what are the implications of such methods for tax and import licence/duties?
• Maintenance and updating of the site - How will you manage the day to day running of the site? If there are problems and the site is down it can lose you potential customers!
• After sales service - What measures are you gong to put in place to cater for after sales service/customer queries? What happens if a customer does not like the product - this might be highly relevant to those businesses where customers are not able to see the product before they buy?
• Legal issues - What are the legal requirements involved in setting up e-commerce systems? Are you aware of the range of legal provisions you will have to satisfy? What are the rules about the use of any databases of customer details that you possess? What role does the EU play in regulating e-commerce? What is the difference between marketing your business by e-mail and SPAM?

Here are STO7 we can help in every aspect of your Ecommerce presence. We work with the latest technologies to ensure your data is safe and secure at all times. We will take care of the technical requirements and build your Ecommerce site to the high levels of compliance needed. We can integrate youre presence with any of the online payment providers, and offer you instant email confirmations of orders placed on your site. Online secure card processing and payment terms and conditions are all included in our packages.

We will also offer you the ability to keep your site up to date and constantly available for you to add new product lines, products or special offers. This means you wont have to keep engaging a web development company to keep your business running online !

Please contact us to discuss you requirements and see how we can get you working efficiently online with your business.