Starting out a E-commerce website.

[CSSisthebest]

Hi Guy/ Girls,

Im thinking of creating my own web shop, i have never attempted e-commerce before and dont really know where to start.

what i want to do is create an online store, which i have a basic concept idea on how i want it too look.

Am i allowed to build my own shop or do i need a license to do this, because of credit card details etc?

What coding language would i need to learn to be able to create my online store ?

I have a relative amount of experiance in XHTML and CSS some javascript
and AS2.

Thanking you in advance, as i dont have a clue where to start.

James :thumbsup:

[mlseim]

You first subscribe to an Credit Card Merchant account.
This host handles the credit card processing between
the website and your bank. Also called a Payment Gateway.

This is not free. Some charge a monthly fee plus handling per
transaction, other just charge a fee for each transaction.

PayPal is an example, and also see http://www.authorize.net ... they have a
good explanation of how it works with nice pictures.

You then look for a pre-existing shopping cart (e-commerce) PHP/MySQL script.
Some are free (CubeCart, OsCommerce) ... others are not (X-Cart)
There are many to choose from, but pick one that handles your particular
Credit Card Merchant (Payment Gateway).

Then you install, configure and customize the shopping cart scripts to match the
look of your website. This is where you need to know XHTML/CSS/PHP

You'll be making some other decisions (that may cost you) .... example, if you choose
to handle the credit card entry yourself (on your site), you need to have your store
on a secure server HTTPS instead of HTTP ... and it will cost money for that.
Otherwise, you let your Credit Card Merchant handle that, which means your customers
will leave your site during the entry of credit card info, and return back when done.

Hope that gets you started.

[CSSisthebest]

Hi,

thanks to the above :thumbsup:

Used Cubecart and managed to intergrate it into my site.

this is it so far i have managed to change the colour of my background
http://technolane2.freehostia.com/store/index.php

i would like to place the whole online store inside a one of my black boxes with the white border like i have here: http://technolane2.freehostia.com/onlinestore.html

does anyone know of the easiest way for me to do this or could help me, understand what i need to do to acheive it.

thanks

James ;)

[mlseim]

or ... think about taking your website design (header, banner, menu) and
changing the header and CSS of CubeCart (where the "skin" or template is stored).
So you're not putting your online store in your website, you're putting your website
in your online store. It will look the same, but still remain in it's own directory.