E-commerce solutions for businesses on a budget! By J. O'Brien www.jcscomputer.com
It's Saturday, or after hours a buyer lands on your website and discovers the only way to order your product is by calling you the next business day. You lost a sale and the real problem is you may not even know it. Would you like to have a website and manage the content without a webmaster? How about a website that takes orders and passes all the information into your accounting system with the push of a button? Here is a list of the tools you would need to purchase, all for a total investment of around $1,600 and a few days of your time.
Domain name registration $25 Make sure the provider is reliable, easy to work with and has the ability to change and redirect your web domain if you need to. Additionally, make sure you have password protection, registrar locking ability and for advanced users you may want the ability to change DNS settings and have flexible configuration options without having to pay for these changes.
Peachtree Web Site Creator Pro Version 4.5 $197.88 for the annual subscription. Build a professional-quality web site for your business with customizable pages and an online catalog, including inventory items that you can upload from your Peachtree Premium software with graphical pictures. This product has an intuitive basic setup page that includes a step-by-step guide to help you get your website up and running. You may view a sample of this product @ http://www.bellwethergarden.com/ct_catalog.htm
Peachtree Web Site Trader Version 4.5 $197.88 for the annual subscription. Sell your products and services online and transfer web orders into your Peachtree Accounting software. This product has a secure interactive storefront and instantly adds new customer information to Peachtree from web orders. Additionally, the e-mail order confirmation for you and your customers is simple to modify. The price listed also includes annual web hosting. After you have your Peachtree Accounting software up and running you may purchase the web site subscription from www.peachtree.com.
Peachtree single user Premium Accounting Version 2006 retails for $499 - This product has additional features not found in some of the lesser priced versions of Peachtree. It is designed to help small businesses better manage their accounting, streamline their operations, and aid in their decision making. With training you can quickly learn, use and easily correct mistakes. This product helps businesses do more in less time. To get almost a 20% discount off the software, plus mail in rebate coupons, forms discount coupons and free tips and tricks newsletters shipped with your order go to www.bizsoftresource.com.
Training classes from certified training centers are generally around $350 per day, include a training manual and sometimes lunch. I would suggest a minimum of 2 days of training. A listing of the certified training classes be found @ www.peachtree.com/forms/html/premiertrainers.cfm
We have helped a few of our clients set up E-Commerce solutions using these tools and have set up a site of our own. Once we decided on the content it took us less than 8 hours to upload our inventory and configure the website. I give this product thumbs up! Look for information on Peachtree's credit card and a payroll processing services which we will review in future articles.
About the Author
Jennifer OBrien founded JCS Computer Resource, Inc. in 1989 and has been a member of the SAGE Steering Committee 5 times over the past 15 years.