Online trading is a lucrative business. Around 100,000 companies have an e-commerce site, while another 400,000 are seen as potential users. And according to technology research company Forrester, UK online business trade was set to hit £300 billion in 2005 and e-marketplaces will facilitate 41 per cent of these transactions. In addition, e-business trade is on track to top euro 2.2 trillion in 2006, with the UK, France and Germany accounting for 64 per cent of Europe’s online trade. Obviously these figures do not tell the whole story – some industries have been quicker to adopt e-commerce than others and some firms have benefited more than others. What is certain, though, is that e-commerce represents a real opportunity for businesses to find new markets and serve existing customers more efficiently.

To enable you to succesfully sell online, we can provide, configure and build a complete shopping cart system, running on our Windows Server 2003 servers. This can be integrated with WorldPay, PayPal, ProtX, SecPay as well as other payment providers to accept online orders via credit/debit cards.

Time taken to customise this, and to upload product lines, configure and test etc will vary but, as a guide, you can generally start trading online for between £1000 and £2000. Payment providers acceptance, fees and credit card commissions are separate and depend on a number of factors - we can advise on the various options currently available.

Even once you factor in annual hosting fees from £50 annually, you'll soon see how much more cost effective this solution is, compared to application service providers like ShopCreator, who charge a minimal annual fee of £250 on top of any external hosting fees. And we build in, as standard, some fairly advanced features. It's worth it; one site we have taken over and redesigned has increased turnover by 400% in less than 4 years.

This shopping cart web design solution allows you to create, amend and delete product information online via your browser, as well as enabling you to create invoices, check stock levels, organise mailing lists for newsletters, plus much more besides. You can even run affiliate accounts and tracking. Or it can be as minimalist as you want - it's your choice! Fully enabled content and inventory management built in - no requirement for you to install any software! Click here for a live example. Or here for another. Or here for another.