Starting an Ecommerce Site

[majiren]

Ok - so I'm a bit new to this. I have a good idea for an ecommerce site and want to try selling some of my own products.. I recognize most of the ecommerce solutions (ie; oscommerce) are lacking when it comes to content, therefore I would probably start a blog along side this for the search engines (providing regular content items, etc).

However my question is - what would be the best way for me to promote my ecommerce site so that it is the one ranking in the search engines and not my blog?

cheers

 

[Elvie]

With OSCommerce, you can add tons of content to each product's page. Or you can program a website and have the shopping cart (OSCommerce) as one link in your navigation if you are looking to add content that isn't directly related to each individual product.

I like OSCommerce, in some sort of sick and sadistic way. If you don't code and aren't familiar with PHP you'd probably be better off hiring someone to set it up for you unless you plan to use the default display. It's not the easiest open source product to work with.

 

[majiren]

Yah - so I'm only ever going to have X number of products, but would like to keep the updating regular..

so I think the best solution would be some wordpress.. would I just have this under the main domain (which would be oscommerce) ie; www.maindomain.com/info/wordpress_install/

 

[Elvie]

I'd probably do it the other way around and have the regularly updated content at the main domain and have osCommerce as a directory below it.

 

[Brandon]

osCommerce is one of the best, and it's open source which makes it even better. You can also easily add some SEO addons to it which make it nice.

 

[kyleirwin]

I can't stand osCommerce. I really haven't run into any packaged e-commerce setups that I've actually liked. I'd either learn to code, or hire somebody that can.

 

[ToddW]

I can't stand osCommerce. I really haven't run into any packaged e-commerce setups that I've actually liked. I'd either learn to code, or hire somebody that can.

I can't stand OSC either.

I recently setup 2 MIVA5 stores for customers and I really really like it. Sure add-ons cost money but they actually work and if they don't you can complain, get help, etc. MIVA5 also allows you to use a 100% custom design which I think is #1 advantage over OSC. You can get MIVA5 license for a LOT cheaper than from MIVA or you can lease it for a monthly cost. I think if you are serious about starting a REAL e-commerce store you should look at MIVA or Yahoo stores*gasp*... both are better than OSC in my opinion.