Newbie really needs advice on software...

A

ampilgrim

New Member
I could really use some advice after having spent crazy hours trying to get a small business website up from scratch and then hitting a big brick wall.

Without getting too mired in details, my issue is that I have spent a lot of time and resources creating and publishing a website using both Coffeecup Shopping Cart Creator (SCC) Pro & Designer Pro... only to find out that it's not going to work for me and the business due to limitations with how the (software) shopping cart handles shipping calculations as well as with limitations in how PayPal Payment Services (PPS) handles shipping cost calculations... and I need either the shopping cart software or the payment service to be able to handle accurate shipping costs based on current USPS postage rates. And with neither SCC nor PPS being able to do so without requiring me to input literal mountains of data into custom shipping tables - I'm stuck.

What that has left me with is needing to find a shopping cart service that provides robust and accurate built-in USPS postal calculation rates. Which means I'll have to pretty much scrap the website built with the Coffeecup software in total...

I have found shopping cart services like AuctionInc which provide the robust shipping calculations I need and for which I'm willing to pay a monthly fee for... But that leaves me with needing to redesign the rest of a new website from scratch - which really hurts considering all the time/money already spent.

So my question is:

If I restart designing a website from scratch, could anyone recommend a WYSIWYG type website designer program that plays nicely with 3rd party shopping cart services like AuctionInc... which in turn will play nicely with PayPal Payment Services Standard?

I want to do things right this time because I'm running out of money and time with getting a viable website up and running. Any advice or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

My apologies for the length of the post!
 
Last edited:
CaldwellYSR

CaldwellYSR

Member
WYSIWYG editors don't play nice with anything... if you want to design a website you need to write the code for it. Otherwise you need to hire a professional. I don't know much about shopping carts but Magento is one I've heard good things about.
 
Phreaddee

Phreaddee

Super Moderator
Staff member
A good shopping cart deserves time, effort and money.

if you are going to do it, do it right. A seamless e-commerce solution coupled with a third party payment gateway is the go. Paypal is just frustrating, and the amount of lost sales is simply staggering. for every sale through paypal you are probably losing another 7 or so because you arent offering CC such as visa, mastercard and amex.
option a
shop>checkout>details>success.

option b
shop>checkout>details>paypal>signup>more details>more information>maybe success

if this is your business sink your teeth into it and go for it.
if you cant be ****ed then your business is doomed to fail anyway.

and if coffeecup CAN do it, just you need to make some data tables. make the tables! the time spent making the tables will not equal a brand new site rebuild. trust me.

one thing i've learnt over the years. do it right the first time.
dont stuff around with "make do" efforts and what not.
and with ecommerce the right way is not the paypal way.
payment gateways
 
ronaldroe

ronaldroe

Super Moderator
Staff member
I have to say, you're probably best off just hiring someone. The problem is, WYSIWYGs don't really play nice with much of anything. They exist for one purpose: to let non-coders built static websites. You can find plugins for some of the higher end (read: not free) WYSIWYG editors to help you code for very specific CMS's, but I went down that road when I was just learning, and believe me, it doesn't work as advertised.
 
A

ampilgrim

New Member
Let me clarify, I'm not too concerned about designing a basic website (already have a website and hosting).

But I'm not a programmer in the sense of being able to make my own content management system for handling and updating 100-200 different products, descriptions, options, and updating stocks, etc. I'll need to use a CMS software solution even if I paid someone else to set it up (which isn't the issue for me - I have the time and desire to do that myself).

Same deal with a shopping cart for handling shipping calculations for products that range in size and weight from a few ounces in size/weight & low price to to products of larger size and higher weight. It would take literal weeks of sitting at a computer only inputting data into tables for possible shipping options, rates, packaging, distance, etc. and it would need to maintained as well... [Flat-rate shipping just won't work in my situations/business.] The only solution I can find is to use a pay-for shopping cart service that can handle those options. It's not just an issue of me not wanting to put time/money into it - it's just not physically possible for me to do other than by finding a shopping cart service that can.

So what I meant to ask is - is there a CMS that could easily integrate into a pre-existing website and automatically calculate shipping options based on different carrier rates/options/distance prior to the customer being handed off to a payment service provider like PayPal (since PayPal Payment Standard is lacking in automated shipping calculation)?

The only solutions I've found is to use a shopping cart service like AuctionInc, scrap the current CMS that's integrated into my website (CoffeeCup SCC) and rebuilding a new website integrating something like AuctionInc that would handle automatic shipping calculations prior to the customer being handed off to a payment service provider. Or does anyone know a better solution (regardless of if I pay someone else to set it up or I do it myself)? Am I on the right track?
 
A

ampilgrim

New Member
Thanks for the useful link Phreaddee.

Am I on the right track though with thinking I'll probably need to still integrate a shopping cart service that can handle a lot of shipping options/rates in addition? I know a lot of them claim to automate shipping options but then fall far short of actually doing so, or require mountains of data to be entered in order to make them functional to a buyer... This is where CoffeeCup SCC really let me down and in addition, and it also didn't play nice with PayPal payment services.

By the way (to one of the earlier posters), I want to offer PayPal because a lot of my routine customers are cross-overs coming to my business website from eBay and want to use it. Which is why PayPal as a payment service provider is a big issue for me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top