Ecommerce Development

If your website captures any customer details (especially a form that requests credit card / personal details) then the answer is yes, you need to have an SSL certificate installed on your website.

However, if you run an e-commerce site, online shop or any type of client login then having an SSL certificate is a must.

SSL stands for Secure Socket Layer and adds an extra layer of security to your website and the way the server handles your websites data.
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If you’re looking for an ‘off the shelf’ solution for your ecommerce site then you won’t go far wrong with Softaculous.  Softaculous is a the leading auto installer having some 200+ scripts available which means you can get almost any application with the click of a mouse.

Any good hosting company will be using a leading control panel such as cPanel, Plesk, DirectAdmin, H-Sphere or InterWorx and Softaculous integrates with them all.  So once you’ve bought your domain and hosting you can easily install the application that’s best for you.

The Top 10 applications include – WordPress, Joomla, Opencart, Prestashop, phpBB, Drupal, SMF, MyBB, Dolphin, WHMCS.
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Believe it or not, there are still millions and millions of businesses still not online.  There are a variety of reasons for this, including scepticism about the business opportunity, lack of knowledge or simply a resistance to change.  The world is online and there is no escaping this fact and so whatever your business you need to consider taking the plunge and getting online.

There are some steps to take before you do that, you need to be realistic and do research as to what the market opportunity is for your business.  Ask some questions;

• What are my competitors doing, are they online?
• Are people using search engines to look for my products and/or services?
• What are the dynamics of my market?
• Is it growing, and more competitors appearing, or declining and competitors consolidating?

Then where do you go from here?  Well if you’ve made your mind up that you want to get online, then that’s a great step in the right direction.  Your business and product/service will have a bearing on how you do this.  If you’re a service you may only need to consider a portfolio site, if you have products and you want to actually sell these online then a full ecommerce site with a CMS (Content Management System) is probably nearer to what you require.

Before you spend any money on your website or ecommerce solution, you need to figure out exactly what you want to accomplish. Speaking to a good marketing company, or online consultant may be time well spent. Trawl the internet and see what you like and don’t like, what your competitors do well and not so well.  All this will help you formulate what your solution could be.

Well, there is lots of talk about Cloud Computing, but is it just talk or are there real benefits? Well this is all dependent on your ecommerce business. There are some great benefits to utilising the Cloud for your business and the obvious is flexibility and value for money;

Flexibility – This is where cloud computing really beats any other solution hands down, especially if you have a business that is seasonality driven or has visitor and/or user spikes. Cloud technology means that resources such as RAM, disk space and processing power can be managed in such a way that your site is always performing optimally regardless of the amount of traffic it is receiving.

Value for Money – The flexibility that Cloud Computing can deliver by way of resources can be reflected in costs, in that you are not stuck with a fixed solution and therefore fixed costs. Most Cloud solution providers will offer daily billing based upon your requirements. This has excellent advantages as you only pay for what you really need. If your business is a startup then you can pay-as-you-grow and keep costs under control.

These aren’t just the only benefits, but we recommend that you speak with one or two reputable Cloud providers and get the solution that best fits your business.

OsCommerce, while a great ecommerce solution, has its weaknesses.

This article is designed to highlight some really simple steps you can take to make osCommerce a bit more reliable.

Step 1. Change the default admin folder name. It still needs to be something you will remember but it doesn’t need to be so obvious as “admin” (e.g it could be “secureadmin” for instance).

Step 2. Use a second level of authentication on your new “admin” / “secureadmin” folder, this can be set up simply via cPanel or whichever control panel your hosting provider provides you with. (password protected directories).

Step 3. If you are not using the “Tell A Friend” module, delete it as this is wide open for misuse by spammers.

These three steps will protect you from a lot of vulnerabilities that have been discovered on OsCommerce. But as always, backup your database and website regularly as nothing is safe forever! 😉