Small & boutique busineses have some important choices to make when preparing to open a new online store and e-commerce engine. Whether you are a startup business or have been selling your products for years, it is important to plan carefully when you sell your products online. Your online brand, the presentation of your products and the technology which offers e-commerce to your customers are all factors that play into the success of your online business. Read on for tips & advice from an expert web designer and e-commerce consultant.

• Custom e-commerce engine and online store design: On one end of the spectrum of the options available to you, you can hire a web consultant to design and execute a custom e-commerce engine. Perhaps you have special needs regarding the shopping process or you want an online store that is 100% customizable in its form and function. In that case you may want to consider a custom e-commerce engine and a custom website design. You can read about our custom e-commerce and website design services in this this case study.
   
• Affordable online store service: On the other hand, complete customization may be overkill in terms of your time and resources, depending on your goals. If you are setting up an online store for the first time, have a low budget for your online store and require an affordable solution, or just want to easily test the e-commerce waters out yourself with an attractive and professional service, you may want to consider Shopify.
   

Shopify is a hosted service that offers a website and online store in one affordable package. A hosted service means that you don't need to have a seperate web host, you could combine your online store and website on the Shopify server. However if you already have a website and don't want to mess with it, you can also use Shopify to create an online store as a supplement to your existing website and just link to it from your existing website.

If you are interested to check it out you can view the Shopify home page directly or go straight to the Shopify pricing page and see if it the cost works for your budget. Make sure you sign up for the free trial and give it a spin for 30 days.

Where Shopify really shines is its ability to get set up extremely quickly, easily and at a low monthly cost. You don't need a web designer to set up a Shopify store, in fact you can use the provided tools to customize the look and feel of your website and online store yourself. However you can also hire a web designer to customize your online store with a professional web design. The slick and intuitive interface make it easy to administer products and orders. Shopify also lends itself to sleek and user friendly websites and online stores. For these reasons I highly recommend small businesses and boutiques check out Shopify and see if it makes sense for you.

I'm including a few screenshots below of some different pages on some real online stores that use Shopify for an e-commerce engine. Hopefully they will help you visualize what your online store might look like.
 

Category page including a list of products for sale for a fashion designer's online store:

Product details page with an add to cart button for a high end bicycle online retailer:

Shopping cart page for a boutique online retailer:

I hope this review and advice has helped you in your decision regarding your new online store.

If you are new to Online Success, the purpose of these articles is to help you succeed at your online venture, feel free to browse around and get more great tips from an expert web designer :)

Wishing you the best online success!