Simple Products vs. Shopping Cart Integrations

One of the first things things that we will help you to determine when we start to build your website is whether or not you need a fully integrated shopping cart or just a payment button.  Items we will consider in making this decision include:

Do I want customers to be able to purchase more than one item at a time?

If you have an informational website but also plan to offer a few items for sale, like a book or a t-shirt, then you will probably be agreeable with having your customers purchasing one item at a time. This means that you will not need to have a method of adding the cost of two or more items together. Something to keep in mind here is that, in most cases, your customer will probably not go back to your site specifically to purchase another product so if your goal for the site is to have the highest sales possible then you would probably want to opt for a shopping cart.

Will I need to collect sales taxes?

You will need to check with your tax attorney or accountant to determine if you will need to collect your sales tax from your online sales. If you will be collecting sales tax from all of your customers or none of your customers then a simple payment button may be just fine. If, however, you will charge sales tax to just some of your customers then a shopping cart system will likely be the best option for you.

Will I need to have the items calculated together to give an accurate shipping charge?

Shipping can be a very complex element in trying to complete the ecommerce puzzle. It can also be the most expensive if you don't get it right. If you have a single product that will fit in a single size box and you will charge the same for shipping regardless of where it goes then a simple payment button should work just fine.

But let's consider a more complex scenario. You have a website that sells products from different manufacturers from different locations worldwide and your customer selects several products varying in size and weight that will be shipped to his location from separate locations anywhere in the world.  In that case you will need to have a method of totaling the cost of all items but calculating the cost of the shipping per item, per rate, per location it will be shipped from. In this case you will need to have a shopping system specifically designed for this method of ecommerce.