Review of the top E-Commerce packages for 2012 and alternatives

I have had the pleasure/pain of working with some of these top basic e-commerce platforms in the past.  Shopify – Volusion – E-commerce enabled WordPress blogs – EDirectHost Ecommerce – Ecrater – etc. Let me list my personal list of pros/cons of each.

Shopify -

• PROS – Cheap and easy, quick to setup and takes no real knowledge of programming. Have a number of low cost plugins to enhance your site.  Starts around $29 a month for 100 skus to list.
• CONS – You have to use their shopping cart which is hosted by them to be PCI Compliant.  The customer sees that the website goes to another website for checkout and make them uneasy.

Volusion -

• Can’t recommend.  They recently had another massive site outage.  It’s been one of many in the past.  Don’t use them. – see more info here – http://www.internetretailer.com/2012/07/10/volusion-suffers-another-power-outage

WordPress

• WordPress is popular amongst developers of eCommerce websites for a number of different reasons. One of the major reasons is that it offers applications that are easy to learn and use. These applications are generally quite affordable, and some of them are even free. The majority of the plug-ins and themes supplied by WordPress are open source and light weight in terms of size in comparison to Magento and other famous e-commerce solutions. The only major disadvantage is that it can’t be used for sites with a lot of sales due to heaviness of database queries.This is not an enterprise solution long term.

eDirectHost

• These guys are new to the field with a package starting at $39.95 a month for 100 skus. I actually have never worked with them but if you have any experience using there ecommerce website builder let me know.

eCrater

• A 100% free online marketplace for sellers.  Really…. it’s free.  Nothing to do but setup your products and promote it your customers.  Of course you have limited options but you can’t beat the price.

Hope this helps you out in the future!!

Yahoo Messenger vs Skype Telephone Features

The universe is growing smaller and smaller with the technological advancement in all phases of communication. Webcams and social networking sites are just among the tools that connect many people around the world as if they were living next to each other’s. Skype and Yahoo Messenger are the most famous text, voice and video media that bring together two or more groups together.

This technological innovation facilitates communication of families, friends, and colleagues who are geographically separated from each other. With high speed Internet, they can almost touch their boundaries with the aid of webcams and headphones with microphones. International client collaboration is also made possible through online chat and conferencing services like Skype and Yahoo Messenger. There is growing competition among these two service providers and developers which are both used in private and commercial setting.

While both of them have telephone service features like telephone to PC or vice versa, one is extremely different from the other with regard to convenience, ease of use, and quality. Both offers video calling services although the former is much preferred because of its scratch-free voice quality than the latter. If you are opting to call a conference, then Skype is definitely for you as Yahoo Messenger does not have yet this feature. When it comes to voicemail services, Yahoo Messenger does not ask for a fee unlike Skype that requires a service charge. However, their telephone services are not considered an overall replacement of a true telephone and mobile phones. These two IM systems continue to develop technological innovations that would facilitate global communication.

Making baking a little more fun and simple

Guest post written by Colleen Call

I don’t always do a great job of cleaning up after myself in the kitchen after I’ve done some cooking or some baking. It’s a really awful habit but I can blame most of that on just having to go and get myself cleaned up because I’m so messy when I’m baking! It’s a really big problem and I need to fix it, so I’m going to buy an apron and hope that it really helps things out in the kitchen.

In my defense, it can be really hard to not make a mess in the kitchen. It’s a good thing I live by myself and other people don’t have to deal with my mess! I was looking at some directions on how to make your own apron and thinking about doing that when I saw info regarding debt settlement programs and knew that I had to look through it and read it. I’m going to sign up for on eof them to help me out.

It’s going to be so nice to just have an apron that I can throw in the wash instead of trying to get all kinds of cooking stuff out of my clothes. I’m messy and have already ruined way too many good outfits that way.

How to select the right warehouse management system?

Selecting the right warehouse management system (WMS) for your business is a massive decision & it’s important to understand what the weakness is in your current system, what features would be of benefit to you, & what software can easily grow with you without breaking the bank.

What is the best time to move to a new WMS?

First, don’t wait until your system is broken…. it’s to late then. When your system can’t keep pace with your growth and your current provider is no longer keeping the software up to date. That’s a good sign it’s time to start fresh. I would also suggest going to a logistics conference to get an idea of what other companies are using. Remember the importance of these conferences is not the vendors, but networking with the retailers to learn from them, the mistakes and what they’ve learned from their implementation of new software.

Get your executive team to buy in

Remember, your key leaders need to be behind the idea, or it’s going to fail before you even choose a vendor. First informally talk to the key leaders involved in logisitics and find out other people’s problems with the current system. This “preselling” makes it easier to anticipate questions and concerns when you formally try to sell the idea.

Get the day to day workers to buy in

Find out what challenges people are having in the warehouse & shipping department.  What would make their job easier? What tools would help them do their job better?  What do they hate most about their job. Talk to the guys after work during happy hour so they can be honest with you about how warehouse management software would help them. Your goal is to help them be more productive and become more valuable to the company. Don’t make them think you are trying to take their jobs away from them.

Make sure your company cares

I’ve done the above before but didn’t know the company was being bought out 6 months later.  Only the owner knew about this. So in spite of all the time I spent on the following it all fell through. Just learn your lesson and move on. Here’s a quick list of some providers of WMS systems:

• 3PL Software
• AdvancePro
• ASAP Systems
• Chess Logistics
• DiCentral
• DSA Software
• FishBow Inventory
• Fox Fire Software
• HighJump
• inFlow
• Intellitrack
• Magaya
• Principal Systems
• RedPrairie
• SAP
• Sequoia Group
• Shelko
• Smart Warehouse Systems
• SmartTurn
• TECSYS Inc
• TopShelf
• Traker Systems
• Warehouse 3G

What other tips could you offer our readers? Have you had any experience with any of these systems? If so, what were the pros and cons?

Holiday decorating

Guest post written by Derick Burks

I love to decorate for the holidays. Every year I try to get my husband to help me do it the day after Thanksgiving, but he always thinks it is too early. I like to get the decorations up early so they can be up for an entire month for us to enjoy. I think our house looks so much cozier with holiday decorations up. Last month we switched internet providers to a company my husband found by searching “wireless internet Nashville”. I am so glad we did because I have found so many great ideas online for decorating our home for the holidays. I usually put lighted garland on our mantle and two vases filled with ball ornaments. This year I hope to make some glittered Christmas trees to put on the mantle as well. I know my husband will not be thrilled that I will have more decorations to add to our attic, but I think I will be pleased with how the decorations will look. Christmas comes and goes so quickly, so I am glad my husband lets me enjoy the one month out of the year that I can have the house decorated.

Adobe Acrobat Allows For Free Professional Online Collaboration

Online collaboration is becoming more and more popular as the Internet grows. Instead of purchasing ten airline tickets, all traveling to Orlando, and collaborating for three days in a conference room, you can use your computer’s webcam. Adobe Acrobat allows you to open a conference room for screen sharing, screen controlling, instant messaging, and file sharing. Adobe Acrobat can be used for sharing files peer to peer or simply helping a friend out with their computer. The program can be found for free at Acrobat.com. All you need to sign up is an Adobe account (which is free, of course).

I have used Adobe Acrobat a couple of times to help people with their computers along with working on a Photoshop project with a peer. When you open up a conference room, you can invite people to join via email or a link. When they enter, you can then share your screen, control their screen, share your webcam, files, microphone, etc. When I helped a client with a Photoshop project, I requested control of their computer and then showed them how to perform different tasks in Photoshop. Adobe Acrobat worked quite well and allowed me to collaborate flawlessly.

Florida Virtual Schools Uses Elluminate Software

Screenshot of Elluminate Live

More and more school districts are coming up with unique ways to bring learning to the Web. Florida Virtual Schools, the website where any Florida student can take classes online, tries to make the online classroom more social and they do that with Elluminate. Elluminate Live is a software that allows the teacher or administrator give interactive slideshows and quizzes to the group of people attending. Students can activate a web camera, microphone, or use the chat box to talk with teachers and other students. Many classes require you to complete at least one “collaboration assignment” with Elluminate.

I think that using online conferencing tools for the online classroom is a wonderful idea, but it’s poorly executed. Taking classes that require collaboration myself, it gets annoying to wait for people’s technical difficulties, everyone to calm down, and for people to behave. Just because it’s not the physical classroom doesn’t mean that no rules apply! Many students draw on the PowerPoint slides, put emoticons in the chat boxes, and use “texting abbreviations.” Online conferencing can be a good thing, but in the hands of teenagers, it can cause more problems that it fixes.