Making Money - Page 12

Selling on the web

There are plenty of platforms out there that will let you get online and selling in a hurry. Many include credit card processing so you don't have to go to your bank and jump through a three ring circus full of hoops to take credit cards. Here's a Google search that you might find helpful.

No, I won't recommend. Each has their own strengths and weaknesses, and only you can decide which one fits your needs. You could even roll your own on a webhost using Wordpress + Woocommerce.

Note: in my web business, I used to recommend Candypress. I don't anymore. The learning curve is way too high and their methodology is out of date by more than ten years. My own cart is based on it, but I'm also a web developer and it is heavily customized. I'm also working on a more up-to-date replacement for it.

Never lose sight of the goal...

Accepting Credit Cards

There are several services out there, but by far the best is SquareUp. For accepting cards through a website (if you're rolling your own), Stripe has the simplest API.

Shipping

Sooner of later you're going to have to send something to someone. You could go through the USPS or UPS website, but I've had much better luck using a third party, like Shippo. Their service gets you the best rates at a glance and they handle everything, including label creation right from your website. It's AWESOME.

Shipping Internationally

Shippo has made this much easier, but I try to avoid it when I can. The UK, Australia, New Zealand, Western Europe are all okay, but former Soviet bloc countries and Asia can be problematic. How so?

I shipped a doublet with about three dozen metal aglets on the laces. Bound for the Czech Republic, it made it to Chicago and then vanished without a trace, and I'm pretty sure I know why: someone x-rayed it and assumed it was a frangmentation device, and it was destroyed.

I learned two things: 1. never, ever ship a package without tracking. The customer didn't want to pay the higher price for Priority Mail International so I let him get away with First Class postage, and there was no way to know what happened to it in transit. 2. Whenever possible, use a package forwarding service.

 

 

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