Which shopping cart is best?
As you build your business, do you wonder what service you should be using for a shopping cart?
Do you wonder if you even need a shopping cart?
Do you question how much you need to be spending on a shopping cart?
Today, I am going to give you my take on the world of shopping carts and payment processing options.
Let’s start with an easy, affordable solution.
For many coaches, PayPal will serve your needs perfectly. It is a great choice because there is no monthly fee and it is easy to use.
You may be wondering if PayPal is a reputable service and how it will reflect on your business if you use PayPal.
Did you know that close to 350,000 websites use PayPal as their payment option? PayPal processes over $300 million in payments every day.
While there may have been a time that people were skeptical about PayPal, it is now considered one of the most trusted ecommerce providers.
With a free business account, you can use PayPal to:
- Create payment buttons or links for private coaching services
- Create payment buttons or links for group programs
- Create payment buttons that allow for recurring payments
- Send invoices to clients
PayPal also integrates with AWeber and MailChimp. This means that, once clients purchase from you, you can have them automatically added to a list in your email marketing system. And, you can streamline things by having an automated welcome email sent to them immediately after they purchase.
PayPal will take about 3% of your transactions, but there is no monthly payment, which is great when your revenue is just starting to build.
Do you need a higher-end solution?
As I mentioned above, PayPal may very well serve your needs. However, as your business grows, you may want additional functionality that PayPal doesn’t offer.
It may be time for a higher-end solution if you…
- Want a robust affiliate tracking system
- Want to be able to offer coupons
- Don’t use AWeber or MailChimp and want to have emails automatically sent out to clients who purchase from you, with access to materials, call-in information, etc.
If you are looking for a higher-end solution, I recommend 1shoppingcart. There are certainly many other options out there, but we have been pleased with the 1shoppingcart affiliate tracking and the way that 1shoppingcart integrates with membership plugins such as WishList and Digital Access Pass.
1shoppingcart is not an inexpensive solution, so you’ll want to make sure your revenue justifies the cost. 1shoppingcart’s Premium package, which includes affiliate tracking, is $99 per month, plus 1% transaction fee.
When you use 1shoppingcart, or any other shopping cart, you will also want to set-up a merchant account.
What’s the Difference Between a shopping cart and a merchant account?
Shopping Cart System: The shopping cart has secure servers that can safely collect customer data and credit card information.
Gateway/Merchant Account: The gateway is the “middle man” that takes the credit card data and authorizes it, returning an authorization code back to the shopping cart system. The merchant account is the “bank” account where the money from the customer is deposited into. From there it is automatically moved into your regular checking account a few days later.
You will typically pay about $25 per month for the merchant account, plus 2.19% + $0.25 per transaction.
You can choose to use a free PayPal business account as your merchant account, in conjunction with 1shoppingcart. This will save you money, but it is more limiting as it doesn’t allow your customers to easily use a credit card for payment. We have also run into issues integrating PayPal with 1shoppingcart. Given this, we recommend making the additional investment and signing up for another merchant account.
Please note that these are the current rates and they may change at any time.
Have questions about technology and which shopping cart tools are best for you? Share your questions below so I can support you.
