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Internet/website gurus?

Bu11dog

Active Member
Joined
Jul 23, 2008
Messages
822
Trying to set up a small website for the wife's business. We have a "free" 10mb webspace through our internet provider. I want to set her up to take credit card payments. I used to have a faint idea and new a guy who helped and did most of the work. Any sites out there that will "help me build it" and not charge me or spam the crap out of me?
 
Building the site is just the beginning. If she wants to charge credit cards, she'll need to get a merchant account and a gateway processor such as Authorize.net.

Are you trying to build an ecommerce site with a shopping cart etc.? or just accept credit cards? Do you mind me asking what the business is (retail, subscription, consulting, etc.)?

You're probably not going to find anyone to help you without charging you, but I've had good experiences at RentACoder.com since they hold your payment in escrow and don't pay the coder until you're satisfied. That's where I outsource some of my work to.

I'll help as much as a can, but an ecommerce website isn't the world's easiest thing, and few people are giving them away for free. However, it can be done relatively cheaply.
 
She just needs to get set up to take credit cards, but as a mental health therapist she won't be using it very often just to help settle accounts sometimes monthly as opposed to daily. We were looking into using paypal "personal" account to set her up to take cards, then she could log into her own site and run them through as needed. As a small business the costs are more important than anything and that seemed to be the cheapest way as she won't use it much. The biggest fight is with the insurance company's.
 
I would suggest just using Paypal, some people will disagree because they may have had a spat with PP in the past but I have been with them since 1999 and never had an issue. You can put the PP buttons right on your website with little effort. Hope that helps.:cool:
 
I'd agree that Paypal might be the easiest way for you to go. They offer some business services that easily let you make a "Purchase" button and things like that, send invoices, and they even offer credit card processing if you get a card number over the phone.

Matt
 
Thanks guys, going to work on this Monday, very busy weekend!
 
I would suggest just using Paypal, some people will disagree because they may have had a spat with PP in the past but I have been with them since 1999 and never had an issue. You can put the PP buttons right on your website with little effort. Hope that helps.:cool:


Agreed! PP is also very good about investigating disputes and having your back as long as you are in the right.

You can use their Virtual Terminal to process anything manually, and as Niko said, you can easily integrate it with your site two ways.

One is to have it accept Visa, Mastercard, Amex, and Discover. As long as your credit is good you should not have a problem getting that set up.

The other is to have the PayPal payment button he mentioned for people to use PayPal Express Checkout. They can use the funds from their own PP accounts to complete a transaction.

If your credit is not the greatest, use method two first for a few months, then go for method one once you have built a little trust and they can see a history with you.

Go with a decent E-commerce software that you can use to host your site & cart. I could be wrong, but I can't imagine anything free being sufficient. It would suck to later find that what you are using does not suit your needs and then having to go through all the work of setting up shop again.
Most of those E-commerce companies have plans that start around $25.00 a month and you can increase your bandwidth and other features as needed.

Good luck!
 
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