How to Launch a Web Store in 30 Days
While this may not be a step by step tutorial like most, this is my documented route to choosing and setting up my webstore with Siteground. My goal on this project was to come up with an online webstore with minimal code knowledge and still keep the cost down. What I found was Siteground. Please note that I have no affiliation with Siteground other than as a customer. The current website I have hosted there is www.vatechshop.com
After searching through the web to find a service to host my OSCommerce store I decided to go with SiteGround and wanted to document my experience. Since this was the first time I has used OSCommerce I was looking for a solution that would help walk me through the set up process.
The thing that attracted me to Siteground was the fact that they will set up your OSCommerce store for you. Since I previously had no experience with using OSCommerce or PHP for that matter, this was an enticing solution.
The other great part of this solutions was the cost. It was only $72 for the first year which was well within my budget. The next thing that made me even more comfortable was the Live customer service chat on their home page. This was great for me because I prefer not to sit on hold all day on the phone. I also received good information from the chat such as the fact that they would not only install OSCommerce for me but they would also install the template that I purchased.
Once I signed up for the service, I must say I was nervious. I had adjusted my template in the photoshop file by changing colors images, ect, but I did not do any adjustments in the php files for fear I would screw something up. So my next step was contacting customer service to install the template.
I knew right away that I was asking for more than they were required to do, but I submitted my template with the adjusted photoshop file and asked for help. I was told they would do what they could with the adjusted file but worst case they would install the origional template.
In the end they did more than that. While the file was not perfect to what I was looking for, it was close. And of course I wasn't paying them for design, this was just excellent customer service.
Once the site was installed, I started by changing the CSS page in the directory and was able to adjust most of my changes from there. The one pitfall I found myself in was when I requested they add the group SSL to the site. During this change something went wrong and they were unable to fix it, the only solution according to tech support was to use the back up and I would have to contact another tech support portal on the site for that, plus there was a $25 charge.
I paid the charge and sent a message with my payment stating what had happened and that I felt the problem was due to what ever changes tech support had made. In the end tech support came back with a reasonable compromise, since I had already been charged the $25, instead of just installing the backup, they would spend some development time (usually $50 an hour) to troubleshoot the problem. This for me, was adequate.
Once this has been completed, I had the site up and operational in less than a month. Total time, start to finish was probably two weeks, but a good majority of that was due to having the time to set aside to work on it or working out supplier arrangements with distribution to source the product.
Overall I have been very happy with my choice of Siteground and would recommend them to anyone looking to set up a web store.
You can view my web store at www.vatechshop.com
While this may not be a step by step tutorial like most, this is my documented route to choosing and setting up my webstore with Siteground. My goal on this project was to come up with an online webstore with minimal code knowledge and still keep the cost down. What I found was Siteground. Please note that I have no affiliation with Siteground other than as a customer. The current website I have hosted there is www.vatechshop.com
After searching through the web to find a service to host my OSCommerce store I decided to go with SiteGround and wanted to document my experience. Since this was the first time I has used OSCommerce I was looking for a solution that would help walk me through the set up process.
The thing that attracted me to Siteground was the fact that they will set up your OSCommerce store for you. Since I previously had no experience with using OSCommerce or PHP for that matter, this was an enticing solution.
The other great part of this solutions was the cost. It was only $72 for the first year which was well within my budget. The next thing that made me even more comfortable was the Live customer service chat on their home page. This was great for me because I prefer not to sit on hold all day on the phone. I also received good information from the chat such as the fact that they would not only install OSCommerce for me but they would also install the template that I purchased.
Once I signed up for the service, I must say I was nervious. I had adjusted my template in the photoshop file by changing colors images, ect, but I did not do any adjustments in the php files for fear I would screw something up. So my next step was contacting customer service to install the template.
I knew right away that I was asking for more than they were required to do, but I submitted my template with the adjusted photoshop file and asked for help. I was told they would do what they could with the adjusted file but worst case they would install the origional template.
In the end they did more than that. While the file was not perfect to what I was looking for, it was close. And of course I wasn't paying them for design, this was just excellent customer service.
Once the site was installed, I started by changing the CSS page in the directory and was able to adjust most of my changes from there. The one pitfall I found myself in was when I requested they add the group SSL to the site. During this change something went wrong and they were unable to fix it, the only solution according to tech support was to use the back up and I would have to contact another tech support portal on the site for that, plus there was a $25 charge.
I paid the charge and sent a message with my payment stating what had happened and that I felt the problem was due to what ever changes tech support had made. In the end tech support came back with a reasonable compromise, since I had already been charged the $25, instead of just installing the backup, they would spend some development time (usually $50 an hour) to troubleshoot the problem. This for me, was adequate.
Once this has been completed, I had the site up and operational in less than a month. Total time, start to finish was probably two weeks, but a good majority of that was due to having the time to set aside to work on it or working out supplier arrangements with distribution to source the product.
Overall I have been very happy with my choice of Siteground and would recommend them to anyone looking to set up a web store.
You can view my web store at www.vatechshop.com
posted by Brad Smith at 7:29 AM
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