using a website to sell goods

whats the best way to do this? Im thinking of starting a online sales business to help my dad out. He has never asked for anything in his life and its about time i tried to make a few of his dreams come...

so ive come up with an idea. are there any free sites you can use or is it best i buy one?

i now a few poeple on here have online businesses just need to know how it all works...

any advice would be great

thanks

you can pay a company to build one for you that comes with a backend so that you can manage the products on the site.

cheap version is to get an eBay shop and then if you get business get a proper one

I'd recommend www.godaddy.com.

You can setup a server to host the site from them, and include things like catalogue generation, DB integration etc etc.

The prices for the hosting start at around £3/month, but the software to do the online catalouges etc can be very pricy. GoDaddy has a system that will allow you to simply hit a button, and it will install the application on the server for you.

You could then even link to people like PayPal for payment, or you can go through the Visa system using someone like WorldPay.

If you don't have web development skills, then you'll need to find someone that can put a site together for you, and they will probably provide a slightly different solution to the one I would. So don't sign up to anything until you've got a good picture of what you need, and what you want help with from a contractor of some kind.

[MiniMac]

Try OScommerce.

Oh, and check the business and Computer forum on Pistonheads, this comes up quite a bit and there are plenty of alternatives suggested. Have a search

[Nicky S]

zen cart is good but dose not look to nice but i think you can buy templates for it. but it depends what you are selling