A bit of advice needed please.

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A bit of advice needed please.

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Bodger

Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 13524

Posted: Wed Jan 17, 07 10:54 am Post subject: A bit of advice needed please.

This is the family business web site www.backsnnecks.com

The other half and our secretary run the website and I have nothing to do with it.

Like a lot of people on here, I have an interest in books. I have it in mind to start what would be a hobby sized business dealing in second hand books.

What I need is a nice simple web site that even I can use. I don't want anything too complicated , just something I can show a list with my prices on.

We have E commerce on the back site , would I need this on my new site or would this Pay Pal thing be better.
Ideally I'd like to stay away from the scary technical stuff and just have people speak to me over the phone.
I have a swipey machine in the shop for transactions but realise that this isn't the normal way of carrying out transactions today.

How much should a website cost me ? Any help and advice would be much appreciated by this technodullard.

Behemoth

Joined: 01 Dec 2004
Posts: 19023
Location: Leeds

Posted: Wed Jan 17, 07 11:06 am Post subject:
Abe Books may fill your need: https://www.abebooks.co.uk/docs/Sell/

hedgewitch

Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Posts: 5834
Location: Daft wench GHQ

Posted: Wed Jan 17, 07 12:35 pm Post subject:

Very much as a smallscale hobby of selling books, I've been selling through AmazonUK.

As a way of dipping a toe in the water for bookselling, I've found they offer a good service. I think they take a bigger cut than Ebay, but they also do all the payment stuff for you, so no hassle if someone doesn't pay etc. That said, you've probably got experience in that area where as I have none, so may not be so useful for you. It also got me in the habit of thinking of postage costs - again something you may already be familiar with.

If you don't sell a book, there is no fee to pay to Amazon. It gave me a good feel for what sells and what doesn't without costing me anything. I'm not sure it would be as good as ABE or your own website if you planned to grow and take it seriously, but it's good for a bit of market research.

sally_in_wales
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 06 Mar 2005
Posts: 20809
Location: sunny wales

Posted: Wed Jan 17, 07 12:41 pm Post subject:

If you'd prefer they speak to you on the phone, what about a site like this
https://www.librarything.com/

you can get a cheapy little barcoad scanner
https://www.librarything.com/cuecat.php
so all you have to do is scan the barcode and it finds all the bibliographic data off the web so you don't have to type it all in. Might make it easier to load up joblots of books and categorize them for best saleability

(have to say I fancy one of the scanners just to do all my own books

)

hedgewitch

Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Posts: 5834
Location: Daft wench GHQ

Posted: Wed Jan 17, 07 1:02 pm Post subject:

sally_in_wales wrote:

(have to say I fancy one of the scanners just to do all my own books

)

Yep - great idea

Just to plug Amazon again, but if you just enter any detail (just author or title, but ISBN is most accurate) you get the full bibliographic record up so very little data entry here too.

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