How Do I Build a Site?

Hopefully we've convinced you of the importance of having your own site. It's one of those foundational beliefs for us at iThemes. There are a lot of places you can have a site these days—including Facebook, Tumblr, Blogger, Etsy and many more—but you're not in charge. Sometimes those companies disappear. Remember Posterous? Twitter acquired it in 2012 and shut it down in 2013.

You never know what a tech company is going to do— even when they promise not to be evil (remember Google Reader?).

So we always recommend building your own site. You'll need three things: WordPress, an ecommerce plugin and a payment solution.

Why Not Go Simple?
That sounds complex—is there a simpler way to go? Yes, there always is. Building your own site with WordPress and an ecommerce plugin isn't as hard as it sounds, but you can go easier. You could start with PayPal or Gumroad for simple ecommerce.

These can be good solutions for single products. It might be a way to test the waters and see if this is really worth your time.

But these simple solutions require sending people to a third party site. Your customers have to go to PayPal or Gumroad to complete the purchase, and research shows that can decrease your sales. Gumroad has some overlay and embed features, but you need to have SSL set up on your site.

These are fine first steps for ecommerce, but if you're serious you should look into an ecommerce plugin. You can still start basic, but you can also quickly scale up to a fullblown store.

Just as it's important to own your own site, you should own your own ecommerce solution as well.

1. WordPress

   We recommend WordPress (of course) as the foundation for your site. It's got everything going for it—it's free, flexible, powerful, easy and you own it.

   We've got a lot reasons to love WordPress:
   •    Simple: It's so easy your mom can use it. You're learning how to sell, not learning how to code.

   •    Powerful: While it is easy to use, it also packs a punch. By going the simple route you're not sacrificing what you can do. Because WordPress can do a lot.

   •    Flexible: Part of what makes WordPress so good is its flexibility. With the help of plugins it can do all sorts of things, from ecommerce to social networking.

   •    Free & You Own It: When it comes to ownership, WordPress is all about you. It's free and you own it.

   It's that simple. You're not putting your content in someone else's system and paying for it. It's your own site and you're in control. WordPress is open source software, so there's no tech giant ready to buy it out or shut it down.

   •    Do It Yourself: We're big fans of the entrepreneurial spirit, if you haven't already guessed. We think it's important to do it yourself and retain control when you can. WordPress gives you that power.
    

   We wrote a whole blog series about Why WordPress. If you need help digging into WordPress, you can always check out our Getting Started With WordPress ebook.

   But once you have a site you're not done. You need a way to sell your product.

2. WordPress Ecommerce Plugins

   An ecommerce plugin allows you to turn your website into a store. You can add products to your site and give customers a way to browse your goods. The plugin creates a shopping cart and enables the checkout experience (though you'll need a third piece for the checkout process to actually work).

   Ecommerce plugins come in all shapes and sizes, but they all let you own your own store on your own site. It's a simple solution with one login for you, one site for your customers and minimal confusion.

   This is why we created the Exchange ecommerce plugin. We think you should have all the power on your site to create and run a store. You shouldn't have to farm out your store to someone else or send customers off to a different site just to complete a transaction.

   Exchange is even free (you pay for the add ons), so if you're doing a simple store you won't have to spend a dime.

   Of course we created Exchange, so we're a bit biased. But there are loads of other WordPress ecommerce plugins out there and we encourage you to check them out and find the one that works best for you.

   You can find more information about Exchange here and you can find tutorials at iThemes and on the Exchange Codex.

3. Payment Solutions

   The ecommerce plugin builds your store online. But you still need to be able to accept payment. That's where a payment solution comes in.

   You'll need some sort of payment processor, whether it's the standard combo of a payment gateway and a merchant account or the simpler solution of a third party processor such as PayPal or Stripe.

Payment Gateway & Merchant Account
The top-notch professional solution is a payment gateway paired with a merchant account. The payment gateway allows you to accept credit cards by talking to banks and approving transactions. Then the payment gateway sends those approved transactions to the merchant account for collection. Your merchant accounts goes to the various banks to collect your cash, depositing it in an account you can later transfer to your own bank account.

Third Party Processor
A simpler approach is to use a third party processor such as PayPal or Stripe. These solutions combine the payment gateway and merchant account into one solution. It's a simpler approach, but that comes at the cost of fewer features, less control and more cost. But it's a lot easier to set up.

However you go, the payment solution is what allows you to accept credit cards and ensure you get paid. There are a lot of options and it can get pretty complicated. For simplicity's sake, if you're doing less than $3,000 in sales per month, you can do good with a third party processor.

Once you start making more than that you'll want to go with a full blown payment processor and merchant account, which are more complicated to setup but will get you better rates.

Ecommerce Options
Those are the main components you'll need to do ecommerce: WordPress, a plugin and a payment solution. You can keep it simple or make it as complex as you want. Here are a few extra options you might want that can add something more to your store. These are features you should look for in your ecommerce plugin and make sure your payment solution can handle them (for example, not all solutions can handle recurring payments):

• Download Management: Deliver digital files to your customers without making them freely available to anyone.
• Customer Pricing: Letting customers name their own price is a must-have for nonprofit donations.
• Guest Purchases: Let customers make purchases without creating an account.
• Discounts: Discounts, coupons and sales the way you want.
• Membership: Set up your own membership site (we've got a whole ebook that talks about membership).
• Recurring Payments: Steady income can give you stability over the long haul. This is an important feature for services and subscriptions.
• Physical Goods & Shipping: We launched Exchange to sell digital goods only and rolled out shipping options for physical products later. Some ecommerce plugins only do digital, which might be just what you need. But if you have physical stuff to sell, make sure your plugin handles it. You might want simple shipping or more complex options.

​If you're ready to learn more about how to set up ecommerce, how to make the most of shipping and how to boost your sales, check out our ebook WordPress & Ecommerce: A Simple Guide for Selling Products Online.