Internet Strategies to Improve Farm Business Management

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Making Sales on Your Own Website

Once you have provided enough information to allow the buyer to decide which items they wish to purchase, you must now facilitate the transaction. A virtual "shopping cart" is a popular and user-friendly approach to selling. The shopping cart is simply a database that indicates which products the buyer wishes to purchase and how many of each are being ordered. For example, your shopping cart may show that the consumer wishes to purchase two twelve-ounce jars of blackberry jam and one sixteen-ounce jar of strawberry preserves. At any time, the buyer should be able to view the shopping cart and modify the quantity of all products purchased, deleting those no longer wanted. Electronic shopping carts will usually provide a running total price for the items in the cart, although the price may not include shipping charges, which are later calculated based upon the shipping destination. Your shopping cart will also accept sales taxes if needed. Be sure to ask your accountant about relevant laws for selling on the Internet.

Making Credit Card Sales on the Internet

If you've never made sales by credit card, you probably have no idea where to begin. The following is based on available researched information.

Accepting credit card payments on the Internet requires you to have an Internet merchant bank account. These should be easy to get, since most banks now offer this service. However, you should keep the following in mind.
- Your account could take up to a month to become active.
- If you have an existing merchant account, you will probably need to upgrade that to an Internet merchant bank account.
- Your bank's credit card processors should be able to connect to FDC, Paymentech, or Verisign. These are Internet payment companies.
- The bank's account must be able to handle "Card Not Present" transactions.
Obtaining a digital certificate enables Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption on the web server. This is a mandatory security measure.
The company that hosts your website, including your on-line store, should meet the following criteria.
- Little downtime
- Quality technical support
- Fast connection to the Internet
- Staff that knows e-commerce
- Compatible with major e-commerce providers
Select an on-line transactions provider based on the
- expected number of transactions,
- number of products available,
- product complexity,
- complexity of purchase process, and
- other issues.

Brad Hollabaugh also discusses his use of 3rd party vendors and the benefits and drawbacks you may encounter.

Of course, you can perform the transaction by other means. Email, phone, FAX, and snail mail will serve the same purpose. If you choose not to adopt a shopping cart technology, remember that the more you ask the buyer to do to make a purchase, the less likely they are to buy from you. You should make it as easy, or convenient, as possible to make the transaction.

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These materials were developed as part of the Southern Rural Development Center’s National e-Commerce Extension Initiative. They are based upon work supported by the Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under Award No. 2005-45064-03212

Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture or the Southern Rural Development Center.