Online Ordering

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For many businesses they will not be able to afford a full blown e-commerce website. This cost is not just the actual cost of setup, monthly and transaction fees. But it will also include development and customisation of there current ordering and billing systems and more than likely storage of items on hand.

There are a number of ways that small business can still take orders online and provide some level of security and comfort to their customers. Below I've listed some ordering mechanisms and linked them to actual examples for you to review.

Examples

Scenarios

There are a number of different scenarios that can be instituted to enable quick and easy ordering.

Use of a sercure server page, to send their credit card details, this can attract a small fee from your virtual host, but it is usually quite reasonable and is as secure as most credit card transactions.
They can post, fax or phone in their credit card details and they can be either faxed or emailed or phoned back a member number. Then on any orders they place, they quote their member number. Before filling any orders, an auto responder sends back a copy of the order to the members nominated email address to confirm the order.
Provide details of your bank account including a deposit slip, they print off a copy of the slip, deposit the money in your bank, then your verify payment and send the order.

There are a number of ways that your business can actually obtain the information you need to place an order long before the order is every placed. Classic methods are; a special email newsletter which your customers can subscribe to, or a specials page which once again they subscribe to.