May 7, 2009
New Store - AccessKeys
AccessKeys
April 1, 2009
Tired of Expensive Ebay fees? Try SwiftStore
We’ve attained some customers who prefer to set up a shop with us rather than trade through e-bay. One of our new customers - dkgmodels put a message on their landing page stating that they were using our software and moving away from e-bay due ebays charges. So a little bit of an investigation was called for to see just how do we compare to eBay on price?
We worked out 2 examples, both based on a business with an eBay shop using the “Buy It Now” function. In both cases we are considerably cheaper than ebay, both for a basic store and a featured store e-bay is over twice as expensive. These figures are taken from http://pages.ebay.ie/help/sell/fees.html and are accurate as of the 01/04/2009.
Example 1
Say a vendor with 20 items, selling 10 in given a month @ an average prive of €40 / item.
|
Ebay Shop |
|
|
Basic monthly charge |
€19.99 |
|
Insertion Fees per item |
€0.50 |
|
Insertion Fees @ 50 cents per item for 20 items |
€10.00 |
|
Commission cost per item, selling 10 items at €40 per item (9.9% commission per item) |
€3.96 |
|
Total Cost for selling 10 items in month |
€69.59 |
|
|
|
|
Revenue from these items |
€400.00 |
|
Costs as a % of turnover. |
17.40% |
|
Swiftstore |
|
|
Basic monthly charge |
€20.00 |
|
No Insertion Fees |
€0.00 |
|
Commission cost per item, selling 10 items at €40 per item (2% commission per item) |
€8.00 |
|
|
|
|
Total Cost for selling 10 items in month |
€28.00 |
|
|
|
|
Revenue from these items |
€400.00 |
|
Costs as a % of turnover. |
7.00% |
Example 2
Say a vendor with 50 items, selling 30 in given a month @ an average price of €40 / item.
|
Ebay Shop |
|
|
Featured Shop Monthly Fees |
€59.99 |
|
Insertion Fees per item |
€0.06 |
|
Insertion Fees @ 6cents per item for 50 items |
€3.00 |
|
Average Selling Cost per item at €40 per item |
€3.96 |
|
Say Sell 30 items |
€118.80 |
|
Total Cost for selling 30 items in month |
€181.79 |
|
|
|
|
Revenue from these items |
€1,200.00 |
|
Costs as a % of turnover. |
15.15% |
|
Swiftstore |
|
|
Intermediate monthly charge |
€40.00 |
|
No Insertion Fees |
€0.00 |
|
Commission cost per item, selling 30 items at €40 per item (1% commission per item) |
€12.00 |
|
|
|
|
Total Cost for selling 30 items in month 1 |
€52.00 |
|
|
|
|
Revenue from these items |
€1200.00 |
|
Costs as a % of turnover. |
4.33% |
All in all there are huge savings to be had from using SwiftStore, on top of which you get your own site with a much greater degree of control of it.
March 9, 2009
Kriega Ireland - New SwiftStore
Another new store setup - www.kriegaireland.com a new store to buy kriega motorcycle equipment.
Kriega Ireland
Check it out!
February 25, 2009
Some downtime…
Just letting users know that we have had some downtime from around 9:20AM to 9:40AM on the 25th of February. This was due to a software upgrade. Hope that no inconvience occurred.
Thanks
The SwiftStore Team
February 18, 2009
New Functionality
We have just release a added some new functionality in SwiftStore.
First off we have added the concept of order value based delivery costing i.e. you assign delivery costs to order amounts. We have also changed order views offering more filtering of lists.
There are changes to some rules around dynamic content. We are locking down the kind of text which can be put into new pages, this is to stop people placing scripting into their sites.
We have also amended the order creation process, previously with PayPal you needed to have IPN enabled to receive the order details. IPN is PayPal’s method of handling real-time purchase confirmation, which offers merchants more security of payment. Not all PayPal users want this functionality so we have relaxed that rule (you can use it if you want). Now shop owners get an email notification of orders as soon as the buyer click submit order.
We are looking to our next release, so if you have an ideas or requests, just mail us.
The SwiftStore Team
January 16, 2009
Starting a Business in a Recession
Currently Ireland, UK, USA all of Europe and a large part of the world is in a recession. Officially Ireland has been in a recession since last September, when the box was ticked to meet the classic definition of two quarters of negative growth. In reality most SME’s know that the teeth of a recession has been biting for a bit longer. We set up our company SmartCube in a recession and have some tips / advice for individuals who are considering setting up a business or are taking the first few steps in a new venture:
1. Cash is King – If you are in a day job and are trying to set your business up in tandem keep the day job for as long as you possibly can. Work in you free time, weekends, lunch break before work on your new venture. It’s imperative to have as much confidence as possible in future income streams from your new venture before committing to it full time.
2. Prepare a business plan - This can often seem like a waste of time especially when you think you have a great idea, however it will give clarity to the concept. By doing this exercise you will be able to plan and visualise how the next 12 months will pan out, you will have to answer uncomfortable questions. It might seem like a chore but its well worth the effort for these reasons also banks and venture capitalists will most likely look for one.
3. Seek Advice Part 1 – Governments around the world as desperate for entrepreneurs to set up companies and succeed, entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of a healthy economy and are the job creators. Here in Ireland there are a number of bodies that will give you advice:
- County and City Enterprise Boards
- Enterprise Ireland
- M50 Enterprise Program
- Industry Specific Groups e.g. Crafts Council of Ireland, Arts Council of Ireland, Retail groups.
4. Research the Market - Probably the most important thing that needs to be done and can be often overlooked in the excitement of getting things going. Essentially you need to have a forensic knowledge of the market that you are going to tackle:
- What’s the size of this market?
- Who are your customers?
- What are their needs?
- What will they pay?
- Who is in the space already?
- Talk to potential customers – would they be willing to trade with you? If not why not?
If you don’t know the answers to these questions – you can be damm sure your competitors will. These questions should be answered in your business plan.
5. Seek Funding - The best thing is to bootstrap and to steer clear of diluting the equity in your company, but there are sources of funding that you can access which AFAIK wont dilute things:
Enterprise Ireland will generally give you a grant of some sort if your product / service has an overseas or the potential of an overseas customer base.
Seed Capital Scheme: This is a revenue driven scheme that enables you to get as seed capital some of the tax that you have paid in a previous life.
Enterprise Boards offer feasibility grants and employment grants.
First Step Micro Finance are specifically set up for entrepreneurs who need a loan to get things going: http://www.first-step.ie/
6. Take a Course - There are a number of courses, either free or for a small cost: http://www.startingabusinessinireland.com/syobboot090214.htm this is run by Brian O’Kane and gets a big thumbs up on askaboutmoney.com: http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?t=170
If you are unsure about what you want to do or want to bounce ideas around some like minded people go along to the Ideas Generation Workshop at the Guinness Enterprise Centre (http://www.guinness-enterprisectr.com/news_upcomingevents.php)
7. Dip your toe into the market - Can you set your business up without leaving your full time job? We specifically made our product so people could dip their toe into the world of online selling at a low cost.
8. Keep the Costs Down - Cash can be gone through very easily, plan for what you need to spend and review it regularly, like anything in life costs can be kept down with a bit of shopping around.
9. Seek Advice Part 2 - Ask friends and family that you know will give not give you the answer that you want to hear. Its important to be able to get feedback that is honest, to the point and is not going to stroke your ego. That said if you are offering a product or service to a niche market many people may not have the knowledge.
10. Network - Get out there and talk to other entrepreneurs. They will often have overcome some the problems you are encountering. You can also get some business contacts and raise your profile.
11. Don’t lose faith! - Nothing comes easy, you need to work hard to be successful.
These are uncertain times, of that there is no doubt, but through planning, forward thinking, being efficient with your time and a thorough analysis of the market you will hopefully help to reduce that uncertainty. Many business have started and flourished in a recession.
January 13, 2009
Some production problems…
As some customers noticed, we had some production problems yesterday evening, running into this morning. This was due to release which introduced a problem.
We had to take the admin site down for an hour to correct the issue.
Sorry to all our customers and thanks for your patience!
January 9, 2009
SwiftStore - New Functionality
As part of our continual upgrade to our application we are releasing an upgrade with two new pieces of functionality:
1) SEO Keyword Tags on Homepage
You can now add words which you want to be picked up by the search engines to describe you site i.e. if you are selling trainers you add “Nike, running shoes, fashion trainers”. This will appear in the title bar of your homepage. The first 50 characters of the tag will get picked up, its best to keep what you put in succinct and to the point, e.g. don’t put in a sentance, put in the keywords that your customers would search under.
This is accessed through the log-in page, go to Site Management - Home Page, enter your keywords in the box “Web Browser Header Text”.
2) Add Images to your Homepage
There is now functionality whereby you can add images to your home page. You can currently add a bit of welcome text, but now you can also add an image. Images are added using the same functionality as they are added for the other customisable pages.
Any problems with any of this let us know.
The SwiftStore Team
Recent SwiftStore Shops
Just like to say welcome some recent SwiftStore shops….
Check them out!
SwiftStore Team
December 23, 2008
Happy christmas from SwiftStore
We would just like to say Happy Christmas to everyone, and we hope that 2009 will be a prosperous and happy one for all!
Thanks for all your support during the year, and check back in Jan for more news.
The SwiftStore Team