Your Money

Choose How to Get Paid
By November 6, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Choose How to Get Paid

After you’ve decided on a shopping cart, you’ll need to choose a payment gateway (sometimes called a payment provider) that securely authorizes and charges customers’ payment cards, temporarily holds the funds in a merchant account that’s part of the service, and sends you the payments less transaction fees. Examples of payment gateways include PayPal, Authorize.net, Chase Paymentech, and Sage […]

PayPal Secrets
By October 28, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

PayPal Secrets

If you search online for the phrase “PayPal sucks” you’ll find discussion board comments and even entire websites with bad things to say about PayPal. Many of the complaints seem to suggest that PayPal freezes funds and even shuts down the accounts of honest merchants for completely unfair and arbitrary reasons. Reading between the lines, I […]

QuickBooks Hell
By May 19, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

QuickBooks Hell

As your business grows – and especially once you start to work with outside suppliers – you’ll likely need an accounting software package. For most businesses QuickBooks is the unavoidable choice. If you want to get help from an accountant or eventually hire a bookkeeper QuickBooks is practically mandatory. QuickBooks has the potential to make […]

The Inventory Trap
By June 6, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

The Inventory Trap

One of the most bewildering aspects to managing a business that stocks and sells physical goods (as opposed to selling only electronic downloads, or items drop-shipped directly from manufacturers to customers) is understanding the huge importance of inventory that you keep on hand to sell. It’s entirely possible that at some point your accounting software will tell […]

Keep Your Money Safe
By June 15, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Keep Your Money Safe

Today there seem to be almost limitless ways for criminals to steal money from an online business. Your bank accounts, online merchant account, credit card accounts, website, and the computers you use for work will be under constant attack. You’re never 100% safe, but I can suggest some basic guidelines that should greatly reduce the […]

Manage Your Money
By June 24, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Manage Your Money

After the first full year of running a moonlight business, I found that we’d earned a nice profit. The money wasn’t yet as much as I earned from my day job, but it represented more spare funds than our family had seen in a long time. Unfortunately, anyone who knows US tax law* will tell […]

Control Your Inventory
By May 28, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Control Your Inventory

As discussed in our story about the inventory trap, if you sell physical products (as opposed to electronic downloads or items drop shipped directly from outside manufacturers to your customers) your ability to manage your inventory could be critical to the survival of your business. Minimizing excess inventory is essential to ensure you’ll have enough […]

Register with Your Government
By December 30, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Register with Your Government

After you’ve registered your company name online, registering your new business with the government can seem almost stress-free. I found our county offices to be surprisingly helpful – and no wonder, since over the years we’ve sent them a lot of sales taxes collected from customers in our state. A first step is to visit […]

Set Up Your Bank Accounts
By December 21, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Set Up Your Bank Accounts

Your choice of where to set up the bank and payment card accounts for your new business could have a big impact on daily convenience. You should choose carefully, since it could become difficult to move accounts as your business grows. It’s often easiest to create separate, linked business accounts at your current bank. But […]

Get the Right Shopping Cart
By November 15, 2013 0 Comments Read More →

Get the Right Shopping Cart

Your shopping cart is software that allows visitors to select the items they want to purchase, calculates shipping and tax, and communicates the costs to your payment gateway so that customers are charged the correct fees. The shopping cart also provides reports to help you manage your inventory, keep your financial books, and perform other important tasks. […]

Posted in: Your Money, Your Website