TulipTools Internet Business Owners and Online Sellers Community

Quote:Your decision will ultimately depend on the size and scale of your operation. Since you've already run up against limitations with your current vendor, you'll want to make sure that you take into consideration your anticipated growth of sales and find new vendors that can support you as your business grows. "Many companies offer starter e-commerce solutions that work very well while an e-commerce venture is getting off the ground, but become frustrating once a business grows to the point where they want to start having features that are outside of the box in terms of what that starter package supports," says Chris Kivlehan, vice-president of sales and marketing for INetU Managed Hosting.

It's important to remember that Web site hosting and e-commerce are two separate things. A hosting company is something like a landlord that leases you space for a traditional store, says Janet Attard, a small-business consultant with BusinessKnowHow.com. "The difference is that the space you are leased is the disk space needed on a Web server to hold all the computer pages needed for your Web site and e-commerce functions...