I would agree with most elements of the last post except the part about going for a "hosted solution". How does a hosted solution offer any advantage over a solution that is not hosted?

To be honest there are a number of rants in communities about "hosted solutions" Basically you put all your eggs in the "hosters" basket and leave your entire business to potential disaster should the hoster "go out of business", "be purchased by a competitor", "discontinue support for the solution as they migrate to new technology" there are a number of reasons why a small business should not go with a hosted solution. Its not a feature its a potential disaster.

Hosted solutions do not cost less to operate then other non hosted solutions and consider that when it comes to cost a merchant is at the mercy of the hoster for many items. An example would be Merchant accounts which many hosted solutions insist that you get a merchant account through the hosted solution provider at a rate which is much higher then the normal. I personally have seen hosted solutions chargeing 2.5% higher then what a merchant could have received had they shopped for their merchant account. In many cases that is a tax on profit which can amount to many thousands of dollars in a year. Also Many hosted solutions charge by transactions, charge by number of products, charge by month and charge by volume of orders.

So be aware that there are many great solutions available to a merchant. Some work with accounting software, some with shipping providers and others with merchant account providers. IF your going to be a successful merchant you have to think through all aspests of a tranaction including the costs for a transaction and then choose a solution which matches your business needs.

Beware of hosted solutions that dump their license fee costs to cut a deal. They only cust their license fees because they know they can recover that cost and make more off a customer from other hidden fees.

I hope that helps.

Brian