The basic needs for eCommerce

There are essentially four ingredients necessary to sell products or services directly on the Internet:

• SECURE WEB SERVER RUNNING SSL ENCRYPTION
  Consumers will not enter private information such as credit card numbers into an order form on a web page that is not secure. In addition, banking institutions have rules against allowing credit card information to be entered into a non-secure site. Our Ashton ITC eCommerce Virtual Servers come pre-equipped with SSL encryption and MivaMerchant eCommerce software. We can also add SSL encryption to your existing Ashton ITC Basic, Corporate or Enterprise Virtual Server.
• SERVER DIGITAL ID CERTIFICATE
  Not only must a site use SSL encryption to keep transactions secure, but consumers need to know that you are who you say you are. A digital certificate from a trusted 3rd party agency like VeriSign not only ensures that you are a legitimate organization, but prevents someone else from "spoofing" your site. Ashton ITC is a registered ISP agent for VeriSign and you can learn more about these Server IDs and apply for a certificate on-line at this site. We also take care of the technical details of installing and maintaining the certificate for you.
• MERCHANT SOFTWARE (catalog, shopping cart, custom)
  Customers need to see your product offerings, add them to an order (place in a shopping cart) and purchase them. It has become increasingly important that this process go fast, smoothly and completely on-line. Ashton ITC provides ready to go eCommerce servers with Miva Merchant software and SSL encryption pre-installed. You can maintain your own "store" very easily through a standard Web Browser interface that allows you to easily add, change or delete products, pricing, shipping methods, specials, etc. We also write custom eCommerce applications for those organizations who need a different type of transaction model.
• INTERNET CREDIT CARD MERCHANT ACCOUNT
  To conduct eCommerce you need a way to transfer funds from the buyer to you. Depending on volume, you can either manually process the credit card numbers on a daily basis by downloading orders through a secure connection to your Ashton ITC virtual server, or have the transfer of funds take place in real-time when the order is placed from your Website. Most traditional credit card merchant accounts do not permit Internet transactions of any kind or charge a very high "discount rate" when used this way. A number of banking organizations have specialized in this area however and have made it relatively easy and affordable for a merchant to transact business on the Internet. We have made it easy for you to apply for a merchant account through the Ashton ITC website.