Part IV: Making Money in Java

Encoder Code 39 Extended in Java Part IV: Making Money

There are various opinions on how to pronounce chmod Most folks say chuh-mod, but others say shmod or see-aich-mod

FAQ is Internet-ese for Frequently Asked Questions Just like it sounds, this is a list of the questions that most users ask most often Including one can save you lots of time when it comes to providing tech support to your visitors That s why you usually see a link at the top of any support page asking users to view the FAQ before contacting the site s support team You can try to invent a FAQ before you ever go live with your Web site, but you re probably going to have to wait a while until users actually do ask enough questions before the content of your FAQ actually justifies the name If you do decide to go with the first option, the best technique is to ask friends and members of your family to surf your nascent site and write down anything that they find problematic You can then take all their comments and work up a set of responses to create your preliminary FAQ so that you don t have to go live with nothing

Table 14-3 lists some places on the World Wide Web where you can find more information about the topics covered in this chapter

Table 14-3

Web Address wwwfreightworldcom/exp_ geohtml wwwciocom/archive/111503/ playhtml wwwcoprescocom/pkgtrackhtm wwwteletransportit/newweb/ eng/pagine/servizi-shipasp wwwtrack-tracecom

How to Redesign Your Website to Play to Your Audience, from CIO Magazine Package Tracking Links, from Copresco TeleTransport Shipping Tracking track-trace

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Using PayPal and Google Checkout Becoming a credit card merchant Avoiding pitfalls Converting currencies

f you re operating a regular store, taking in money from customers is a pretty easy matter Cash, checks, credit cards, debit cards you name it, and some well-established process is in place to handle it From night-deposit drops to armored car pickups, the bricks-and-mortar merchant is already well covered when it comes to getting paid You won t find any cash registers online, though, so you need to look at other options The major approach is to take credit cards You can, however, arrange to be paid in other ways, such as accepting checks by phone or using digital money So far, however, none of the other ways can really compete with the power of plastic

Credit cards are king If you do nothing but take MasterCard and VISA, you re pretty thoroughly covered Nearly everyone who can afford a computer has one or both of them Toss in American Express for the high-end customer and the business client, and you re all set But some alternatives are out there, and you may want to add some or all of them to your setup

When it comes to online payments, one very impressive option is PayPal, now part of the eBay empire PayPal takes a slightly different approach to online payments, and it s worth a good look With PayPal, you can accept credit card payments without having a merchant account, and your customers can pay you directly from their bank accounts What do you have to do Not much Just sign up for an account at www paypalcom (See Figure 15-1) What does it cost Nothing, unless you actually make some sales In that case, you pay $030 per transaction and anywhere from 19 to 29 percent of the selling price on top of that Rates can be higher for international sales PayPal offers a complete payment system for you to use at no extra cost You can integrate its free Web tools into your site s pages easily Throw in a thorough payment-reporting system which PayPal does and you couldn t ask for a better setup for a startup business or even an established one