Q. How does one generate income and make a profit with an eShowcase shopping mall?
A. Most eShowcase shopping mall owners charge $795-$1,295 per year for each store they create. With just 50 stores, a mall could generate a renewable cash-flow of $50,000 per year.
Since most eShowcase malls are one person operations, the only out of pocket expense is the monthly web site rental - usually $50 a month ($600 year).
So a mall with 50 stores, charging $995 per year per store, could have pre tax profits of almost $49,000. If the mall had 100 stores, the profit could be closer to $100,000 per year (renewal each year).
Q. What about the mall concept - is that what businesses want?
A. Most customers really don't care about the mall concept. What they really want is to get their business on the internet quickly and to be able to receive orders and email inquiries from customers.
They don't want to be (or have to hire) a computer expert to keep their internet business going, or to add products, change prices, or update their site. They want their site to be professional looking and pain-free to use and change.
With eShowcase, that's exactly what you are offering. You can create a new business storefront in less than a minute, and the store owner can instantly be in control of their web site without the need for a programmer. All changes to the web site are done through a simple 'admin menu', and no programming is required.
Most store owners don't know and don't care that they are in your mall - they have their own site address, and that's what they use in their ads, business cards, and letter heads.
Q. How do I find customers for my stores?
A. Almost every small business wants or needs an internet site. But many have been turned off by the amount of time, money, and work required to get a site on-line.
With eShowcase, you eliminate all the reasons businesses are reluctant to get a web site, and give them positive reason to have one - easy to use, instant order forms, no pain.
We've found that the easiest way to sell store fronts is to do live demos for potential customers. Either go to their business and show them what their site can look like, or set up a booth at a local trade show and do live demos of your ecommerce sites (some eShowcase mall owners report selling 20 or more sites per day at trade shows!)
Q. What types of businesses will want stores in my mall?
A. Typically real estate businesses are the easiest to sell. They love the idea of being able to put their listings up on the net instantly. Also RV dealers, boat dealers, antique stores, auto dealers, music shops, pet stores, furniture stores - in fact most retail businesses.
We've also seen a number of dentists and pharmacists purchase eShowcase stores in different malls.
Q. What's the best way to get started finding clients for my mall?
A. The quickest way to attract clients wanting internet stores is to give a few stores away to local businesses and organizations.
Start by arranging to provide a store for the local animal shelter or other worthy charity - and once the store is up with photos of all the adoptable animals, let the local newspaper know (get free publicity this way).
Then give away a store front to a small local real estate company - with one catch. Require them to use the address of their store in all their ads. (This will get the attention of the larger realtors who will then seek you out.)
Be sure to exhibit at local business trade shows, where you can do live demos, and actually create stores for customers (some eShowcase mall owners report selling as many as 20 stores a day at trade shows.)
Q. How Difficult is it to install eShowcase Pro?
A.Installation is quite simple. But you don't have to do the install as we offer to install eShowcase for you and test it fully - at no extra charge. This way we make sure that your shopping village is fully functional from day one.
Q. Once installed, how difficult is it to create stores for new customers in my mall or shopping village? A. Creating new mall stores for customers is a 'no-brainer'. It is a simple point and click operation, usually taking less than 30 seconds. (To see how easy it can be to create a storefront, click here to see admin menu. Feel free to add a store.)
Once you have create the new store, eShowcase automatically emails the client instructions on where to find his store, and details on how to use it.
Q. How many stores can I create with in my shopping mall with eShowcase Pro?
A.The only real limit to the number of stores you can create, is the amount of disk space you have available from your web host. Some of our clients are reporting having more than 100 stores in less than 30 meg of space with room to spare.
eShowcase allows you to preset how much space each store can use, and to automatically notify the store owners when they get close to exceeding their limit.
Q. How much does web space cost and who do you recommend to host web malls?
A. There are many companies offering a wide range of web hosting services. From most of these, you can you can get 50 meg of internet web space for under $50 a month.
We strongly recommend you avoid bargain web hosts, and go with only the best. The quality of the web host you choose will affect every store in your shopping mall, and can make a great deal of difference in customes satisfaction. For best results, you want a web host that has a proven history of having fast, reliable service connected directly to the backbone of the internet - with several level of backup. That's why we strongly recommend Hiway Net's Plan II (it's what we use for our own web malls.)
Q. Does eShowcase come with a manual?
A. Yes. eShowcase Pro comes with a fully illustated user's guide which covers all the features and options in eShowcase. The user's guide is provided both in print and Online.
Q.What about product support?
A. Our experience has been that once installed, most customers have no need for further support. Everything is pretty much self explanatory.
Still, we offer phone support at 501-559-2688, and internet support at http://www.eshowcase.com/support.html.
Q. What are the computer requirements to run eShowcase Pro?
A. eShowcase Pro runs on the internet, not on your local computer. This means that any computer that has internet access, can run eShowcase. This includes MACs, PCs, even WebTV!
Q.How is the product supplied (disk, CD?)
A. Your eShowcase Pro package includes the software on an PC format disk. However, in most cases, you'll never need to use this as we are happy to install the software on your website for you - thus insuring your get you off on a good start.
Q. What about Product Upgrades?
A. When you purchase eShowcase, you get all upgrades free for a period of one year. When you place these upgrades on your site, they automatically update the folders of all your clients. No additional work on your part.
Q. When I order, what happens next?
A. When you order eShowcase Pro, we will install it on your web site for you, fully test out each feature, create a test store, add a photo product listing, test out the order form and email forwarding, and make sure everything works as it should.
Then we'll add the on-line user's guide to your web site, test it, and send you full details.
At the same time, we'll prepare the print copies of your user's guides, and ship them along with your backup install disk to you via priority mail.
Then we'll send you an email and let you know that everything's set for you to start creating malls in your store!
If you have any questions, or run into any problems, we'll be there ready to help.
Q. What if I have more questions?
A. You can either use our Automated Contact Form or call us at 501-559-2688.
Q. How do I order?
A. You can either use our Secure Order Form or call us at 501-559-2688.
Frequently Asked Questions