Creating a Magento powered online shop does not have to cost you a fortune, with the use of some creativity, DIY attitude and reasonably priced service providers.

Typically a creative agency will quote you from $20.000 and up for a Magento based web-store, this can be a bit of a hurdle when starting up a new business so in this article we will show you how you can start a brand new Magento based online shop on a low budget.

Domain, web site address:

If you have not gotten a domain name yet, you will need to purchase one.

Choose your brand name as the domain or alternatively a name that is descriptive of your business.

If you want to sell internationally then purchase a .com domain.

If you are mainly focused on a specific country marked then you are usually better of registering a local domain name. For instance lets say your marked is Australia, then get a com.au domain name and if Spain then .es and so on.

For future proofing i would suggest to get both the local and international version of the chosen domain name.

The yearly price of a local domain will vary some, International .com domains can be purchased at for instance Namecheap Domains for $10.69.

Business Email:
To get emails using your brand new domain name you will need an email hosting plan.

Google Apps for Work offers plans starting at $50,00 a year while for instance Namecheap business email plans start at $28.88 a year.

Hosting:
Magento requires quality hosting to run smooth and fast, preferably a powerful VPS or a dedicated server.

If you are in a budget then specialized Magento optimized hosting is a good choice, Nexcess Magento optimized hosting plans start at $19.95 a month.

If you are on a very low starter budget, SiteGround Magento hosting plans starts at $3.95 a month. This also includes e-mail hosting.

SSL Certificate:

To ensure security and gain customer confidence in entering their personal information at your website you need a ssl certificate with your hosting.

There are many types of SSL certificates with different level of site and business verification, from domain name only verification and up to business and physical location verification.

When starting up a new web-shop a standard domain verification SSl certificate is usually sufficient and as opposed to the ones with stricter validation they are also issued immediately. For instance Nexcess SSL Certificates starts at $29.95

Web-Shop Design:

Your new website represent the face of your company and its should give a good first impression with a professional look.

A professional web logo design design can be had for as low as $98 and professional web designers can be hired for as low as $50 an hour.

A great budget tool and a shortcut to a great design can be a pre-made template, which can be purchased from as low as $84 and you can then customize it further to suit your needs. You can find a wide selection of professional looking templates at Themeforest Magento templates.

Accepting Payment:

Magento comes with built in support for several payment options include Bank transfer and PayPal.

PayPal lets you accept Credit card payments without any start up cost, so is a great starter solution which does not require PCI.

Once you are up and running and making money and want to have a smoother checkout with credit card information entered at your site you can focus on PCI certification and switch to one of PayPal’s paid plans or another payment gateway provider of your choice.

You can contact your business bank and inquire about a merchant account and supported payment gateways. Most countries have their own local payment gateway alternatives that offer full support for local variations and payment options.

Extended functionality, SEO and Speed optimization

To extend your new shops functionality, add payment options, shipping options and more you have a large selection of both free and commercial Magento extensions available at Magento Connect.

Some useful free extensions:

Speedster Advanced – Combines, compresses and caches JS and CSS files.

Lesti_Fpc – Full page cache

One Page Checkout – One Page Checkout

CreareSEO – SEO Tools Manager

More free Magento Extentions >>

Conclusion:

Example of potential startup cost with a DIY attitude and using PayPal for your payment solution.

Magento CE $0
Template $84
Logo Design $98
Domain name $11 (1 year)
Email $30 (1 year)
Hosting $240 (1 year)
SSL Certificate $30 (1 year)
__________________________________
Total: $493

If you want less DIY and more professional help then hiring a professional eCommerce developer can be had as low as $50 an hour.

There are no standard on time needed each individual business usually have different needs and priorities, but as a base line lets say your project needed 20 hours of professional help, that would make the total into $1.493.

In conclusion getting a professional looking online shop online using Magento can be done without breaking the bank.

Resources:
– Magento Commerce
– The Best Magento SEO Optimization Extensions
– The Best Magento JS and CSS Optimization Extensions
– The Best Magento Full Page Cache Extensions
– Magento Speed Optimization