Shopping cart software is a piece of

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...

software on a

web server A web server is computer software and underlying Computer hardware, hardware that accepts requests via Hypertext Transfer Protocol, HTTP (the network protocol created to distribute web content) or its secure variant HTTPS. A user agent, co ...

that allows visitors to have an Internet site to select items for eventual purchase.Farris, Paul W.; Neil T. Bendle; Phillip E. Pfeifer; David J. Reibstein (2010). ''Marketing Metrics: The Definitive Guide to Measuring Marketing Performance.'' Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. . The

Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) The Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB), authorized by the Marketing Accountability Foundation (MAF),MASB''Marketing Accountability Foundation (MAF)''. ited 8 December 2010is an independent, private sector, self-governing organizat ...

endorses the definitions, purposes, and constructs of classes of measures that appear in ''Marketing Metrics'' as part of its ongoin
Common Language in Marketing Project
The software allows

online shopping Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of th ...

customers to accumulate a list of items for purchase. At the

point of sale The point of sale (POS) or point of purchase (POP) is the time and place at which a retail transaction is completed. At the point of sale, the merchant calculates the amount owed by the customer, indicates that amount, may prepare an invoice f ...

, the software typically calculates a total for the order, including

freight transport Freight transport, also referred to as freight forwarding, is the physical process of transporting commodities and merchandise goods and cargo. The term shipping originally referred to transport by sea but in American English, it has been exte ...

, postage as well as

packaging and labeling Packaging is the science, art and technology of enclosing or protecting products for distribution, storage, sale, and use. Packaging also refers to the process of designing, evaluating, and producing packages. Packaging can be described as a co ...

. Associated

tax A tax is a mandatory financial charge or levy imposed on an individual or legal entity by a governmental organization to support government spending and public expenditures collectively or to regulate and reduce negative externalities. Tax co ...

es are calculated as applicable. This software also allows for a final review of the shortlisted purchase and the choice for a user to modify the purchase. The data is used in online marketing particularly in the form of abandoned carts.

History

The development of web shop systems took place right after the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...

became a mass medium. This was a result of the launch of the browser

Mosaic A mosaic () is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/Mortar (masonry), mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and ...

in 1993 and

Netscape Netscape Communications Corporation (originally Mosaic Communications Corporation) was an American independent computer services company with headquarters in Mountain View, California, and then Dulles, Virginia. Its Netscape web browser was o ...

in 1994. It created an environment in which web shops were possible. The Internet therefore acted as the key infrastructure development that contributed to the rapid diffusion of the

, a subset of e-business that describes all computer-aided business transactions. In 1998 a total of 11 e-business models were observed, one of which was e-shop business model for a

B2C Direct-to-consumer (DTC or D2C) or business-to-consumer (B2C) is the business model of selling products directly to customers and thereby bypassing any third-party retailers, wholesalers, or middlemen. Direct-to-consumer sales are usually transa ...

(business-to-consumer) business—also called the “online shop” The two terms “online shop” and “electronic” or “e-shop” are used interchangeably. The term “online shopping” was invented much earlier in 1984. Today the term primarily refers to the business-to-consumer transactional business. In order to enable “online shopping” a software system is needed. Since “online shopping”, in the context of the B2C business model, became broadly available to the end consumer, internet-based “online shops” evolved.

Technical definition

These applications typically provide a means of capturing a client's payment information, but in the case of a credit card they rely on the software module of the secure gateway provider, in conjunction with the secure

payment gateway A payment gateway is a merchant service provided by an e-commerce application service provider that authorizes credit card or direct payment processing for e-businesses, online retailers, bricks and clicks, or traditional brick and mortar. The ...

, in order to conduct secure credit card transactions online. Some setup must be done in the

HTML Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It defines the content and structure of web content. It is often assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets ( ...

code of the

website A website (also written as a web site) is any web page whose content is identified by a common domain name and is published on at least one web server. Websites are typically dedicated to a particular topic or purpose, such as news, educatio ...

, and the shopping cart software must be installed on the server which hosts the site, or on the server which accepts sensitive ordering information. E-shopping carts are usually implemented using

HTTP cookie HTTP cookie (also called web cookie, Internet cookie, browser cookie, or simply cookie) is a small block of data (computing), data created by a web server while a user (computing), user is browsing a website and placed on the user's computer o ...

s or

query string A query string is a part of a uniform resource locator ( URL) that assigns values to specified parameters. A query string commonly includes fields added to a base URL by a Web browser or other client application, for example as part of an HTML doc ...

s. In most server based implementations however, data related to the shopping cart is kept in the session object and is accessed and manipulated on the fly, as the user selects different items from the cart. Later in the process of finalizing the transaction, the information is accessed and an order is generated against the selected item thus clearing the shopping cart. Although the most simple shopping carts strictly allow for an item to be added to a basket to start a checkout process (e.g., the free

PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support E-commerce payment system, online money transfers; it serves as an electronic alter ...

shopping cart), most shopping cart software provides additional features that an Internet merchant uses to fully manage an online store. Data (products, categories, discounts, orders, customers, etc.) is normally stored in a

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...

and accessed in real time by the software. Shopping cart software is also known as e-commerce software, e-store software, online store software or storefront software and online shop.

Components

* Storefront: the area of the web store that is accessed by visitors to the online shop. Category, product, and other pages (e.g., search, bestsellers, etc.) are dynamically generated by the software based on the information saved in the store database. The look of the storefront can normally be changed by the store owner so that it merges with the rest of the web site (i.e., with the pages not controlled by the shopping cart software in use on the store). * Administration: the area of the web store that is accessed by the merchant to manage the online shop. The amount of store management features changes depending on the sophistication of the shopping cart software chosen by the merchant, but in general a store manager is able to add and edit products, categories, discounts, shipping and payment settings, etc. Order management features are also included in many shopping cart programs. The administration area can be: ** Web-based (accessed through a

web browser A web browser, often shortened to browser, is an application for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's scr ...

) ** Desktop-based (a desktop application that runs on the user's computer and then transfers changes to the storefront component). * API: most of the major shopping cart software solutions offer an API which allows third-party solution providers to build integrations to the shopping cart software. For example, an accountancy platform like Xero or

QuickBooks QuickBooks is an accounting software package developed and marketed by Intuit. First introduced in 1992, QuickBooks products are geared mainly toward small and medium-sized businesses and offer on-premises accounting applications as well as ...

will build an integration with the shopping cart software so that orders placed on the shopping cart are automatically exported as invoices.

Types

Shopping cart software can be generally categorized into three

types of E-commerce There are many types of e-commerce models, based on market segmentation, that can be used to conducted business online. The 6 types of business models that can be used in e-commerce include: Business-to-Consumer (B2C), Consumer-to-Business (C2B) ...

software: * Open source software: The software is released under an

open source licence Open-source licenses are software licenses that allow content to be used, modified, and shared. They facilitate free and open-source software (FOSS) development. Intellectual property (IP) laws restrict the modification and sharing of creative ...

and is very often free of charge. The merchant has to host the software with a

Web hosting service A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that hosts websites for clients, i.e. it offers the facilities required for them to create and maintain a site and makes it accessible on the World Wide Web. Companies providing web h ...

. It allows users to access and modify the source code of the entire online store. * Licensed software: The software is downloaded and then installed on a

. This is most often associated with a one-time fee, the main advantages of this option are that the merchant owns a license and therefore can host it on any web server that meets the server requirements. * Hosted service: The software is never downloaded, but rather is provided by a hosted service provider and is generally paid for on a monthly or annual basis; also known as the

application service provider An application service provider (ASP) is a business providing application software generally through the. ASPs that specialize in a particular application (such as a medical billing program) may be referred to as providing software as a service. ...

(ASP) software model. Some of these services also charge a percentage of sales in addition to the monthly fee. This model often has predefined templates (often known as themes) that a user can choose from to customize the look and feel of their website. Predefined templates limit how much users can modify or customize depending on what platform the template is used on. Some platforms like Shopify, BigCommerce or ShopWired allow users to edit the individual files that their template is made from, often using a templating language to render dynamic content (such as Shopify's Liquid or Twig). Hosted services offer the advantage of having the vendor continuously keep the software up to date for security patches as well as adding new features.

PCI compliance

The PCI security standards are a blanket of regulations set in place to safeguard payment account data security. The council that develops and monitors these regulations is composed of the leading providers in the payment industry:

American Express American Express Company or Amex is an American bank holding company and multinational financial services corporation that specializes in payment card industry, payment cards. It is headquartered at 200 Vesey Street, also known as American Expr ...

, Discover Financial Services, JCB International, Mastercard, and

Visa Inc Visa Inc. () is an American multinational payment card services corporation headquartered in San Francisco, California. It facilitates electronic funds transfers throughout the world, most commonly through Visa-branded credit cards, debit c ...

. Essentially, they define the best practices for storing, transmitting, and handling of sensitive information over the internet. Visa Inc. can hold shopping cart software providers responsible for liability that may occur as a result of non-compliance to Visa's regulations. For this reason, Visa Inc. may require that online merchants use shopping cart software providers from their list of PCI DSS-validated service providers.

References