FARAH Ilyana Khairudin, 24, has been selling women’s clothing and handbags at her boutique, Cala Qisya, since April this year. It’s no ordinary boutique but an online outlet that she operates with her sisters Farah Mislina, 21, and Farah Azrina, 18.
“Online technology offers small-time business operators like us the opportunity to bring forward our creations to the world at minimal cost,” says Farah Ilyana.
The pretty woman says customers now have another avenue to purchase online products via mobile devices like iPhone, iPad and Androids.
“This is made possible via a transaction service provided by online purchasing platform PayPal,” she says. “The use of mobile devices to do transactions makes it easier for small businesses to offer more payment options to customers.”
According to Farah Ilyana, all that is needed in the cashless payment modes like PayPal is 3G service.
“It’s inexpensive. We don’t need to buy credit card swipe machines and wiring facilities,” she says at the recent Malaysia’s Online Fashion Entrepreneurs’ Weekend 2011 in Mid Valley Megamall.
At her stall, Farah Ilyana demonstrated how the transaction via the smartphone can be done.
“What the buyers need to do is download the QR code reader from Apple Apps Store or Android Market to their devices,” she says.
Customers have to open an account with PayPal (www.paypal.com/my), which is free, but they need to top up some money to the account via online banking or credit card.
“Once they have everything in place, they just need to scan our QR code, and make their purchase,” says Farah Ilyana.
Meanwhile, PayPal Southeast Asia and India’s head of consumer marketing and strategic merchant alliances, Ju Lee Tan, says mobile payment services like PayPal offer an alternative to both shoppers and businesses.
“Today, shoppers can even leave their wallets at home and use their phones to do any transaction. As for the businesses, they can offer more purchasing options to customers,” she says.
To date, about 1,000 merchants have signed up to offer the PayPal mobile payment service to customers.
-Google help to set up your online store
IF you have a business and do not have a Web presence yet, it’s time to do so. With the Get Malaysian Business Online (GMBO) initiative (www.getMYbusinessonline.com.my) by Google, you will be able to set up an online store front in just 30 minutes, for free.
For this effort, Google is partnering Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), .My Domain Registry and ITrain to provide an end-to-end service to small businesses.
“It’s really simple to set up. Businesses can do it themselves or go for a subsidised training provided
by ITrain,” said Google Malaysia Sdn Bhd’s country business head, Sajith Sivanandan, at the launch of the initiative in Kuala Lumpur recently.
by ITrain,” said Google Malaysia Sdn Bhd’s country business head, Sajith Sivanandan, at the launch of the initiative in Kuala Lumpur recently.
He added that businesses can list their products and services, accept orders and get notifications of queries and orders,as well as maintain the store’s items and inventory.
Sajith said the first 10,000 small businesses to sign up for this initiative will get everything for free for the first year, including the Website and free domain hosting.
Those who need training can go for a two-hour face-to-face session provided by ITrain Sdn Bhd. The first 1,000 who sign up for the training will get it for free, while the rest have to pay RM50.
To make it more affordable for the small businesses, .My Domain Registry has decided to charge an annual fee of RM23 after the first year instead of the regular RM80 fee for those who sign up under this initiative.
Google aims to get 50,000 small businesses to sign up in the next 12 months.
(Izwan Ismail, New Straits Times)
