www.Naeem.co.za

This is an interesting issue.  Over the years I have asked various scholars and received fairly mediocre answers.  Personally with the Autostyle online store, it was started with the correct intentions.  Sure one of it was to improve turnover but also to provide a service to our customers with:
1) online catalogue,
2) easier & quicker way to order,
3) safe online enviroment to purchase,
4) door to door delivery,
5) servicing customers who cant drive to our store.
However, in Islam one cannot sell a commodity without owning it.  For you to sell a tyre, you must own the tyre and then sell it to whoever. I suppose using this logic the world economy would be in a better place right now. (more…)

Online fraud. Cornerstone of any successful ecommerce store. Autostyle is no exception. Every week we cancel a bunch of orders which slip through the banks, slip through the online gateways and end up ‘approved’ in our mail boxes.

We do have measures in place to prevent this and having less then 5 charge backs over 3 years is a pretty good average I think.

The scammer below sent us a copy of his credit card and Identity Document as part of our verification process.

I’m offended, at least have the decency and professionalism to send proper ‘fake’ documents instead of this newbie induced photoshop vomit.

Seriously – this is the original image he sent.

Voting is now open in the 2008 Jump Shopping E Commerce Awards

2008 marks the 3rd year of this prestigious awards showcasing the best in the South African E Commerce industry.

Autostyle Motorsport has been fortunate to be voted winners of the 2006 & 2007 awards.  We need your votes to win the 2008 award and make it three years in a row!

Since being at the helm of Autostyle Online in 2001,  I have successfully grown and pushed Autostyle’s online presence & off-line presence higher and higher.  From a crude .gif animated website receiving 100 visitors a day to a powerhouse php database driven ecommerce store receiving over 130 000 visitors & 1.85 million page impressions a month.

As it stands today, we are the 50th busiest website in South Africa (according to Websites Association of South Africa )

I would also like to ask your vote & support for iGroup, the development company we use for our web hosting, programming & behind the scenes work at Autostyle Online.  I can safely vouch for iGroup’s honesty & dedication in any project they take on.   I have personally known their founder & MD, Marc Seymor for nearly 9 years.  Year after year, they have grown & we have grown.  Proof that hard work, dedication, honesty & strong business acumen is a true recipe for any business & startup.

Vote for Autostyle Motorsport for Best Automotive Website 2008  and
vote for iGroup for Best Ecommerce Enabler 2008

It’s that time of year again, the annual Jump Shopping Ecommerce Awards.  Started in 2006, I am proud to say that Autostyle.co.za won the 2006 & 2007 awards for Best Automotive website.

2006 we won purely being the only real online retailer for car accessories and I’d like to think that the revamp on the look & feel was cause for the 2007 award.

Nominations are now open and close at the end of September, after that the voting begins and during the end of October the winners will be announced.
Click here to Nominate: http://www.jump.co.za/awards/2008/

2008 is a whole new level. The last 12 months saw very little change to the overall look at feel of the Autostyle.co.za website. The bulk of my time was spent in streamlining our backend area, product updates, staff permissions, etc etc.   In fact the only noticeable change on our website was our Blog & Photogallery – both of which are add-ons to the actual website. Additionally several new projects are planned to compliment our online store.

All of these are leading to an eventual design overhaul. Yes I am full aware of our crammed design – hopefully toward the end of 2008 a newer, wider & more user interactive design will be up.

Just about every  retailer I have spoken to in recent months has complained about slow business, lower turnovers, rising costs & an overall negative approach.

Granted our rand/dollar battles, petrol price hikes, the eskom debacle & the national credit act passed last year have all combined to make 2008 a rather difficult year for retailers.

But has it really?

Our brick’n Mortar stores have felt the brunt of this decline and yes, business is not booming how we would want it to. As with all businesses and life itself, you have your ups and downs.
“One day you eat chicken & one day you eat feathers” as my brother regularly says….We will ride this out.

However, Online shopping has shown tremendous growth. Our online store, autostyle.co.za has consistently gotten bigger & busier, both in visitor statistics and conversions. It baffled me for a while as to why my online store continues to grow yet our brick’n mortar stores are going through a bit of stagnant period.

Two reasons spring to my mind:

1) Petrol prices have really taken its toll, in our niche market it is common to meet customers who have trekked all the way from Witbank, Nigel, Bethlehem, etc to our JHB Store. Perhaps they now realize it really is cheaper to rather pay the courier cost and have items delivered to your doorstep instead?

2) During the economic boom, every Tom, Dick & Harry opened up a store selling products like ours. Many survived purely on a month to month and now with the dip in our economy – they are folding. Just last week we were offered to buy stock out from a closing down store. Hence many who used to buy from these stores now have no other option but to buy the item through us & if they are not nearby to us – buy it online and have it delivered!

Now more then ever is a good time for online shopping. Like any venture, a good business acumen & correct methods are a must for a success. Even in these troubled times, South Africa really is a positive place to do business.