Beth Cox

So, you want to be an e-commerce entrepreneur? The first thing you need is a Web site — right? Well, not exactly. The advice I got 18 months ago was to start first on eBay, learn how to do the ad listings right and get the inventory control, customer service and shipping procedures down … […]

Well, it finally happened to me. I’ve written countless stories about online fraud and how not to get ripped off. I’ve advised everyone to “be careful out there.” I even followed most of my own advice. And still I got ripped off. Not for a lot, mind you, but for a $15 item in one […]

Want to make millions of dollars at e-commerce? I think I’ve finally found the answer! All you need to do is establish an offshore company, buy the right kind of software, and then cash in as the popularity of online poker soars. Poker has never been more popular, thanks largely to a big gamble made […]

Remember your first entrepreneurial effort? Maybe it really was a lemonade stand, or a Kool-Aid sales operation, or Girl Scout cookies, or a magnificent (in memory at least) theatrical performance in the basement at home for which you charged admission. I got to thinking about that recently in the context of my little (read micro) […]

You went from ordinary seller to Power Seller status on eBay pretty fast, but how do you tell when your fledgling online business has gone from small to medium in the SMB equation? Well, if you accept ChannelAdvisor’s definition, it’s when you hit the magical $20,000 a month mark. That’s about when you’re eligible for […]

Sooner or later, I think every Net-using consumer or small business entrepreneur will have typed their own name or company into a search engine, as often as not Google, to see just what comes up. That’s how I found out about the Beth Cox in Tennessee whose husband was declared dead after his ransacked car […]

Another tax issue is looming over the U.S. e-commerce landscape, and this time it’s winging in from across the pond, where new European Union regulations regarding the Value Added Tax (VAT) are set to take effect July 1. Analysts and VAT experts say the new measure will have an impact on all U.S.-based businesses that […]

Depending on whom you listen to, sales taxes on e-commerce transactions are: Natural and inevitable, and will create a level playing field for all retailers. Likely to put a big crimp in online sales and be devastating to small online businesses. Be so complex as to be unworkable without employing an army of accountants. There […]

What if they imposed a sales tax on online purchases, and nothing happened? A new study on the impact of sales taxes on e-commerce says that’s exactly what’s going to happen — nothing. Imposition of a sales tax on e-commerce transactions is indeed likely within three to five years, says the report from New York […]

A notorious spammer who pitches pirated software from Symantec’s Norton product line over the Internet has left vast amounts of customer data exposed for the world to see. And apparently, that is not at all uncommon. One of the Web sites operated by this particular spammer is called salesscape.com, and links related to the site […]

By Beth Cox Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo! has been steadily broadening its revenue stream with new business-oriented offerings — it launched a business email service in October of last year. The portal’s small business service itself was begun back in 1998. Site hosting was first offered in 1999 when the company rolled out a series of […]