Do you have a website or company to promote? Are you a frustrated designer/author/musician? If so, a merchandise shop may be just what you need. By placing your own designs on merchandise such as T-shirts, mugs, hats and bears you can promote your site/self and even make some money in the process".

CafePress.com is a US based company that allows you to do exactly that. They have a wide range of products that you can customise with your own designs and sell in your own CafePress shop. There are two levels of membership - the free package or the premium package.

A free package allows you to create your shop (or shops) at no cost. However, you are limited to one of each product type (although there are several types of T-shirt/clothing product so you can sell multiple designs). The premium package allows you to sell more than one of each product type.

Your designs can be uploaded in JPEG format and they even provide guidance on how large the image should be for each product type.

Adding products to your shop is easy. You simply choose the product you want from one of the categories, choose the design(s) you want to add to the product, give it a name and description and then choose the selling price. Each product has a base price (which it cannot be sold under). If you increase the price above the base price then you keep the difference as profit. All products are priced in dollars however and there is a higher shipping fee for international delivery.

Click here to see the site I created - e-CommerceGuru Merchandise

Once you are happy with your site, you then need to market it. CafePress can help there by submitting your site to major search engines and promoting your site and products through its own pages. You can edit the meta tags for your site to optimise it for the search engines.

If you'd prefer a more UK or European focused site, there are similiar companies on this site of the Atlantic.

PrintShop is a UK based company that gives you a free branded shop (so you can make it look just like your own site) and allows you to design your own T-shirts, mugs, mouse mats etc. You can be up and running in about 2 days.

SpreadShirt is a European company that allows you to set up your own shop selling customised products. They have over 50 products to choose from. The prices can be in Euros or Sterling. However, in order to set up your shop and receive payment, you need a SWIFT code and IBAN (International Bank Account) number so its one for businesses rather than individuals.

Make my megaStore is another site offering you a free web shop to sell your own products. They also have a large selection of images that you can use on products if you don't want to make your own. They have several different opportunities depending on how you want to sell, ranging from a white label affiliate site, a reseller program, a retail program (you can sell their products in a retail shop) or a sales agent/home worker program to sell to people who don't have internet access.

Click here to visit the megastore I created,
e-CommerceGuru.makemymegastore.com.

Future parts of this feature will look at ways of using these sites to promote a business, publish your own book or launch a music band.

An entry, listing or mention on www.e-commerceguru.co.uk does not constitute an endorsement of any product, service or programme. No responsibility or liability is taken for any losses incurred through the use of such goods, services or programmes.