What is it? The Google Checkout Merchant Center is available to everyone who creates a Checkout merchant account. It is a secure web application that allows you to perform the following Google Checkout order processing activities through your browser:

• Receive new orders in the Orders Inbox
• Charge credit cards
• Mark orders as shipped
• Provide tracking numbers
• Cancel or refund orders
• Update your Google Checkout settings

Best for:

• If you just want to immediately start accepting and managing orders
• Lower volumes of sales, as orders must be handled manually
• Merchants who don't already have their own order management systems
• If you have no need for line-item shipping or cancellations

Time required: None. Just go to the Merchant Center website and start using it.

Technical skills required: None. Just Internet access.

Next step: How to Use the Checkout Merchant Center to process orders   (or skip ahead to Merchant Center &mdash requires sign-in)

What is it? A pre-integrated order processing system is an order processing system that has already been integrated with Google Checkout by one of our integration partners (listed in the next step, whose link is below). It is generally included with a pre-integrated shopping cart and includes the underlying code to support receiving notifications about orders and sending order processing commands for Google Checkout orders. Typically, a pre-integrated order processing system is developed by a third party and made available to anyone, so is off-the-shelf. (Contrast with custom order processing below.)

If you are already using a pre-integrated cart, check with your provider to see if they support order processing for Google Checkout. If your integration provider doesn't support Google Checkout, then you can process orders through the merchant center (above).

Best for: Merchants who are using a pre-integrated shopping cart.

Time required: If you already have a pre-integrated cart installed and integrated with Google Checkout, enabling order processing usually only requires obtaining the API callback URL from your cart provider and entering it in your Google Checkout merchant account.

If you don't have a pre-integrated shopping cart and decide you need one, the amount of time to set up the shopping cart and enable order processing varies quite a bit, depending on whether it's a hosted or deployed software solution. Each eCommerce platform is different.

Technical skills required: If you already have a pre-integrated cart installed and integrated with Google Checkout, enabling order processing doesn't require any technical skills. You'll only need the API callback URL from your cart provider.

If you don't have a pre-integrated shopping cart and decide you need one, the amount of technical skill needed to set up the shopping cart and enable order processing varies quite a bit, depending on whether it's a hosted or deployed software solution. Each eCommerce platform is different. If you need additional guidance on how to integrate with Google Checkout, please contact your provider.

Demo: See integration partner websites

Next step: How to Set up Google Checkout with your pre-integrated shopping cart and order processing system

What is it? If you're currently accepting and managing orders using an order processing system custom-built by you or a third-party developer, you can integrate Google Checkout using our Application Programming Interface (API) to handle those orders in your existing custom-built system.

An order processing integration is appropriate for you if you want to invest a bit more time in the integration process so you can fully automate order management processes.

If you do a custom integration of order processing:

• You'll be notified of new orders via an SSL-secured callback URL that you define.
• You can continue to process orders through the existing order management system you used before integrating with Google Checkout. Google will send you order information in XML messages if you use the XML API or name-value pairs if you use the HTML API as defined by the Notification API. You can then issue order processing commands over an SSL-secured channel.
• You may still use the Google Merchant Center to process orders if you'd like.

Time required: Integrating a custom order processing system is more complex and will take more time. The amount of time you'll need to integrate will depend on the following:

• The technical expertise of the programmer performing the integration.
• The number of programmers performing the integration.

For an integration estimate more specific to your business, we recommend you consult with the programmer or programmers who will be responsible for your integration.

Technical Skills required: The programmer responsible for integrating your order processing system with Google Checkout via the API should have a strong working knowledge of:

• The programming or scripting language your existing order processing system is written in: PHP, Perl, Python, ASP, ASP.NET, Java or equivalent web application technology
• XML (if you choose XML API)
• HTTP
• Your existing order processing and inventory management systems and business process flows

Demo: (none)

Google Checkout offers two ways to integrate with a custom order processing system: HTML API and XML API, which you can choose from in the next step.