[Stuzo]

PayPal or Google Checkout are both good ways to start out with. But depending on the volume of transactions and the amount of control you want you may want to go with your own merchant account. They are not hard at all to set up. Talk to your current bank to see if they have an arm that deals with merchant accounts. Most banks that offer business accounts either have their own or partner with a third party to provide the services to customers. Note that you will need an SSL certificate if you go with a merchant account. I’d recommend VeriSign ( they will also most likely end up being your Payment Gateway if you do decide to set up your own merchant account). Their SSL certificates are a bit pricy, but the most trusted name in the business. You want to make sure you get a low processing fee (percent of the transaction that the bank ends up taking – shoot for under 2% and a low per transaction fee (shoot for 20 cents or lower – hard to find). After a lot of shopping around, we ended up going with Bank of America. Best of luck!