Choosing the right eCommerce platform is really important and can make all the difference to your business growth. There are a lot of options out there, and you could easily spend weeks deciding which one is the best for you so I figured I’d save you some time and pick out what I think are the best eCommerce platforms that you should consider if you’re looking for a new solution to grow your business.
The Best eCommerce Platforms
Strikingly
Strikingly is a website builder that is designed to be easy to use, even for those who have never built a website before. It offers a range of stylish templates and allows users to design their site quickly using the drag-and-drop editor.
While Strikingly may not have all the advanced features of more developed platforms like Wix or Squarespace, it is a good choice for those who are looking for a simple and straightforward way to create a website. Strikingly is particularly well-suited for personal portfolios, small business websites, and blogging, but may not be the best choice for larger sites or businesses that need to scale up.
It offers reliable customer support and reasonable pricing, and also has an ecommerce feature called “Simple Store” that allows users to sell up to 500 products on their site (depending on the plan).
If you’re looking for a user-friendly website builder with reliable customer support, then Strikingly is definitely worth considering.
Click here to try Strikingly and see for yourself how easy it is to build a stunning website with this platform.
WooCommerce
WooCommerce is a free WordPress plugin that adds eCommerce functionality to any WordPress site. It’s an extremely popular option, with over 4 million downloads, and powers over 30% of all online stores.
As one of the most popular content management systems in the world, WordPress has a vast community of developers who build themes and plugins designed specifically for WooCommerce stores. This means that you have access to thousands of resources that allow you to customize your store as much or as little as you’d like.
WooCommerce also has a variety of easy-to-install extensions for site builders like yourself who want to extend their capabilities without having to do the coding. You can add features like live chat or shipping calculators with just one click.
Check out this tutorial on how to set up your WooCommerce store
Shopify
Shopify is a fully hosted solution that allows you to set up and run your store all from their backend.
Shopify has become one of the most widely used eCommerce platforms on the web. It is powerful, easy to use, scalable, and can help you grow your business.
The platform is designed for people with little or no coding experience, so it’s perfect for entrepreneurs who want to get an online store up and running quickly. As your business grows and you need more advanced features, Shopify has a lot of room to grow as well.
Shopify offers a vast array of features that will help you build, run and manage your online store:
- Unlimited products
- Easy inventory management
- Customizable storefronts (100+ free and premium themes)
- Mobile commerce ready
- Blogging platform built-in
- Efficient order management system
- Shipping calculation at checkout (including real-time carrier shipping)
- Secure shopping cart with SSL included for free
- Abandoned cart recovery
- Social media integration (Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, etc.)
Check Shopify Features and Price Plans Here
BigCommerce
BigCommerce is one of the most popular eCommerce platforms on the market.
It’s known for its easy-to-use interface and comprehensive features, but these days, that alone doesn’t make it stand out from the crowd.
BigCommerce is a great option for online stores big and small. It’s flexible enough to meet your needs now and in the future, with a wide range of integrations available in their app marketplace.
The Bigcommerce platform offers an abundance of features including:
- Unlimited products
- Unlimited bandwidth
- Unlimited storage
- No transaction fees
- Abandoned cart saver
- Product reviews
- Mobile responsive sites
- Customer groups and segmentation
- Real-time shipping rates from UPS, USPS, and FedEx
Magento
Magento is an open-source eCommerce platform written in PHP. Magento was acquired by Adobe in 2018 and is now part of the Adobe Experience Cloud, which brings together a number of integrated solutions.
Magento has two different versions: Magento Open Source (previously known as Community Edition) and Magento Commerce (previously known as Enterprise Edition). The Open-Source version can be downloaded for free, but it does not come with any technical support. Instead, users need to rely on a community forum for help. The commercial version comes with support and has more features.
Magento is an extremely powerful and flexible platform. It has over 5,000 extensions available to add functionality to your site. You can set up multiple stores in different languages or currencies with Magento’s multi-store functionality. And there are different options depending on the size of your business: Magento Open Source is free to download, while Magento Commerce starts at around $22K per year.
There are a lot of positives to using Magento — it’s fast, scalable, and highly customizable — but it comes with some challenges too:
- The interface can be clunky and complicated for less tech-savvy users.
- It has a steep learning curve for developers too — but if you’re paying for a professional developer this shouldn’t be an issue.
- The Community Edition doesn’t offer support if you run into issues with the software — you’ll need to pay for this if you want more help.
Wix
Wix is an easy-to-use website builder with tons of features, a huge selection of design themes, and complete eCommerce integration. The platform has all the tools you need to create an online store, sell products, and manage your business.
The Wix website builder offers hundreds of templates that are tailored for eCommerce stores. One of the best things about Wix is the drag-and-drop editor that makes it easy to add new elements or customize your existing theme.
Wix’s mobile responsiveness and SEO capabilities are top-notch. Your online store will look great on desktop computers as well as mobile devices. You can even build a mobile version of your store specifically for customers who shop with their smartphones or tablets.
To help you drive traffic to your eCommerce website, Wix includes free web hosting, unlimited bandwidth, and 500MB of storage space for your data and images.
PrestaShop
PrestaShop is an open-source eCommerce solution. It comes in three flavours: Starter, Deluxe, and Ultimate. The software is completely free to download, and there are no transaction fees either. The platform supports many languages and currencies and is fully PCI compliant.
PrestaShop offers several attractive pre-made themes and a full set of marketing tools to help you drive traffic to your site. And because it’s an open-source platform, you can also customize the code to suit your needs.
Launched in 2007, PrestaShop has become one of the leading eCommerce solutions for small to medium-sized businesses around the world. Over 250,000 stores run on the PrestaShop platform, serving over 100 million shoppers worldwide.
PrestaShop’s modular structure allows users to pick and choose functionalities they want to implement in their online store — download as many or as few modules as you like.
Weebly
If you’re looking for a simple website-building tool with integrated eCommerce functionality, check out Weebly. It’s an easy-to-use platform with drag-and-drop functionality, and there are plenty of apps that integrate with its platform to add additional eCommerce capabilities.
Weebly also comes with a built-in option for digital goods that lets users sell ebooks, music, and videos from their sites. This feature is especially useful for artists who want to sell their work directly to consumers.
Weebly has its own payment processor, Square, so you’ll want to make sure your business is comfortable using that. In addition to its monthly subscription plans, Weebly also charges transaction fees (2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction).
Squarespace
The first thing you’ll notice about Squarespace is its unique, stylish designs. Squarespace’s interface is very intuitive and user-friendly. It offers a range of attractive templates, which are easy to edit and customize to your needs. There are also plenty of support options available, including live chat and email support, making it a good option for beginners.
Squarespace has all of the basic eCommerce features that you would expect from an online store builder (think product catalogues and shopping carts), but it also offers some more advanced features like inventory management, abandoned cart recovery, and professional email marketing campaigns.
Squarespace offers a 14-day free trial so you can try it before you buy. If you decide to sign up, plans start at $26 per month (billed annually) and include unlimited bandwidth, storage, and 24/7 customer support.
Conclusion
Remember, this is only a listing of the top eCommerce platforms. Your business model and company goals should dictate your platform choice. Also, consider your budget and its infrastructure before you spend money on an eCommerce system. Finally, we recommend always testing different software to see what works best for your business.
If you want expert help, then do reach out to us at A3H Consultants to know how we can help you start your own eCommerce business.
