Before the rise of the internet, starting a business was an expensive undertaking for most people. It required a lot of money as capital, but there was no guarantee that the business idea would be successful.
Starting a business is not that risky these days because you can start small. You don’t need to build a physical store, and you can even sell digital products, which eliminates the need for a physical store. All you need is a product idea and the will to act.
Of course, there are technical aspects involved in setting up an online store. This is where eCommerce platforms come into play.
These services, both free and paid, allow you to host, build, and manage your e-commerce website. These services vary in features, appearance, and procedures, but all are designed to allow you to create a website where visitors can browse and eventually buy your products.
5 Best E-Commerce Platforms and Solutions
We researched five of the largest e-commerce platforms.
To give you a clear idea of the popularity of these five platforms, we compared them using Google Trends:
Therefore, the top three most searched platforms are Shopify, Magento, and WooCommerce.
Let’s take a look at these five platforms and see how they compare to each other.
| E-commerce Platform | Cheapest plan | Overall evaluation |
|---|---|---|
| BigCommerce | $29/month | 9/10 |
| Shopify | $9/month | 10/10 |
| Magento | Free | 8/10 |
| WooCommerce | Free | 9/10 |
| Bigcartel | $9.99/month | 7/10 |
1. BigCommerce
BigCommerce has been around since 2009 and is used by brands like Camelbak, Toyota, and Martha Stewart. It’s a full-featured software that manages everything from website hosting, web design, order processing, shipping, to analytics, and more.
If you don’t already have a domain name, you don’t have to bother buying one – BigCommerce can set it up for you when you sign up for its services.
All plans also come with free SSL, which means your website will be secure and will protect your customers’ payment information.
Using its integration features, you can sell on eBay, Amazon, Facebook, and Pinterest. It also integrates with POS software like Square and Shopkeep to record on-site sales.
With BigCommerce, you can accept payments from PayPal, Braintree, Stripe, Authorize.net, and even digital wallets like Amazon Pay and Apple Pay.
advantage:
- Free SSL
- Lots of operation videos
- Advanced marketing tools
- Unlimited products
shortcoming:
- More expensive than self-hosted sites
- Few add-ons available
price
- Standard Plan ($29.95 per month) – Up to $50,000 in sales per year. It also includes the most important features like a website builder, zero transaction fees, unlimited storage, and dedicated SSL.
- Plus Plan ($79.95 per month) — Up to $150,000 in sales per year. Comes with more features like customer groups and abandoned cart protection.
- Professional Plan ($249.95 per month) – Maximum sales limit is $400,000 per year. Adds more features like custom SSL, product filtering, and Google customer reviews.
If you want to get to know the platform, you can try it for free for 15 days (no credit card required).
2. Shopify
Shopify was founded in 2006, and since its inception, the platform has grown to host over 220,000 online retailers. This isn’t surprising, considering how easy it is to start an online store using the platform.
Compared to BigCommerce, Shopify is much more user-friendly, and any business owner can get a store up and running in minutes without having web development skills.
In addition to being easy to use, Shopify also offers beautiful themes for your online store. Some themes are free, while others require payment. Premium themes cost around $140 to $180, and they usually come with different layouts to provide more design options.
After adding your products, you can manage them using Shopify's built-in inventory section. You can also offer discounts and gift checks to your customers from your dashboard.
If you want to do anything else or want to integrate with Shopify, you can head over to the Shopify App Store. Most integrations are free, but there are some premium integrations that offer more advanced and specialized features.
advantage:
- Hosting Included
- Easy-to-use content management system
- Marketing Tools and Analytics
- Unlimited products
- Beautiful Themes
shortcoming:
- More expensive than running a self-hosted store
- Initial setup is not easy
price
- Basic Shopify ($13/month) – This plan will provide you with basic website, blog, and store functionality, including unlimited products, two staff accounts, and a free SSL certificate.
- Shopify ($54 per month) – This increases staff accounts to five and includes all ***the basic *features. It also allows for abandoned cart recovery and fraud reporting.
- Advanced Shopify ($107/mo) – Up to 15 staff users, includes all ***Basic and Shopify * plan features plus Advanced Report Builder and third-party calculated shipping rates.
All plans come with 24/7 customer support. If you want to try it out, Shopify offers a 30-day risk-free free trial.
3. Magento
Magento is an open source software for building e-commerce websites. This means it’s free, just like WordPress.
You can install it from cPanel and build your store using Magento admin panel.
This platform is more advanced and may require you to hire someone who specializes in this system. The benefit is that you can customize each product however you want. For example, creating groups allows you to show specific products to specific groups of people.
Aside from product customization, you can manage almost everything else from within the admin panel.
You can monitor sales, organize your catalog, manage customers, check abandoned carts, and create newsletters. These features are similar to what paid services like Shopify offer, but at a fraction of the price.
advantage:
- Open source and free
- Flexible
- Powerful SEO
shortcoming:
- Difficult to use
- HTML/CSS skills required
price
Magento itself is free to install . There is a premium service called Magento Go that includes hosting. Additional integrations and themes may be available for a fee.
4.WooCommerce
WooCommerce is popular among WordPress users. In fact, it powers 28% of online stores.
Aside from purchasing a domain name and web hosting, using WooCommerce is completely free, but other extensions may require purchase.
Considering all the other platforms on this list, WooCommerce wins in terms of ease of use and price. It provides the basic and most important features, allowing you to run your online store without spending a penny. If you just want to manage a small store and see how it turns out, this is the perfect starting point.
WooCommerce supports an unlimited number of products and images, so you can add as many products and images as you want for each product. You can customize your products with product variations and set different prices.
Payment options include digital wallets like PayPal, as well as more traditional payment methods like bank transfer or cash on delivery. Products can be shipped locally or internationally, or you can offer customers the option to pick up their products.
advantage:
- Free Platform
- Ease of use
- Numerous extensions to increase functionality
- Unlimited products
- Excellent customer support
shortcoming
- Domain/hosting not included
- Some extensions can be expensive
price
WooCommerce can be installed for free as a WordPress plugin . The WooCommerce marketplace offers free and premium extensions and themes.
5. Bigcartel
Unlike the first four platforms on this list, Bigcartel takes a minimalist approach when it comes to selling products online. As its website states, the platform is for small businesses in creative fields.
Bigcartel has a free option that lets you sell five products on a store with a Bigcartel URL (mystore.bigcartel.com). If you want to use your own URL, you’ll need to upgrade to any of the three paid plans. Paid plans increase the product limit, with the maximum number of products allowed being 300.
You can really get a feel for how simple this platform is once you sign up and start the setup process. Once you’ve added your first product, added categories, and set up your payment processor, you’re done.
There is a website builder similar to some WordPress themes, where you can customize your site’s logo, text, and colors. You can also use themes if you want to change the overall look of your store.
advantage:
- Ease of use
- Affordable
- iPhone app available
shortcoming:
- Lacks inventory functionality
- Free options are too limited
- Not suitable for products with multiple variations
price
- Free Plan (Free) – Allows up to 5 products, order management, and Facebook integration.
- Paid Plan ($9.95/month) – Allows up to 25 products and comes with more features including Google Analytics and custom domains.
- Diamond Plan ($19.99/month) – allows up to 100 products.
- Titanium Plan ($29.99/month) – Allows up to 300 products.
Which eCommerce platform to use?
Not all businesses are the same. Therefore, you need to carefully consider which platform is right for your business.
Ask yourself a few questions:
-How many products do you plan to sell?
-Who is your target customer?
-Are you going to build the website yourself, or will you hire someone?
-How much are you willing to spend?
-If you were a customer of your own store, which features would make your shopping experience pleasant?
After answering these questions, you should have a better idea of what your ideal store should look like and how to achieve it. For most projects, this will probably require trial and error.
Hopefully, with this article, you can make a better decision without making any mistakes.
Let me know which platform you chose and what you think about it in the comments below!
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