In search of the best e-commerce platform for your business? It’s such a headache I might say. It’s because to survive in today’s competitive market, you’ll need a platform that allows you to deliver on the high expectations of modern customers.
An e-Commerce platform is not just the foundation of your business. It is also the business partner that provides you with the tools to sell and market the right products, deliver outstanding shopping experiences to your customers, and fulfill your orders efficiently.
Today there are a ton of e-commerce platforms to choose from. If you’re new to e-commerce, it can be very confusing to select a platform. That’s exactly what this article is for. Below are the 6 best e-commerce platforms to sell online and an evaluation of their features.
1. Shopify
Overall score: 4.4
Shopify highlights:
Fully-hosted, so you do not have to worry about server maintenance and costs
Beginner-friendly and easy, quick to set up
A wide range of themes to select
A ton of add-ons and apps that can provide support
Active community
Support of multi-channel retailing (e.g., online, offline, social)
Shopify downsides:
Additional transaction fees for not using Shopify Payment
High subscription fee ($29-$299/month)
No option to customize checkout
Add-ons and apps come with high prices
Shopify is certainly a good starting point for those who are looking to build their very first e-commerce business. Store set-up on Shopify doesn’t take too much time and effort to be done, so it is probably the best fit for beginners.
However, beginners on a tight budget should take Shopify’s overall pricing into consideration. The subscription fee might not be a problem if they pay for the basic plan ($29/month) but they do need to pay for expensive apps and integrations to sell well.
2. ShopBase
Overall score: 4.1
ShopBase highlights:
Beginner-friendly
SEO-friendly
Excellent upselling and abandoned cart recovery tools
Free, customizable themes and templates
Free apps
Easy to use and beginner-friendly interface
Affordable pricing
ShopBase downsides:
Inconsistent loading speed
Transaction fee required for any paid plan
No seamless integration with marketplaces/ social platforms
Limited themes and apps
ShopBase stands apart from other e-commerce platforms. This is mostly due to its focus on dropshipping, white-label, and print-on-demand. Those are 3 e-commerce solutions that allow entrepreneurs to sell products globally without stocking and shipping.
Therefore, if you are about to start your business using one of the 3 solutions above, ShopBase is certainly the best option for you. The platform is probably the best fit for those who are looking to start dropshipping yet on a tight budget. ShopBase’s paid plan starts at $19/month only and requires no additional fee for using upselling and add-to-cart recovery add-ons.
However, ShopBase appears to be unready for big e-commerce sellers. Their apps are still limited in quantity.
3. Wix
Overall score: 4.1
Wix highlights:
A ton of free, amazing themes and templates
Easy, quick setting-up
Free plan available for beginners
Accept multiple payment methods with no commission
Marketing automation tools provided
Allow users to customize everything to their preferences
Wix downsides:
Not SEO-friendly
Poor upselling capabilities
Weak integration with Amazon
Doesn’t primarily focus on e-commerce
Similar to Shopify, Wix delivers a wide range of features and functions which can be easily used by nearly anyone. However, Wix’s focus is more about standard website building rather than e-commerce website creation.
In short, Wix is possibly the best fit for those who want to do everything on their own and be able to craft the store according to their own preferences.
4. Yo!Kart
Overall score: 4.3
Yo!Kart highlights:
A self-hosted standalone multi-vendor platform
Rich user experience
Pre-Integrated APIs & Multiple Payment options
Ready Native Mobile Apps
Intuitive admin and seller dashboards
Fully customizable & Scalable
Lifetime license and source code ownership
Yo!Kart downsides:
Themes are costly
Upgrades are paid
Yo!Kart is one of the finest multi-vendor ecommerce platforms to build B2B, B2C or Peer-to-Peer marketplaces. It offers hundreds of features and pre-integrated APIs in its base package as well. The multi-vendor software has been used by startups to enterprises for their online marketplace needs.
Unlike Shopify or Magento, it comes with a one-time payment and can be customizable for every specific marketplace’s needs. However, the learning curve of Yo!Kart is steep, as it has a lot of functionalities
5. BigCommerce
Overall score: 4.3
BigCommerce highlights:
Excellent tools for managing products, orders, and business performance.
Automatic marketing tools and AdWords integration
A wide range of apps
Able to integrate with Facebook, Mailchimp, QuickBooks, eBay and etc.
SEO-friendly
Big Commerce downsides:
Unstable load speed
Premium themes come with high prices
No custom homepage
1.5% transaction fee for the cheapest plan
Store set-up and design takes lots of time and efforts
If you’re just getting into e-commerce and looking to build your very first store, Big Commerce is probably not for you. However, Big Commerce is the best solution for the ones who are growing fast and looking to scale their business to the next level of growth. You can also get help with Bigcommerce template design from skilled pro’s to help you build exactly what you want.
6. WooCommerce
Overall score: 4.0
WooCommerce highlights:
SEO-friendly, suitable for those who prefer WordPress
A wide range of integrations
Highly customizable
Highly-engaged community
WooCommerce downsides:
Self-hosted, so you have to handle maintenance and updates
Requires expertise and proficiency in WordPress
WooCommerce is an open-source e-commerce platform that is built for WordPress. Using the platform might be quite intimidating for those who are just getting into e-commerce and have no knowledge and experience with WordPress. The good news is that WooCommerce has a lot of features. Almost everything you need to design your site, but the bad is that it can take a significant amount of time to learn how to use them.
7. Magento
Overall score: 3.5
Magento highlights:
SEO-friendly
Self-hosted on any PHP web hosting
Scalable
Free to get started
Magento downsides:
Not beginner-friendly
Require technical knowledge and skills
Expensive for enterprise version
Magento is a one-stop solution for e-commerce. It offers a ton of features with almost nothing missing from the eCommerce platform. That being said, it can be difficult for those who have zero technical knowledge and experience.
If you are about to make your very first move into e-commerce, you should probably skip Magento. It can be said that the platform is born to serve pre-existing businesses, which are looking to scale to the next level of growth.
Source: https://www.mikegingerich.com/blog/e-commerce-platform-reviews-the-best-e-commerce-platform-for-2021/
- https://www.mikegingerich.com/
- Mike Gingerich
- United States
