Top Ecommerce Platforms for 2020

MyPR: Top Ecommerce Platforms for 2020:

When it comes to choosing software for your ecommerce website (online store), there are so many different platforms to consider. Lets dive into some of the important factor’s to compare before we actually look at some of our top picks for 2019/2020.

1. Is it worth while selling on an eCommerce platform, perhaps a marketplace is better served — or like some top retailers, both?
2. What type of functionality, features and/or tools do you need?
3. Do you have current sales volumes and projections for future growth? Will the platform and/or technology partner you choose support these volumes?
4. What’s your technology budget and timeline?

In this article, we’ll focus on ecommerce platforms in particular. An ecommerce platform is web software that allows businesses to launch, host, and manage their online store.

While different ecommerce platforms offer different features and range from free (open source) to paid, all of them give merchants the opportunity to build a branded online storefront to sell their products.

We’ve reviewed the top options on the market today to help you figure out which is the best fit for your business.

1. WooCommerce
WooCommerce is the most popular shopping cart system in the world, powering over 30% of all eCommerce websites. Best of all it’s free. Sort of. While it’s certainly possible to set up shop and start selling online with only the free WooCommerce plugin, there are some limitations.

WooCommerce helps you build an eCommerce store using WordPress.

WordPress is like your website’s operating system, and WordPress is also by far the most popular way to make a website.

WooCommerce takes that basic WordPress operating system and turns it into a fully-functioning eCommerce store.

More than that, WooCommerce is the most popular way to build an eCommerce store for successful sites. It powers 25% – a plurality – of the eCommerce stores in the top 1 million sites worldwide:
Top eCommerce Usage Distribution in the Top 1 Million Sites

Why is WooCommerce so popular?

There are a bunch of reasons why WooCommerce is such a popular way to build an eCommerce store:

WooCommerce is free, and the underlying WordPress software is also free.
WooCommerce is open source. Anyone can go in and audit, modify, or extend the code.
WooCommerce is regular person friendly. You don’t need to be an expert developer to launch a store.
WooCommerce is extensible. Using something called “plugins”, you can add all kinds of new functionality to your store without the need for any technical knowledge.
WooCommerce works on all devices. More and more people shop on smartphones, and WooCommerce is ready to serve those people.
WooCommerce looks how you want it to. Using something called “themes”, you can control exactly how your store looks without the need for any technical knowledge.
WooCommerce is secure. Beyond being open source, WooCommerce comes from Automattic, a billion dollar company with the resources to secure your store.

So what is WooCommerce? It’s your way to build a secure, flexible eCommerce store using the most popular tool to make a website (that’s WordPress!).

2. Shopify
Shopify allows beginners (and pros) creating online stores without coding. No software installations or hosting services are required. Shopify features plans ranging from $ 29 – $ 299/month and there are no additional transaction fees if you use Shopify Payments.

As I see it, Shopify is not only an easy way to launch and manage your online store. It’s geared towards supporting store owners in crucial aspects like opening additional channels (e.g. Amazon, eBay or Facebook), offering customer support tools (e.g. live chat) or by taking care of the technical hassles.

3. Shopify Plus
Shopify Plus is an award winning cloud-based enterprise e-commerce platform for high volume merchants. In our test of popular ecommerce solutions it got the highest score and was distinguished with our Great User Experience Award for 2017. It offers enterprise-grade selling capabilities without the huge price tag and hassles of traditional enterprise solutions. Many large brands and fast growing companies use Shopify Plus to boost their business.

Shopify offers a highly distributed, multi-tenant platform that processes billions of dollars a year. This platform reduces IT expenses and with it you don’t have to worry about transaction fees, rack space, or bandwidth.

Shopify Plus makes it simple to sell your products on all major marketplaces and social networks. Its multichannel capabilities boost customer engagement, improve sales, and increase brand awareness across any channel you choose.

The vendor’s expert team of account managers, dedicated support agents, and technical designers make transition to Shopify Plus smooth and fast.
Image result for shopifyShopify | A great choice for your first EStore

4. BigCommerce
With a wide variety of built-in features and customization options, BigCommerce appeals to both enterprise-level ecommerce merchants like Toyota and Natori and those who are just starting out.

Features include industry-leading uptime, advanced security, payment and order fulfillment partnerships, and a wide variety of built-in integrations with leading ecommerce apps.

BigCommerce can be an expensive option with a bit of a steep learning curve, but it’s popular for a reason — it offers a full-fledged store without complex backend hurdles, making it a great choice for a wide variety of merchants.
Image result for big commerceBigCommerce | Feature-full eCommerce platform

5. Magento
Magento is an ecommerce platform built on open source technology which provides online merchants with a flexible shopping cart system, as well as control over the look, content and functionality of their online store. Magento offers powerful marketing, search engine optimization, and catalog-management tools.

Magento is designed to be utilized as an application by someone who isn’t a developer. The Magento community is extremely large and very helpful. However, at some point the average person is going to hit a wall.

There are a number of reasons why developers are called upon to adjust a Magento website. It is a very robust system even at its most basic. Once you begin to integrate with other systems, or introduce tens of thousands of products, businesses often need the assistance of experienced developers. As an example, we’ve had clients need additional options for how they view their dashboard. Typically you might be able to select viewing products in groups of 5, 25, and/or 50. We have a client who wants to view 2000. The functionality can be changed only up to a point; beyond that, it needs to be customized by an expert who really understands Magento, and follows best practices.

6. Wix
Wix is one of the most basic ecommerce platforms, making it great for brand new online stores. With 72 free themes and a super simple setup, Wix is a no-frills option that offers just enough features for small sellers to get started, but can’t necessarily scale alongside fast-growing stores. Wix’s online store hosting is also one of the most affordable ecommerce platforms, starting at just $ 20/month.

Wix’s drag-and-drop editor makes it easy to create a professional website – without having to know a line of code! With hundreds of templates and great tools Wix lets you build and sell through your site. Beginner-friendly and scalable, Wix is suitable for anything from personal online portfolios to small business websites.

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