Choosing the right eCommerce platform is important to the success of your business. You’re picking the features you need, but on the other hand you’re picking the challenges you’ll face as your business develops or changes. The versatility, flexibility, and cost of your platform can possibly work in your favor.

Before you compare ecommerce platforms, it’s a good idea to have worked out a lot of their skills and strategies. For example, there are some platforms that are better for those that are focused on SEO. You’d rather not make your eCommerce site and then realize it’s not optimized for your strategy. While some platforms will feel restrictive for those with coding skills, those without such experience can greatly benefit from the simplicity of the platforms themselves.

Keeping your priorities top of mind, join us as we take a look at the six best eCommerce platforms currently available.

1) WooCommerce

For quite some time, WooCommerce dominated their market. As a direct WordPress plugin, it actually has a lot going for it, especially for those businesses that have a website and are jumping into eCommerce unexpectedly. WooCommerce has high adaptability and built-in analytics. The platform also has support for users 24/7 like virtually all e-commerce platforms.

The plugin itself is free, but you actually need to have your site and pay some related expenses. In the event that you need a general package, competitors such as Squarespace may make more sense to you.

2) Shopify

Shopify is overwhelmingly well known. It’s the eCommerce platform of choice for those who rely on social media marketing to sell or who outsource. The platform is simple, flexible and scalable for small and medium businesses. Also, you don’t need to bother with knowledge of a coding language to use it. Instead, the platform has a drag and drop interface that allows you to build your site.

Shopify focuses on selling and provides a lot of customer experience management (CEM) and upselling features. However, Shopify has a hard time handling the larger stores. Shopify Plus can help you become a bigger store, but if you’re already a big retailer, it might not be the best option for you.

3) Great Trade

Many businesses end up narrowing down their choice between Shopify and BigCommerce. Big Commerce can not only handle the massive stores that Shopify struggles with, but also offers stronger SEO performance. It has a one-page checkout experience that could help your conversion, however, it falls short on the one-click upsells that Shopify does so well.

Whether or not BigCommerce will work for you over Shopify depends on your own strategy, of course. In case you choose BigCommerce, you can expect high customizability (if you have coding skills) and consistent customer support. However, you can also expect a higher price for many features that other platforms include in their basic plans.

4) Open cart

If Big Commerce’s higher price isn’t feasible, you might appreciate OpenCart instead. It’s open source and free to use, though you can invest in plugins, which range in cost from free to $100. There are plenty of additional alternatives, some with features you’d have to pay for elsewhere.

The platform also requires a great deal of coding knowledge, because it is exceptionally customizable, but its support is not as strong as other platforms. In the event that something goes wrong, you may need to modify your website yourself while OpenCart strives to respond to you.

conclusion

Ultimately, the best eCommerce platform for your business will be the one that matches your coding skills and development expectations, both in volume and number of items offered.

The right platform should also enable you to use the marketing and customer experience strategies you need to thrive.

Whichever you choose, don’t make the decision to pick the right eCommerce platform; it’s a complicated decision that will have a significant effect on your business.