Skip to content

Find the best E-Commerce app for your needs

There is no single best solution. Move the sliders on the left according to your priorities, and the list will reveal your personal winner. You may also compare the apps head-to-head and see all the arguments for each contender.

E-Commerce Software: Characteristics and Important Criteria to Consider for your Decision

E-Commerce software (also known as shopping cart software) allows users of your website to purchase items online. Typical E-Commerce software offer a variety of tools and features to both assist the user in the shopping process (order, payment, shipping) and you as the business owner (design, orders, handling, marketing). There are two different types of software: Hosted services and licensed services. Hosted software is normally easier to use, as the software does not need to be downloaded or installed. The software is paid for on a monthly or yearly basis. Some systems also charge a certain percentage of the sales, or offer a mixed model. As there are no big upfront costs, it is easy to start your business online. When selecting a platform, it’s important to find a system that caters for your specific needs. In general, it is important to look out for the following criteria:

PRICING

Find out how much you’re likely to earn and select a model where you can keep most of your earnings. Paying a small percentage of your sales might sound tempting, but if you’re selling expensive items, it’s often better to pay a monthly fee. Also, most of the time you can save money by paying on a yearly basis.

DESIGN

Many systems allow you to customize the shop appearance. Some offer a variety of templates to choose from, and many allow you to upload your own templates or tweak the ones they’re offering. Determine how much time you want to spent in branding your shop. If you do not have a lot of time, you should favor a solution that has great templates so you’re ready to go faster.

FRONTEND FEATURES

Here it all comes down to how many features we get from the platform, how useful they are for the average online shop owner and how modern is the UX.

STATISTICS AND CONTROLLING

Your E-Commerce solution should provide you an overview how many users visit a shop, how many proceed to the checkout (or leave in the process) etc. Without proper data and a solid analytics dashboard, it’s difficult to improve conversions.

EXTENSIBILITY

Typically, no shopping cart software provides enough features for everyone. If you’re happy with a system in general, but it is missing a feature that’s key for your business, maybe it’s possible to include an extension or plugin which offers this feature.

SUPPORT

Especially in the process of setting up your shop, you might be facing problems or have questions. In this case it’s important to be able to get help quickly. Support can be offered live via online chat or phone, but many companies also provide knowledge bases, ebooks, videos or forums online.

To select the best E-Commerce software for your specific needs, adjust the sliders on the ranking page. If a criteria is important to you, move the slider to the right. If you do not care that much about a specific aspect, move the respective slider to the left. The ranking will re-order accordingly. When you’re done, your best bet will be on top of the list. Furthermore, you can get a head-to-head comparison of any two apps by clicking on Compare. The comparisons are very detailed, you’ll find arguments for both apps for each criteria. For an example, see the comparison between Magento and Shopify.

shopify-popup-new