How To Choose The Right eCommerce Platform for Your eCommerce Business?
In today’s competitive market, it is very essential for businesses to stay ahead of the competition. Also, it is important to reach out to the larger crowd to attract potential customers and drive them towards the business. The best way to get noticed and reach potential buyers is by using the Digital Commerce Platform.
Ecommerce platforms provide the all-in-one solution for easy management of the website, operations, sales, etc. This eCommerce solution online provides a cloud-based solution delivering seamless operational efficiency, improved customer experience, and enhanced growth opportunities.
Before getting into the core topic, let’s brush up with some basics about eCommerce platforms.
What Do You Need To Know About eCommerce Platforms?
An eCommerce platform is software that acts as the front end for consumers to interact with the online business. It enables commercial processes including selling and buying products or services via the internet. Both the sellers and buyers play a significant role on the platform provided by E-commerce to carry out our commercial activities.
Apart from that, eCommerce solutions online facilitate businesses in many ways. This includes maintaining the company’s official business website, marketing channels, sales operations, and also managing business operations. It doesn’t matter whether it’s small, medium, or large-scale businesses, eCommerce platforms always deliver the best for business growth.
Here are the lists of a few vital reasons that trigger the essential of utilizing the power of eCommerce.
Business Growth
Implementation of an eCommerce platform helps businesses grow to the next level. It promotes the business presence among the target audience worldwide and increases commercial activities among worldwide potential consumers.
Robust Enterprise Solution
Irrespective of the business size and type, the eCommerce platform delivers a robust enterprise solution. It will simply create a huge impact on your business with more stability and increased profitability.
Streamlines Customer Interaction
Unlike the traditional way of shopping, eCommerce solutions online streamline how customers want to interact with a business. This will boost the user experience and increase reputation among potential buyers.
Do you want to discuss how an advanced eCommerce platform empowers your business operations and helps you in driving immense revenue?
What eCommerce Option Does Business Owners Have?
Undoubtedly, an eCommerce solution provides significant benefits to businesses looking to stabilize their sales in the virtual world. However, many business owners struggle to pick the right eCommerce solution for their businesses. The main reason behind their struggle is that they are unaware of the eCommerce option they have.
If you are one of those business people seeking full details about eCommerce solutions online, then this section will be helpful for you.
Well, when it comes to the eCommerce platform there are 3 main options.
- Open-source Ecommerce Platforms
- SaaS eCommerce Platforms
- Headless Ecommerce Platforms
Let’s discuss in brief all 3 eCommerce platform options.
1. Open-source eCommerce Platforms
As per the name, the open-source eCommerce platforms allow their users to modify their aspects according to their needs. This means users or brands preferring this type of eCommerce solution online are responsible for all including web hosting, PCI compliance, inheriting tools & plugins, and so.
The hosting environment for this type of eCommerce platform would be mostly cloud-based or on-premise where the platform implementation and other aspects should be done manually. In most cases, these types of eCommerce platforms are preferred by brands or companies who would like to have complete control of their eCommerce environment.
Benefits
- Easy to Customize
- No Vendor Lockdown
- Custom Security Option
- East to Audit
2. SaaS eCommerce Platforms
SaaS (Software as a Service) eCommerce Platforms are cloud-based systems that are typically sold on a subscription basis. SaaS eCommerce Platforms typically remove all the complexity involved in the eCommerce business. When compared with an open-source eCommerce platform, the development cost of this SaaS eCommerce platform is very cheap.
SaaS providers take care of all those operations involved in product updates, data security, hosting issues, PCI compliances, and so on which are relevant to managing the platform.
Benefits
- Flexibility
- Predictable
- Affordable
- Easy to Launch
3. Headless eCommerce Platforms
Headless eCommerce is just like other cloud-based eCommerce solutions online. However, it manages all the eCommerce operations without a front-end delivery layer. In this type, the shopping cart of an eCommerce is completely decoupled from the site content management system.
Instead, developers can make use of APIs to carry out the role of CMS like posting content, publishing customer reviews, displaying product details, and so on.
Benefits
- Delivers True Omnichannel Experience
- Allows To Customize Front-end
- Personalized Customer Experience
- Flexibility
- Long-term Cost Savings
Visit Headless Commerce: All You Need To Know to get exclusive insights into headless commerce. The post helps you to explore the advantages, disadvantages, and other aspects of Headless Commerce that help you in making a well-informed decision.
If you are struggling to select the right eCommerce platform for your online business, read Expert’s Guide on Choosing Finest eCommerce Platform for Your Business to make the right choice by considering different parameters suggested by experts.
Are you still in a dilemma as to which type of eCommerce is the right fit for your business? Credencys loves to help you in implementing the best one.
What Features Can You Expect from an eCommerce Platform?
In today’s market, one can find numerous eCommerce platforms however picking the right suitable for your business will deliver the best result. Modern eCommerce platforms are evaluated based on their features.
eCommerce platforms offer countless features and functionalities with a sheer number of choices. It is nearly impossible to pick the right and most suitable eCommerce platform without knowing what your business needs and requirements are.
Take a look over the lists of essential features of an eCommerce platform.
Scalability
The chosen eCommerce platform should have the ability to handle the growth of the business and the growing demands of the consumers in the future.
Easy to Use
eCommerce platform should have a user-friendly UI so that users/buyers can able to navigate the sites without any hassle. In addition, it should be transparent and have multiple payment options.
Easy Integration
To tackle the growing demands in the eCommerce industry, the eCommerce platform should have seamless integration capabilities. So that various functionalities can be inherited through plugins and tools.
User-friendly Interaction
The biggest challenge of the eCommerce industry is to create user-friendly interaction between the buyer and seller. Ecommerce platforms can utilize the power of AI when it comes to communicative features.
Attractive & User-friendly Navigation
Apart from just user-friendly UI, the eCommerce solutions online should provide multiple attractive themes along with an easy navigation system.
Apart from that, a perfect eCommerce platform should be easy to set up and operate. Also, it should offer an excellent shopping experience. Finally, the cost of the eCommerce solutions online should be considered and make sure it suits well with the budget factor.
Do you want to build a robust eCommerce solution that contains all the above-listed proven features and helps you amplify your online success?
Tips for Choosing an eCommerce Platform For eCommerce Business
There are various factors involved that an enterprise needs to consider while selecting the best eCommerce platform for their eCommerce business. Take a look over the expert tips for the selection of the perfect and best eCommerce platform for your business.
Product type
The product that the enterprise wants to market using the eCommerce platform plays a very crucial role. The different types of products will have different types of eCommerce platforms.
Thus, it forms one of the most important selection criteria. Certain eCommerce solutions online are ideal for a specific type of product, service, or industry. There are different e-commerce platforms for fashion products, electronics, foods and beverages, craft materials, etc.
Easy shop setup
The selected eCommerce platform should have an easy setup and design. It should have the ability to capture the uniqueness of the company brand. The organization can check the available templates provided by the platform if they provide a suitable one for their type of business based on the needs.
The templates are easy to use, do not require any special technical knowledge, and also provide a professional appearance for making a bold market statement.
Ease of navigation
The selection of the eCommerce platform should provide ease of navigation to the user. Online shoppers do not like spending more time waiting so the platform should enable the users to have a seamless experience that is fast in searching for their requirements.
Secured use
While shopping online, customers prefer to have top-notch security for payment processing. The enterprise should select the eCommerce platform that supports the use of HTTPS/SSL that is safer and secure for transactions.
Ease of integration
There are several applications or tools that an organization uses for its smooth operations. Thus the selection of the eCommerce platforms should be based on their ease of integration with the other applications or tools that are used.
This ease of integration is very essential for the smooth running of the eCommerce CRM with the other applications.
Mobile-friendly
Due to digitalization, most customers shop using several devices. The most commonly used device for online shopping is mobile as it is handy and can be used on–the–go. The eCommerce platform selected for the product should be able to run efficiently on any device including mobile.
As the display area for the mobiles is compact as compared to the other devices, there should not be any glitches while shopping through the mobile device.
Cost of ownership
The cost of accessing the eCommerce platform is one of the most important criteria for its selection. The organization should understand the cost of the platform before making the purchase.
These platforms have monthly fees and the organization can consider the pros and cons of each of the platforms to get the best value that suits their budget. It is important to understand the hosting cost involved, the maintenance cost, the duration of the contract, etc. before making the purchase.
Themes and user experiences
The theme of the eCommerce platform defines the design of the online store and makes the site more appealing. The different e-commerce platforms provide a variety of options for the theme to select from. Some of the themes are free of cost while the advanced themes might have some charges or subscription costs.
These themes have a well-designed experience that makes them easier to handle. The selection of the platform should be based on these factors as the organization may not need to invest in technical support for handling these features.
Ecommerce platform speed and scalability
As the business expands, the organization can include its number of products on its website or use multiple channels for attracting potential customers. Many customers prefer online shopping thus many people may visit the website at the same time.
An increased number of customers visiting the site at the same time should not make the platform sluggish. The platform should be able to handle peak traffic efficiently without affecting the customer experience.
Store functionality
With the enhanced shopping experience, the enterprise needs to provide additional features and functions on its eCommerce platform. This includes the details like the shopping options, product details, advanced features like a wish list, comparison, shipping options, dynamic filters, etc.
The organization can select the eCommerce platform that can handle these features efficiently.
Support multiple payment gateways
While online shopping, the enterprise should make sure to provide multiple payment options to their customers to pay for their purchases. The online store should be connected to a payment gateway that is reliable and safe for moving the funds from the customer’s account to the business account.
The selection of the eCommerce platform depends on its compatibility with the different payment gateways.
Personalization
With the increased use of artificial intelligence and machine learning, the eCommerce platform can provide personalized services that help in improved customer experience.
Various eCommerce platforms are equipped with a recommendation engine that allows the shoppers to make their purchase based on different criteria like demographics, behavior, context, history, psychographics, etc.
Do you want to discuss your specific business case with our team to develop a feature-rich eCommerce solution using an advanced eCommerce platform that enhances your online presence?
Conclusion
There are various options that an enterprise can select from to stay ahead in this competitive business and make their business make. Selecting the right type of eCommerce solution online will provide the best features and functions that are required by the organization to keep their customers engaged and boost the business.
The main selection criteria for the eCommerce platform depend on the objective of the business and the needs of the customers. Considering this the enterprise can select the best eCommerce platform for the growth of their business.
The organization needs to consider the pros and cons of each of the available eCommerce platforms before selecting the best one for their business.
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