The best eCommerce Platforms to Launch Your Online Business

eCommerce business is rising and choosing the best ecommerce platforms can significantly help you grow your business, reach more target customers, and make sales.

There are different e-commerce platforms that you can choose from to launch your business.

This article will give you a list of these platforms so that you can compare them and choose the best one that suits the business you want to launch.

Factors to consider when choosing the best eCommerce platforms

Before we can look at the ecommerce platforms, here are the factors that you should keep in mind when making your platform choice.

Mobile-friendliness

The online world is evolving every day and target customers are now more than ever using mobile devices to search for products or services. Statista research shows over 3.8 billion smartphone usage by 2021.

As you make your choice of platform, ensure it has mobile-friendly features and you can optimize your business for mobile use.

If your customers find it hard to access your business on mobile phones, you lose the chance to engage the target customers and convert them into customers. You also give your competitions an upper hand as those customers will reach out to them and convert for them.

Integrations and plugins

As you run your e-commerce business you need to integrate it with different tools and plugins to help grow your business and give your customers the best user experience. When you choose the best ecommerce platforms ensure that it has the capacity to integrate different tools without any complications.

Scalability

As you reach more target customers, engage them in your e-commerce business, they will more likely convert into customers. Your business will be growing gradually and you will serve a wide variety of customers.

The platform that you choose should have the potential to accommodate your growing business.

From the different e-commerce platforms, choose the one that will quickly help you scale your business. The platform should also be fast as clients hate sites that have a slow loading speed.

Customer service

The platform you choose should be able to give the best customer services to clients. It should help the customers solve their problems in the shortest time possible and provide 24/7 service availability.

Security

Nobody likes making purchases from sites that are not secure. They may find your site offering awesome products, but will not make a move to purchase from you.

The insecure site sends signals to them that their personal information could be stolen or their credit card crushed. When choosing a site ensure that it is secure and has an SSL certificate to prove it. Here is an example of Magento which is one of the ecommerce platforms.

The platform should also be compliant with the payment card industry ( PCI) The above security measures help put customers at ease and comfortable when making purchases. Here are some security seals you can look out for in your search for an e-commerce platform.

Payment methods

Customers use different methods to make purchases of products online. The platform you choose should have different payment ways to suit the customers.

Many customers abandon the cart on the checkout page when they can’t find the right payment method to use.

 Ease of use

For you to give your clients the best user experience you have to use all the tools the best e-commerce platforms have to satisfy your customers.

Ensure the site you choose has easy-to-use tools to help your business grow. In case you are stuck on the way the tool work the platform should have a fast and efficient team to guide you and show you what to do.

Ecommerce platforms you can compare

Now that you know what factors to consider in your choice of e-commerce platform, here are the platforms to compare.

Shopify

This is one of the most popular ecommerce platforms that power many e-commerce stores. It has great features that are easy to use. The tool is suitable for both small businesses and large brands.

It has a drag and drop feature that new customers can use when creating their website. Shopify has great tools to help you in your marketing campaigns for your brand. Here is its pricing structure.

Big Commerce

This platform has great tools to have your new e-commerce platform running in no time. You can integrate your site with other tools like Amazon and eBay to reach more clients and increase sales.

The platform had great themes, some paid others free to help improve your website design. The tool gives all the marketing tools and features you need to market your business get clients and make sales.

Big Commerce platform has great performance for e-commerce businesses such as security, faster speeds, and give customer great experience. This platform supports e-commerce stores in different industries. Here is its pricing structure.

To learn more about the features of each package here is the website pricing page. You can use the integration feature of the platform and integrate your store with tools that will help market your business.

Square

With the Square platform, you can accept customer orders through email, phone, or online. When making payments you can use touch-free payment options like Google pay or Apple pay through its contactless hardware.

It has a great point of sale system that is easy to set up. The Square platform point of sale ensures the checkout system is fast for the customer transaction.  This helps reduce cart abandonment in the checkout process when they are making a purchase.

You can visit the Square website run a demo for the point of sale, download it then create a free account. Here is the pricing structure of the platform.

Wix

It’s one of the great e-commerce platforms you can use to create your website. You can easily create your e-commerce store from scratch with its drag and drop features. Its customer templates make the work even easier.

With Wix e-commerce website builder, you can manage end-to-end fulfillment. You can give your customers secure payment ways, and reach out to your customers through different channels. You can sell your products anywhere with the Wix e-commerce platform.

To learn more about its features and its payment plans visit the website.

Open Cart

With the open cart platform, you can set your products to appear in different stores and manage these stores with a single admin interface.

You can use the platform to sell unlimited products in different niches. You can use different currencies with the platform as you sell your products to customers. Here are some of its payment gateways.

You can integrate your website with different shipping methods for your customers and also get sales analytics reports to know how your sales are growing.

Woocommerce

This platform is fully customizable and supports products in different niches. You can add either free or paid platform extensions to your site make it easy to market and scale your business.

The platform has great features, is flexible with your business growth, and can integrate different services.

Woocommerce platform has different payment gateways so your customers can use the options that suit them and it’s also secure. You can join the support forum where you can interact with other users.

If you want to use the eCommerce platform learn more about woocommerce payments here.

Ecwid

You can use this platform to sell your products in different channels such as social media, your website, or Amazon. Ecwid can manage your online store on a single dashboard and use tools like Facebook advertising to scale your business growth.

Ecwid has a mobile app where you can run and manage your business on your smartphone. It is compatible with other ecommerce platforms and offers great customer support services. Here is its pricing model.

You can visit the Ecwid pricing page to learn more about the features of each package.

Magento

This platform is suitable for large businesses in B2B and B2C in different industries. Here are the products and solutions Magento offers to ecommerce businesses.

Magento has different extensions to customize your store, improve user experience, and engage target customers to your brand.

Weebly

As you build your ecommerce store, you can use Weebly’s customizable web pages to make it attractive to target clients.

You can reach your target clients and make sales anywhere. The platform has great features to help launch your ecommerce store.

You can also manage your store with the platform mobile app. Here is how Weebly helps brands start from scratch and progress with their growth.

Here are the pricing packages for the Weebly ecommerce platform.

3DCart

The 3dcart platform is SEO-friendly and has built-in tools for SEO to help drive more target customers to your online store. It supports over 200+ payment gateways which makes it easy for target customers to use any method suitable to them.

 The platform is secure and PCI compliant so customers’ private information can’t be compromised. 3dcart provides users with all the tools they need to grow their ecommerce brand, reach more customers, and make sales.

 You can also integrate your ecommerce store with different tools for your marketing campaigns. Here is the platform pricing structure.

Before you choose your package you can compare the features each package has to see if it’s suitable for your ecommerce store.

Volusion

The platform offers a great website builder with different themes to create a unique attractive ecommerce website. With its great inventory management, you can sell unlimited products with ease.

You can integrate your site with apps and tools to help you grow your customer base and make more sales. The tool only sells physical products and the shipping rates depend on your price package. Here is the cost of the different packages.

You can compare the different features of each package and choose one that suits your ecommerce store.

Squarespace

With this platform, you can sell both physical and digital products. It has beautiful templates to help build your online store.

Squarespace offers marketing tools to help you reach more potential clients, nurture them, and convert them into clients. With the built-in SEO tools, you can use the platform to optimize your site for search engines.

The ecommerce platform has integrations with tools to your ecommerce website to help market your products and engage target customers on different social sites. The platform has the following payment plans.

You can visit the platform pricing page to learn more about how the different plans compare and the features of each plan.

Selz

The platform has great in-built tools to help ecommerce owners promote their business, engage target clients, and sell them their physical and digital products.

 You can manage how your ecommerce store is growing with analytics tools and manage your inventory. Offers great 24/7 customer support with LiveChat.

Selz has great drag and drop tools to build a great ecommerce store with free mobile themes. It gives you free SSL certificates to secure your website. Here are the platform pricing plans.

You can check out how the three plans compare and what’s included in each one of them.

J2store

This platform is a shopping cart extension for ecommerce stores that run on Joomla as their CMS. As you can see from the website, it has more than 350K downloads, 60+ apps to integrate, and 75+ payment gateways.

You can use the platform for a mobile app, sell physical and digital products. You can also sell subscription and membership services using this platform.

It has great customer support that includes a community where you can interact with others as you users. Here are the platform payment plans.

The two plans have the same features except for the number of websites each supports. The developer plan supports three websites whereas the professional plan support one.

E-junkie

Through this platform, you can sell both digital and physical products on your e-commerce store. You can sell these products from anywhere be it your blog, social media pages, or messager.

You can easily create product discounts, codes, or gift cards with the site for your store. They have automatic tracking of conversions if your site is linked to Google analytics or have a Facebook pixel.

The platform has different payment gateways and you can integrate your website with other tools or software to market your e-commerce store. Here are some of its features.

If you would like to use this e-commerce platform, here is what it will cost you.

Oscommerce

The Oscommerce platform has a community where you can post and interact with others to learn more about the platform. Through their public chat room, you can have direct communication with members of the community.

You can customize your e-commerce store with their great tools. The platform can host your online store. Here are some of their hosting tools.

Gumroad

You can run in-depth analytics of your e-commerce business to see how it’s growing. You can use the platform to sell out your digital products like books, music, courses, or rent/purchase your films.

The platform is secure for any transaction so the customer details are safe. See some of its features below.

If you decide to use this e-commerce platform, here is what you will pay.

Prestashop

Prestashop has a community forum where you can find other members and answers to your questions. To reach more target customers you can connect with other tools like Facebook and Amazon. You can use Prestashop ads on Google to reach advertise your products and acquire new customers.

Conclusion

Consider the features of ecommerce platforms and choose the one that aligns with your e-commerce business goals. Your clients are at the center of your business. Make the right choice and use the platform that will give your users the best experience and help you grow your business sales and revenue.