Which technical solution to choose to create your e-commerce site? Webqam helps you find the most suitable solution for your e-commerce.
What is an e-commerce site?
The question may seem trivial but before embarking on the creation of an e-commerce site, it is necessary to identify its needs and objectives. If your goal is to sell your products or services directly online, you need an e-commerce website. If your need stops at the presentation of your product catalog, without allowing purchases directly online, then you do not need an e-commerce site.
Which e-commerce site?
To put it simply, an e-commerce site is a website offering the purchase of products or services directly online. The technical solution used must therefore natively include product pages, product category pages, a purchase tunnel and a payment solution via a payment module. From this base, you can then go into detail in a customization according to the specificities of your activity (B2B or B2C, social selling or customizable products for example). It is the expression of your specific needs that will determine the technical solution that will be best able to meet these needs.
What are the best online shopping sites?
In this article, we are going to present 4 viable and efficient e-commerce solutions (Shopify, Laravel, Woocommerce, Magento), each one responding to different challenges and needs.
Shopify to sell a shallow and deep range of products
Created in 2006, Shopify is an e-commerce solution allowing you to create online stores in a few clicks. Shopify, unlike the other solutions presented, is a monthly paid solution with 3 monthly subscription offers (basic, professional, advanced) according to the needs of e-merchants. Learn more
Due to its easy, quick to set up and ergonomic configuration, Shopify is ideal for a market test, a shallow product range (between 0 and 50 products with little customization) or classic e-commerce features.
But that’s not all, Shopify is also a powerful solution, SEO-friendly and easily interconnectable with social networks (Instagram in mind).
In short, a quick solution to put in place to sell your products quickly with little need in terms of tailor-made features!
Finally, to give you an idea, we have created the Team Cooler ESport e-commerce site using this solution.
Laravel to create your marketplace or your tailor- made e-commerce site
Laravel is a framework written in PHP by Taylor Otwell in 2011. Laravel is a powerful framework for creating custom platforms and marketplaces such as Airbnb , Le Ciseau or Uber .
Unlike the other solutions presented which are 100% e-commerce solutions, Laravel is a framework allowing you to create any type of site (showcase, etc.). Thus, Laravel does not, by default, offer modules for payment, delivery, etc. However, because of its performance and its architecture, tailor-made developments are easily possible.
In short, a longer solution to set up but allowing to have an e-commerce platform with many specific features!
Finally, to give you an idea, we created the Gobelet Français e-commerce site using this solution + Bagisto.
WooCommerce to sell products, services on a WordPress site
Launched in 2011, WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin that allows you to add e-commerce functionality. Widely used on merchant sites in France, it allows you to create a real online store with a moderate number of products (less than 50) and with simple product variations.
With WooCommerce it is possible to sell physical and virtual products, products with subscriptions, packs of composed products or even to make product promotions.
Woocommerce integrates perfectly with the existing WordPress site and integrates management, control and sales statistics into its back office. The strong point of this e-commerce solution is that it takes advantage of the advantages offered natively by WordPress (power, community, SEO friendly, etc.).
In short, an ideal quick solution to put in place to sell your products or services on an existing (or future) WordPress site!
Magento for a powerful and scalable e-commerce platform
Magento CMS is an e-commerce CMS written in PHP by Ebay in 2008. The Magento solution is used by 7.47% of e-commerce sites in the world.
Magento CMS is a powerful, scalable e-commerce solution requiring a relatively long development time. Indeed, using a Magento service provider is not made for all e-commerce site projects (few products, no complex functionalities, few means of payment) but is ideal if you wish to have:
- A powerful, fast and scalable e-commerce.
- A site with interconnections and interfaces with third-party solutions (ERP, CRM, etc.).
- Many products with strong personalization (color, size, custom configuration).
- Multi-store, multi-language, multi-currency, multi-country.
- Many advanced features on inventory management, management of delivery costs, management of promotions or even the management of different means of payment.
In short, Magento is a longer solution to set up but allows you to have an e-commerce site with many interesting commercial features (multi shops, multi languages, web marketing power, links with ERP/CRM).
Finally, to give you an idea, e-commerce sites using this CMS. And for information, for 2 years, Allitebook has been a partner and certified Magento 2 .
