Are you looking to get started with your online store? You’ll need to know the best ecommerce CMS platforms out there.
Developing an online store is essential for any small, medium, or large business in the competitive conditions of the Internet age.
The global ecommerce market is growing at an unprecedented rate. Of course, this growth has seen the number of platforms to build an ecommerce website increase as well.
This has made choosing the best ecommerce CMS platform to get started quite a challenge. There are, as always, many factors to take into consideration too which can result in an overwhelming amount of choice.
That’s why we’ve put together this guide to the best ecommerce CMS platforms so you can make an informed, right choice about which is the right one to build your site.
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Most Popular  | Shopify | Since its founding in 2004, Shopify has become one of the best ecommerce CMS platforms around. It's also one of the most popular, with over half-a-million businesses across 175 countries. It claims to be the "fast, responsive, and reliable" solution, and we certainly can't disagree. Whether you're a small business starting out or a large store with huge profits, Shopify can offer a pricing plan to suit you. Shopify is trusted by companies that range from Tesla Motors to Amnesty International to power their online stores. And, while one of the only disadvantages of this platform is the price, it does include a free trial so you can check out if Shopify is the best ecommerce CMS option for you. However, you are likely to find that at $9 per month for the "Lite" package, the pros certainly outweigh the cons. There are also premium prices to consider too. | Visit Site |
- A wide range stylish and professional templates
- Customer support 24/7 - via telephone, online chat or email
- Easy-use for beginner and advanced users
- SEO and marketing features
- A huge "app-store" for add-ons
- Free 14 day trial to try before you buy
- Data security
- Sale of physical and digital products
- Pay-to-use (from just $9 a month)
- Transaction fees (taken as a percentage of sales)
- Time to get to know Shopify lingo
- Expensive add-on fees for extra software or plugins
Prices
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|---|---|---|---|
User's Choice  | BigCommerce | BigCommerce is another "hosted" all in one ecommerce builder. This means you can do everything you need to do for your website with BigCommerce. Because of this, many of the technical and operating issues are already taken care of by the platform. This allows you to get set up quickly so you can start selling and marketing your products and services right away. BigCommerce was started in 2004 as well. It has since attracted many notable companies, including the car manufacturer Toyota. However, these larger companies are required to a pay an expensive fee for the service. But, if you run a smaller business, this site is often considered a good choice if you only ever intend on having a small store. | Visit Site |
- Easy-to-use platform for non-tech savvy users
- Beautiful web designs and range of features
- Customer support 24/7 - via telephone, online chat or email
- The "BigCommerce University" provides helpful and comprehensive resources for users
- Free 15-day trial to try before you buy
- Customer support is often rated "unreliable" by users
- Expensive (compared to Shopify), especially for big companies
- Limited add-ons and additional features
- Complicated functionality for beginners
- Limited versatility
Prices
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Editor's Choice  | Magento | While the Magento Enterprise Edition powers the online stores of famous brands such as Nike and Samsung, they also offer a more affordable option. The Magento Community Edition is a powerful and professional ecommerce platform. However, in contrast to Shopify and BigCommerce, Magento is an "open source" platform. This means that it does not offer the range of services of the other two options. Despite the more affordable Community Edition, Magento is mostly focused on its larger clients and doesn't pretend to be otherwise. As a small or medium-sized business, there are usually better alternatives than Magento. | Visit Site |
- There is no charge to download and use Magento
- Flexible, customizable and unrestricted platform (for tech-savvy users)
- Large group of committed user community for assistance
- SEO-friendly
- Allows you to create as many stores as you like
- Easy controls from one single admin dashboard
- Large community of developers also working on the open-source platform
- Knowledge of code and technical skills required (or need to hire technical support)
- No customer support 24/7
- Time-consuming and energy intensive to manage
- Complex functionality
- Requires substantial space on server to function effectively
Prices
| • | Product | • | Review |
|---|---|---|---|
Most Popular  | Magento | Wix has been around since 2006 and has been quite successful with smaller businesses since then. Wix is essentially an ecommerce platform that allows users to “drag and drop” any content onto their site. While the platform is initially free to use, there are also premium versions that grant access to more features and tools. Whether you consider this a negative or positive, it’s important to know that Wix is the 100 percent DIY option. This means much of the functionality is quite difficult unless you know a lot about coding and web design, etc. However, if you do have good technical knowledge, you may benefit from the flexibility of the platform. This could result in a truly personalized online shop. However, there are also many improvements that could be made to the platform. For instance, the customer management system doesn’t allow for automated customer purchase confirmations. And in some cases, there are challenging problems such as switching to a different template once you’ve started building your website. | Visit Site |
- Easy-to-use platform for non-tech savvy users
- No knowledge of code or technical skills required
- Customer support (via phone or email)
- A range of design options
- There is no charge to download and use Wix
- Limited features for users
- Technically complicated
- Customer support is not 24/7 or as reliable as Shopify and others
- Time-consuming and energy intensive to manage
- Complex functionality
| • | Product | • | Review |
|---|---|---|---|
Trending  | Weebly | Weebly was also founded in 2006 and is similar to Wix ecommerce as a so-called “drag and drop” site builder. It is one of the easiest to use of the best ecommerce CMS platforms. However, in comparison to Wix, Weebly has even fewer tools and features. Despite this, the features that are included are quite extensive and comprehensive compared to Wix. Although, it’s worth mentioning that they are limited compared to Shopify. For basic online stores, Weebly’s features and tools are usually satisfactory for basic users. And if they are not, there are premium versions to download that provide a greater range of features. | Visit Site |
- Easy-to-use for non-tech savvy users
- There is no charge to download and use Weebly
- Data security
- Customer support (email only)
- Limited features for advanced users
- Sites on sub-domains only
- Technically complicated
- Customer support (only via email) is not 24/7 or as reliable as Shopify and others
- Time-consuming and energy intensive to manage
- Complex functionality
Shopify is The Best Ecommerce CMS Platform on the Market
As has been demonstrated in this blog post, there are numerous ecommerce CMS platforms to choose from.
Many of which have their own advantages and disadvantages. And to some extent, the best ecommerce CMS platform to use, depends on the user.
Despite all of this, the short answer to which is the best ecommerce CMS platform is – Shopify.
Shopify has the best functionality of any of the alternatives that allow you to set up your website in minutes.
In contrast to some of the other platforms, you can concentrate on your website, product, and marketing, rather than the technical matters. Shopify handles this for you. This is especially important for small and medium-size businesses that cannot waste resources on additional technical solutions.
Shopify is the happy medium between the complex and technical Magento, and the simple and basic alternatives such as Wix and Weebly.
Perhaps the best thing of all is that anyone can try out the Shopify platform for themselves with the 14-day free trial.
For more information about the best ecommerce CMS platforms, get in touch.
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