(Newswire.net — December 8, 2016) — As with most things on the internet, there are a huge number of options for building a direct sales website. Getting into the ecommerce game is arguably one of the fastest and, often, most profitable methods for entrepreneurs to launch a start-up business. However, as ecommerce technology advances, the expectations of what features a platform should supply also rise.
It’s not quite enough to provide a simple setup with some basic customization options and the rest of the standard features. A solid platform has to be mobile, have a simple user interface, contain search engine optimization modules, allow for easy integration into multiple social media platforms, and a built-in customer service support center.
The following list details the top platforms that meet the above requirements and have a breadth of features that make them stand above the rest.
Shopify
If you’ve ever wondered how to make an ecommerce website, Shopify simplifies the entire process. As a hosting solution, it is incredibly simple to setup your ecommerce shop and, being one of the biggest names in ecommerce, provides quick loading speeds and secure gateways for payment. There are hundreds of prepackaged templates for customizing your storefront to give your shop’s landing page the custom look you’ve been wanting.
Shopify also has great customer service support with an immersive database of Frequently Asked Questions and knowledgeable representatives available to assist store owners 24/7.
There is also built-in integration for SEO. Shopify enables custom title tags, Meta descriptions and automatically generates an XML sitemap for your online store. You don’t have to be an expert with web tools to understand the back-end options provided by Shopify.
Yo!Kart
Relatively new to the scene, Yo!Kart was designed to combine the advantages of hosted and open-source ecommerce platforms. Like all the other platforms, Yo!Kart is fully customizable with deep, multi-layered security measures and doesn’t require much knowledge of how to operate a website to get started.
The important thing to know about Yo!Kart is that it is primarily for the beginning stages of a start-up organization. You can start your online store with a low-cost, ready-to-launch plan and then later migrate to a fully customizable and self-hosted plan, once your store is established.
Yo!Kart does take quite a deal of knowhow to fully customize your website. It’s also script-encrypted so you would need to work directly with its developers to understand their specific platform. If you have the means and knowhow however, seldom better options exist.
WooCommerce
If your website utilizes WordPress, WooCommerce is a great free-to-install plugin that is completely customizable (It’s free to install the plugin, but there are costs associated with fully integrating WooCommerce as a functional shopping cart). There are many themes to choose from and you can even utilize a custom design if you know the WordPress platform and have the know-how to build WordPress templates.
WooCommerce employs an intuitive administrative panel that just about anyone can understand and manage. There are no limits on product categories, blog (it’s WordPress, so…of course), and thousands of additional plugins and extensions that can be located with a simple Google search.
If you already have a website through WordPress, WooCommerce is a great and simple way to add the element of ecommerce to an already established concept.
If you’re looking to get started on your new life in ecommerce, give one of these three platforms a chance — they won’t disappoint.