10 Essential Factors in Choosing the Right eCommerce Platform for Your Business

Dec. 19, 2022

Over the years, there has been a surge in the eCommerce industry. One can expect this popularity to only skyrocket in the upcoming years. For this very reason, many aspiring business owners have found the motivation to launch their eCommerce stores to take advantage of the sector's enormous growth potential. However, to enter the eCommerce industry through this method, you must first create a website. You will need a web developer to do this for you who will ask for a large sum of money. Plus, it may limit your company's expansion.

The alternative is to use an eCommerce platform that has already been developed.

• What is an eCommerce platform?

An eCommerce platform is a software solution that allows online businesses to manage their website, marketing, sales, and operations all in one place. They are a quick, flexible cloud-based solution that provides memorable customer experiences, improves operational efficiency, and opens up tremendous growth opportunities for your business.

But the options available to choose from are too many. Sit to analyze Shopify vs. Magento vs. Woocommerce, which will keep you confused. However, there are critical features that such platforms have in common. The other specific ones are unique to each. In this article, we will discuss these common factors that you must look for when choosing an eCommerce platform for your business.

• Factors to Consider While Choosing аn eCommerce Platform.

With the opportunities the top eCommerce platforms provide, you can build a budget-friendly and ideal storefront for your company. All you have to do is to choose the right one from the existing wide range of eCommerce platforms. Here are 5 essential features to consider while choosing your right fit.

• Supports Multiple Selling Channels

While choosing your eCommerce platform, it is essential to choose a platform that supports multiple selling channels. You should pick a platform that enables you to offer goods or services via various online marketplaces, like Facebook Messenger, Instagram, Amazon, and others. These technologies assist you in developing various selling alternatives in online marketplaces and generating increased revenue from them by enabling centralized control of your inventory data. It will help you reach a broader range of customers from different channels and boost your income. You can generate a variety of potential leads and have a good chance of converting those leads into sales.

• Mobile Friendliness

It's imperative to explore platforms that make it simple for customers to browse your website through their mobiles and make purchases conveniently. Certainly, this has proved to be more valid in our post-pandemic era. Nowadays, a sizable amount of internet purchases, including those for groceries, home items, prescription drugs, and other necessities, are made on smartphones. The most effective eCommerce platforms will create a framework for a user-friendly, seamless customer journey for these mobile users.

A well-designed mobile experience is essential from start to finish, including the design, navigation, layout, and overall user experience to give a wholesome experience. Your bottom line as a firm is generating sales and creating profits. By choosing a mobile-friendly eCommerce platform, you can avoid losing out on customers who prefer to shop on their phones. When you cater to both PC and mobile consumers, you are more likely to increase your sales. Hence, selecting an eCommerce platform with a user experience designed for mobile is best.

• Scalability

Choose a platform that has the scalability to accommodate your anticipated expansion and handle your traffic demands right now. You will surely expect your eCommerce business to expand over time. Therefore, you should pick a platform that will grow with your business. You must choose a site where there is no constraint on the number of items you may sell. It should support the expansion of your company. When you first start out, you might not want to spend extra money on storage in preparation for development. But in the longer run, it will be a must. An essential component of your evaluation is analyzing the regular site performance and learning how many users the platform can support during high-traffic periods. Choose a platform with scalability and the capability to expand with your company. A platform like that will allow you to be among the finest platforms for eCommerce.

• Security of Data and Payment 

You must carefully assess the security credentials of the eCommerce platform you're evaluating for your present demands and future expansion because you're dealing with so much sensitive data. If customers are skeptical about whether their financial information is safe from hackers and data thieves, they won't purchase anything from your eCommerce site. Because of this, any platform you pick has to include vital security components like PCI (Payment Card Industry) compliance, an SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate, fraud protection, and data backups. If you want to find possible security concerns, select a platform that also conducts security audits so that you may make the required adjustments to safeguard clients from hazards.

Moreover, check the payment methods for not just yourself but also the customers. Does your platform support third-party payment? If not, what is the alternative? You must ensure that the customer does not have to go through any inconvenience in this matter.  

• SEO Friendliness 

Most internet shoppers often use search engines to get the required goods or services. You want them to discover your business when they search for products you sell. Customers will only visit your website if they can find it in search results when looking for items similar to the ones you sell. That online exposure will receive a tremendous boost only with suitable SEO optimization. 

You will receive more traffic with increased visibility. The firm will experience an increase in conversions and revenues due to greater traffic. But for all this to happen, the platform you select has to provide a variety of SEO-related functions. Check out an SEO guide for eCommerce to understand the capabilities and work on SEO for eCommerce platforms to make the best use of it.

• Total Cost of The Platform

One of the first factors to consider when evaluating eCommerce platforms for your business is pricing. You need to know the entire cost of each platform, whether you're a tiny firm just starting or an established brick-and-mortar store coming online.

There will almost always be a monthly subscription for platforms, including the processing costs. When making decisions, you must consider both the up-front and ongoing expenditures but not give up essential items in exchange for a lower cost. Make a pros and cons list of what you are getting and what you want, and the price you are getting it for. Weigh the two sides and only then take a decision.

• Integrations

An eCommerce platform must be outfitted with everything needed to operate an online store. But in addition, it must have plugins to provide some essential services like tax calculators, payment gateways, accounting, email marketing tools, shipping apps, etc.

A number of essential plugins and integrations are present in all eCommerce systems. However, you should choose a platform that supports the integrations and plugins that are most relevant to your business and has a vibrant community that is constantly working to enhance the platform and fixes any problems. Here are some plugins to look for:

• Accounting- Deals in and delivers information about finances, including sales, taxes, revenue, and profits.

• Payment and Shipping- Eases the process of payments and shipments.

• Customer Loyalty Programs- This consists of discount coupons and other rewards that you can gift your customers to motivate them to repeat purchases.

• Email Marketing- This helps you to keep your customers updated about your products and services.

• Third-Party Digital Tools- Allows for customization while easing the integration with tools like ERPs and CRMs.

• User Experience and Themes

When you think of the brands that you go back to again and again or the ones with high popularity and a large customer base, what do you think they have in common? They all strive to provide a fantastic, intuitive User experience (UX) with their elegant minimalism, friendly interfaces, and wide range of options.

Consumers today prefer to shop in engaging, immersive platforms rather than just buying goods. They value and appreciate the experience. A brand's UX quality, if set high, can retain customers even if the price is high.

A part of the user experience will be the style of your online store. A theme determines your online store's style, and most eCommerce systems provide a choice of possibilities. Some themes come free, others have a subscription fee, while others are still premium and cost extra. Differentiating your brand from the competition in these terms is worth the cost because a great user experience is essential to converting visitors into customers.

• Order Management System (OMS)

Your eCommerce experience must be easy and quick to place orders. The longer it takes, the more customers it loses. Seat yourself in place of customers and think of how eagerly most customers await their parcels, regularly checking the shipment status. This means that if you want to compete in the market, you must have an OMS that makes the process accurate, visible, and interactive.

You can be sure that purchases are executed accurately and on schedule, if you use features like order tracking, email notifications, and shipping service API.

In order for customers to be confident that things are in-stock and prepared for shipping, there must be seamless communication between your OMS and Inventory Management System (IMS). ERP and CRM applications can be integrated using APIs or installed as plugins, among other vital elements.

• Support 

Many providers of e-commerce platforms offer a completely managed service that includes technical upkeep and round-the-clock client assistance. Some may offer additional assistance in workshops and other training sessions to assist teams in becoming familiar with using a platform. Offerings that use the software as a service (SaaS) also give complete cost transparency in the form of a pre-set monthly price.

Select a platform provider whose goals coincide with your own. Always check the vendor's track record for keeping their word regarding service level agreements (SLAs). After all, you need to be able to find a solution as fast as possible when something goes wrong. Choose vendors that offer round-the-clock emergency help across several platforms like email, phone, and web chat.

Naturally, you should also make a sensible choice when it comes to the company and systems integrator who will create and operate your online store. They frequently have a better grasp than you do of the advantages and disadvantages of the platform vendor, and they might also be able to communicate with their team more directly.

• Conclusion

The process of finding a platform becomes more clear when you know what to look for beforehand. You can choose a flexible, extensible, and scalable platform by planning and conducting thorough research on the requirements and, from the beginning, gathering a re-platforming project, even though this can feel like the beginning of a massive integration and technological mountain to climb with many risks and unknowns. 

Utilizing an eCommerce platform that fully connects all facets of your company, enables more efficient operations, and gives you a chance to expand is truly an asset for your business to boom. The daily labor of processing online sales will become easier when you use the best eCommerce platform for your company. We hope this will be of great use for you to narrow down your options and land on the most appropriate eCommerce platform for your business.