Nice Online Ecommerce Platform?

[martin001]

Hi all

A colleague of mine wants a new ecommerce site, but we dont want hassles with hosting / installation etc. I used to use CandyPress but we just fancy a nice easy online, set it up, add your logo, add your products etc.

I wondered if any package stood out in particular? He looked at the 123-reg offering but didnt really see any good feed back about it.

Cheers

M

[Faevilangel]

Openmind-Commerce is recommended a lot, along with Iwebshop and Tigercommerce

Don't go with 123-reg, 1&1 etc as they are pretty poor examples.

[iboxsecurity]

There are plenty of options available all depends really on your budget and tech know how. I agree with above though do stay away from 123-REG, 1and1 and the like.

Magento is a great ecommerce sytem although you will need a decent hosting setup (nothing too expensive) to run it as its quite the system hog at times.

[Coppock]

I'd avoid most of the DIY ecommerce sites on hosts - they're great for getting started but can be an expensive mess to upgrade. You'd be better off with Magento, ZenCart, Joomla & Virtuemart, or Drupal with ubercart.

Good luck!
Jen

[cleveland]

Really a good E-Commerce platform!

[JJ Spencer]

Yes, i am agree with Coppock,easy to do but not the best to do.

[Adam_Watson]

You have to lot off option like Magento, ZenCart, ubercart,Joomla & Virtuemart, or Drupal

[GreatSEO]

Magento

Dave

[bdw]

What about Oscommerce?

[martin001]

Yes I was thinking about OSCommerce as there is a lot of community support on their site, and 1000's of cart add-ons etc. I just didnt fancy the initial setup etc.

[davidjgoss87]

Shopify (shopify.com) is reportedly excellent, although I've never used it myself. It will certainly remove the hassles of hosting, security, integration and back-end programming, though.

[brownie]

My recomendation, for a balance of aesthetics and functionality, would be Prestashop.

Quick to setup, doesn't require anything major on the hosting backend, plenty of modules to customise it's functionality, plenty of themes available or designers to modify the appearance.

http://www.prestashop.com/

[edmondscommerce]

Yes I was thinking about OSCommerce as there is a lot of community support on their site, and 1000's of cart add-ons etc. I just didnt fancy the initial setup etc.

osCommerce is a great platform, but to save a load of hassle I recommend using a loaded version such as CRE Loaded or Zen Cart is also good.

However, I have to say that its getting dated so for a new web store I would hesitate to use it.

Prestashop is OK, we have a few clients using it - its easy to work on and simple but these days the best option has to be Magento

[timruffles]

I second what Joeseph says: Magento. However, looking at his sig I can see that he is a Magento developer/contractor like me, bias perhaps :)

Take a look at the back-end and feature sheets - all of them run demo sites. The important thing is finding something that does what you need in a way you understand.

Checkout Wikipedia 'Comparison of shopping cart software' to see which offers the features you need.

[brownie]

these days the best option has to be Magento

If so why isn't everyone using it? :|

Having worked extensively with both Magento and Prestashop I would beg to differ and I think it needs clarifying this is only your POV and not shared by everyone.

They both have their strengths and weaknesses.

[edmondscommerce]

If so why isn't everyone using it? :|

Having worked extensively with both Magento and Prestashop I would beg to differ and I think it needs clarifying this is only your POV and not shared by everyone.

They both have their strengths and weaknesses.

It goes without saying that its my point of view.

I promote myself mainly as a Magento developer because there is a lot more demand for Magento services.

We are equally happy working on Prestashop, CRE Loaded, Zen Cart, Drupal, Wordpress etc etc etc.

As I said we have clients running all of those systems (and more) and on balance if I were to choose one to base a new business on it would have to be Magento.

I am definitely not alone in making that conclusion - more and more people are moving into Magento either as startups or moving from other systems. I know because we are working with a lot of them!

[zigojacko]

LiquidShop (http://www.sitemakers.co.uk/liquidshop-ecommerce/29/) developed by Sitemakers is by far the best ecommerce platform I have ever worked with.

24 hour support, constant development and updates, contains every feature you could possible think of and you just pay for the modules you want.

May cost you that little bit extra but you get what you pay for these days. Some of these cheap ecommerce solutions, many of which there are threads about on this forum are absolutely terrible, why people even attempt to use them is beyond me.

[FreelanceSoftwareDeveloper]

Have you considered Opencart?

I'm a Zen Cart expert but have recently been trialling Opencart as a more user friendly option for clients looking for a simple/clean solution.

It's also very easy to customise the layout.

[zigojacko]

I'm shocked that there are people recommending Zen Cart, it is the most appalling system I have ever come across... Considering they are one of the oldest serving ecommerce providers, I thought they would have moved with the times and been able to offer something much more comprehensive than what they were providing 5 years ago. Evidentely not.

[rendy]

I'd nominate trading eye, its actually a pretty excellent platform.

From their site

Tradingeye is a fully-featured web standards compliant Shopping Cart & CMS, built from the ground up with web accessibility and SEO in mind. Tradingeye is the choice of thousands of online retailers who care about accessibility, usability and most importantly - results.
http://www.tradingeye.com/

[Rob.W]

In a previous business, I used osCommerce - it's a great product and you can find plenty of people to install / customise it to your exact requirements.

Cheers
Rob

[Vision2]

if you want something decent, with worthwhile growth for the future. Magento just kicks everything else out of the water at the moment.

but, if you have no knowledge of setting it up / doing design etc. Then comes the cost of it.

So basically boils down to investment, and whether or not you are willing to step back and think of the bigger picture. :)

[edmondscommerce]

fair point, though we can knock out a Magento site with a custom design for something in the region of £1600 as a reasonable starting point, so we aren't necessarily talking mega bucks

[Vision2]

fair point, though we can knock out a Magento site with a custom design for something in the region of £1600 as a reasonable starting point, so we aren't necessarily talking mega bucks

yeah likewise, mine usually range from 1250 - 3k.

problem is, too many people seem to think a few hundred quid is an amazing amount of money for ecommerce, no where near.

both mine and your pricing is incredibly low for what you get.

Some crazy people out there! :)

[smo]

fair point, though we can knock out a Magento site with a custom design for something in the region of £1600 as a reasonable starting point, so we aren't necessarily talking mega bucks

Out of interest, i presume that uses the free "community" edition as the Enterprise edition seems to have a rediculous price of from $11000, and its yearly!!!

[Vision2]

Out of interest, i presume that uses the free "community" edition as the Enterprise edition seems to have a rediculous price of from $11000, and its yearly!!!

enterprise you would look to be investing 8k+ at least before its even worthwhile talking about it, in addition to the lisencing fee.

I'd be insanely surprised if anyone here or anywhere else would deploy you a enterprise version for anything even remotely less.

Community edition is fine for 99% of site :)

[Greatime123]

Hi all

A colleague of mine wants a new ecommerce site, but we dont want hassles with hosting / installation etc. I used to use CandyPress but we just fancy a nice easy online, set it up, add your logo, add your products etc.

I wondered if any package stood out in particular? He looked at the 123-reg offering but didnt really see any good feed back about it.

Cheers

M

I wouldnt put all my eggs in one basket - get a good hosting company and get a good e-commerce set up.

Hosting (uk):
NetHosted
DonHost
UnitedHosting

E-Commerce:
Openmind-Commerce
Volusion

[edmondscommerce]

Out of interest, i presume that uses the free "community" edition as the Enterprise edition seems to have a rediculous price of from $11000, and its yearly!!!

yes of course.

[edmondscommerce]

Community edition is fine for 99% of site :)

I'd make that 99.9%

As for the budget - I would specify community up to around the £30k mark

[Paddymcc]

I'd nominate trading eye, its actually a pretty excellent platform.

From their site

http://www.tradingeye.com/

That tradingeye looks superb. Any companies out there which make bespoke designs to lay over the backend?

[ispypie]

Interspire is pretty good. They have had an issue with support in the past and the cost can be more depending on the number of products you want to sell but they now have a hosted version called BigCommerce which may be worth checking out. The other cart I was considering was CS-CART which people seem to like and you seem to get good value for money.

[hopeway]

if you want something decent, with worthwhile growth for the future. Magento just kicks everything else out of the water at the moment.

but, if you have no knowledge of setting it up / doing design etc. Then comes the cost of it.

[jeniferdesauza]

Oneforty
From the offset, one of the primary goals of Oneforty has been not only to connect users with the best Twitter apps, but to give developers a platform to sell their products to spur innovation in the overall Twitter ecosystem. However, until now, developers who didn’t already have an existing e-commerce solution on their own sites couldn’t sell directly with Oneforty.

[neit]

In the last few months I have used both zencart and venda smb.

Zencart was good because we needed to some custimization to the scripts
its not the most intutive for beginner but once you get the hang of it
it is fine. Although hosting, ssl etc.. needs to arranged to used and they
have a very active development community.

Venda small business might be a better option based on your requirements.
Its costs £50 a month includes domain name.
No hassle with hosting installation etc...
Basiclly login choose a template or create your own, upload a logo,
configure your payment at the moment there is only offline or paypal.
start adding your products, configure shipping, publish your site

[benjamin_c]

why is the enterprise edition $11k thats an awful lot of money, is there anyone on UKBF who uses it? i have a server with the comunity ED on and i've had a play with the layout and settings and it seems cool, not using it for an actual shop yet though

[wwdg]

EKMPowershop is a fantastic platform for online shops and they are spending alot of time on adding new features at the moment. Great value for money and will give you all the tools you need for an online shop. Have run a company using the software myself and it was fine :)

Really does depend on what features you are looking for really, finding the right platform can be the difference between a successsful online shop and one that isn't

woody

[Vision2]

if you want something decent, with worthwhile growth for the future. Magento just kicks everything else out of the water at the moment.

but, if you have no knowledge of setting it up / doing design etc. Then comes the cost of it.

Why would that come as the cost of it? if you want something done, spend your time in your business - let people who now what they are doing do the deployment and design.

if you want to do it yourself, learn how - and learning how isn't without expence, still costs you time and money that you could otherwise spend on acturally running your business.

[connx]

I'd avoid most of the DIY ecommerce sites on hosts - they're great for getting started but can be an expensive mess to upgrade. You'd be better off with Magento, ZenCart, Joomla & Virtuemart, or Drupal with ubercart.

Good luck!
Jen

sorry for amateur question but can you use something like tiger commerce initially which seems to have a monthly rolling contract whilst getting a site developed and then just swap the new site over in its place without problems?

[Vision2]

sorry for amateur question but can you use something like tiger commerce initially which seems to have a monthly rolling contract whilst getting a site developed and then just swap the new site over in its place without problems?


your just making it harder for yourself, i wouldn't advise that :)

[benjamin_c]

sorry for amateur question but can you use something like tiger commerce initially which seems to have a monthly rolling contract whilst getting a site developed and then just swap the new site over in its place without problems?

Tiger is a pretty decent platform. there's companies with turnover of about £1million using it. so easy to use and the back end is great. in my opinion Tiger is pretty search engine friendly also if you know how to do the meta data :)

[Fill-Your-World]

We have recently switched from Jshop to Blue Park (http://www.bluepark.co.uk/)and cant recommend it highly enough. It has a massive range of features, is very user friendly and the support is just outstanding.

[rendy]

That tradingeye looks superb. Any companies out there which make bespoke designs to lay over the backend?

When I had my site created, I looked at the showcased stores and then contacted designers who had already created designs I liked

http://www.tradingeye.com/showcase.php

They did have a few themes you could buy for the v5 site but looks like they haven't finished upgrading them for the new v6 site yet!

[jackysales2]

I agree with you

[consultant]

Martin,

depending on the number of products, you could use a simple Paypal Pay Now button, however, for more than a few products, I wouldnt!

However, if you are going to do ecommerce in any (semi) serious way, use a proper system. Looking at candypress, there are plenty of options already listed here that are more powerful and free!

For straight ecommerce, Magento, OSCommerce variations like CRELoaded, Prestashop etc are great. However, if a content driven site, Joomla/Virtuemart is great (although just ecommerce is good as well!).

[martin001]

Thought I better dip in here as I started the thread in the first place!

Anyway, my colleague has opted for BigCommerce - which we both think is very easy to use and a fair price.

Thanks for all the input, though doubtless the thread will continue for a while :)

M

[upnorthal]

I've been playing with Zencart today ( I did look at Joomla, but its not for me).

The Zencart local install is about 13mb, it seems pretty nippy.

Certainlly setting up a store seems straight forward.

Financial reporting looks very disapointing, but I've downloaded an entity relationship diagram on the schema and think writing my own financials in SQL would be pretty straight forward.

The future probably is something like Magento, but Zencart is impressing me. I've not looked at any of the code behind it yet!

[zigojacko]

I've been playing with Zencart today ( I did look at Joomla, but its not for me).

The Zencart local install is about 13mb, it seems pretty nippy.

Certainlly setting up a store seems straight forward.

Financial reporting looks very disapointing, but I've downloaded an entity relationship diagram on the schema and think writing my own financials in SQL would be pretty straight forward.

The future probably is something like Magento, but Zencart is impressing me. I've not looked at any of the code behind it yet!

Zencart is terrible, it is limited in so many ways and falls a long way short of many ecommerce providers. What exactly is impressing you?

[RBS]

Check this out:
http://www.ecwid.com (http://www.ecwid.com/)

Free, super easy to set up and use.

[upnorthal]

Its fast, unlike several Magento sites I have seen.
I've pretty much got my head around the basics in a day.
Configuration has been very straight forward to date. I've not played
with template layouts yet.


I'm not looking to create a massive ecommerce site. The software worked immediately - unlike Magento which took several hours to get running due to a variety of reasons. I'm not knocking the potential for Magento or the features it offers.

I do reserve the right to change my opinion though. ;)


Zencart is terrible, it is limited in so many ways and falls a long way short of many ecommerce providers. What exactly is impressing you?

[Ali-v-8]

I have to agree I don't rate zen cart.




I'm shocked that there are people recommending Zen Cart, it is the most appalling system I have ever come across... Considering they are one of the oldest serving ecommerce providers, I thought they would have moved with the times and been able to offer something much more comprehensive than what they were providing 5 years ago. Evidentely not.

[consultant]

Yeh, disgusting, isn't it - a product which you do not pay for isn't updated!

[Ali-v-8]

If you want simple to use and modify, then I really recommend you use EKM powershop.
I also would consider cube cart.
Both are easily optimisable.
Creating SEO friendly URLs, easily editable content pages.
How ever make sure you set the url function on the Cubecart.

If your only targeting UK then EKM is a great solution for only £30 a month all in.
Telephone support is always available.

With cubcart you have to go through to sales to trick them into giving you telephone support.

[Ali-v-8]

I don't like magneto either.
Or zencart
or a number of other solutions.
A lot of Indian companies use magento.

But Joomla. *ali runs off to violently vomit*

Find proven websites that look good. Much better idea.



Its fast, unlike several Magento sites I have seen.
I've pretty much got my head around the basics in a day.
Configuration has been very straight forward to date. I've not played
with template layouts yet.


I'm not looking to create a massive ecommerce site. The software worked immediately - unlike Magento which took several hours to get running due to a variety of reasons. I'm not knocking the potential for Magento or the features it offers.

I do reserve the right to change my opinion though. ;)

[Ali-v-8]

I dont get it :|

well i think i need to introduce my products here its nice platform. We deal with . Jeans, cotton, salt , towel , mobs , rugs and carpets

[upnorthal]

Can anyone (who isn't sellnig their own cart) provide some decent reasons why I shouldn't continue to investigate ZenCart ?

So far I've found the template override system pretty straight forward.
The system is very fast. Much faster than Magento (both ran locally from an Xampp folder)

Sorry to say it, but I actually prefer the 'classic' Zecart template to many Magento sites I have seen !!

The template 'acts' and 'appears visually' the way people expect a shopping cart to work in my opinion. Its not hard to overide the classic template and create something a little more unique.

The product is free too, and I am capable of doing my own adhoc PHP mods and SQL reports.

[edmondscommerce]

I wouldn't judge Magento based on how it performs in XAMPP - it is definitely not happy in XAMPP (though it does run)..

Magento does need to be on a properly configured hosting environment, ideally Linux.

Zen Cart is always going to be faster (for most things) than Magento though simply because it is much lighter weight, it is doing less.

The trade off is that it has less features and functionality than Magento, such as the multi store functionality (which is awesome).

We still work on a few Zen / osC / CRE (they are all the same to me tbh) sites and some big clients are still using these platforms (though often heavily customised).

If you are happy using Zen then I say go for it - don't waste £30 a month on a paid for platform when there is a perfectly acceptable free system out there.. think what ELSE you could do with £360 per annum to grow your business.

[Ali-v-8]

I am speaking from an SEO's point of view.
I dont sell websites although I do endorse EKM Powershops through experience.
Lately i have been impressed with Cube cart V4 and above only.

Can anyone (who isn't sellnig their own cart) provide some decent reasons why I shouldn't continue to investigate ZenCart ?

So far I've found the template override system pretty straight forward.
The system is very fast. Much faster than Magento (both ran locally from an Xampp folder)

Sorry to say it, but I actually prefer the 'classic' Zecart template to many Magento sites I have seen !!

The template 'acts' and 'appears visually' the way people expect a shopping cart to work in my opinion. Its not hard to overide the classic template and create something a little more unique.

The product is free too, and I am capable of doing my own adhoc PHP mods and SQL reports.

[upnorthal]

I can see now that ZenCart does have far reduced functionatliy compared to some other offerings.

I'm please to see some people don't slate ZenCart :)

I still maintain Magento is an excellent product, but as you say (and as I suspected) - you do need to make a little investment to host it on a platform that will do it justice.

For a small start up such as mine, ZenCart does seem the sensible way forward. Plenty of advice around on Google plus its a tried and tested product.

Hosting for a Zencart site should be cheap. I can now focus on getting a merchant account set up - but I may have to stick with someone like NoChex for a few months. I don't fancy putting a 10k deposit up front just to get a Merchant account.

Regards

Al


I wouldn't judge Magento based on how it performs in XAMPP - it is definitely not happy in XAMPP (though it does run)..

Magento does need to be on a properly configured hosting environment, ideally Linux.

Zen Cart is always going to be faster (for most things) than Magento though simply because it is much lighter weight, it is doing less.

The trade off is that it has less features and functionality than Magento, such as the multi store functionality (which is awesome).

We still work on a few Zen / osC / CRE (they are all the same to me tbh) sites and some big clients are still using these platforms (though often heavily customised).

If you are happy using Zen then I say go for it - don't waste £30 a month on a paid for platform when there is a perfectly acceptable free system out there.. think what ELSE you could do with £360 per annum to grow your business.

[edmondscommerce]

using nochex is a mistake, better to go for paypal - at least everyone has heard of it and knows what it is

[edmondscommerce]

re SEO - we have a few tricks up our sleves to optimise osC and derivatives (eg Zen) nicely..

static looking SEO URLs with unlimited complexity

nice auto generated meta tags with the possibility to override them as required (though most clients seem to be happy with the auto generated tags, they are well optimised)

[upnorthal]

Paypal fees are pretty horendous though aren't they? I guess the Paypal branding is something everyone is aware of. I hadn't heard of NoChex until reading about it on here.

I'll confess. I really don't know that much about SEO. I do have some books, but I've not read them in any detail yet.

Is your Zen SEO expensive - is it something I could take over myself after an initial purchase?

Sorry to seem such a cheapskate. I'm just trying really hard to keep initial costs as low as possible to make this work. I do also love rolling my sleeves up and getting stuck in.



re SEO - we have a few tricks up our sleves to optimise osC and derivatives (eg Zen) nicely..

static looking SEO URLs with unlimited complexity

nice auto generated meta tags with the possibility to override them as required (though most clients seem to be happy with the auto generated tags, they are well optimised)

[edmondscommerce]

Re paypal, yes its expensive but people will use it..

If nochex is your only payment option I think you will lose a lot of potential customers. You could always offer both if you wanted.

If the business is serious you do really need to be getting a merchant account and taking cards properly its by far the most cost effective way of doing things.

Re the SEO for osCommerce - its a couple of plugins we can install for you, they are pretty much set it and forget it, would be £400 to get both installed and configured for your store.

If you want to save cash I recommend getting the meta tags one first (£200) as this will have the biggest impact. Can always add the SEO URLs later on.

[Ali-v-8]

Am I misunderstanding this.
Zencart module charges £200 extra for seo. :eek:
this is what you get from Cubecart (http://www.cubecart.com/features/)

Page URL can be set to SEO friendly.

[edmondscommerce]

Its not Zen Cart, its a custom module we have developed ourselves - two in fact. They are not the cheapest - we are not trying to be - but clients who want it have it and are happy with it.

[Ali-v-8]

Cheap doesn't mean good.


Its not Zen Cart, its a custom module we have developed ourselves - two in fact. They are not the cheapest - we are not trying to be - but clients who want it have it and are happy with it.

[edmondscommerce]

Cheap doesn't mean good.

couldn't agree more

[ever126]

couldn't agree more


don't agree

sometimes, we use free service to promote our payable service. but it doesn't mean that free service doesn't work well.

[Ali-v-8]

I agree with Ali cos he is cool :p
Split personality kicking in there sorry.

Offering free stuff as a marketing gimmick is not cheap pricing.



don't agree

sometimes, we use free service to promote our payable service. but it doesn't mean that free service doesn't work well.

[edmondscommerce]

How can "cheap doesn't mean good" not be true.

If you don't agree, then that means that you believe that:

"cheap does mean good"

Which of course is not true. I think this thread has degenerated into meaninglessness...

[Pteppic]

ClickCartPro6 or EuropaCart7 very good SEO built in and full of features. We been using them for a couple of years and work well for us.

[upnorthal]

I've just installed Ceon URI Mapping in Zen Cart. Peace of p*** to install.
It doesn't screw too much with the core files. A quick whiz through with Beyond Compare confirms this.

Now, I'm happily generated categories and products with nice URLS. No idea how good this product is in the grand scheme of things.

Google knows the answer.