Ecommerce is a raging industry, and it is one of the potential business options. If you are foresighted, you will definitely consider exploring it.
Whether you already own a brick & mortar store or just a have the notion to start one from scratch, your website is your primary asset in the online market.
To build every asset, you need to make certain investments. Similar is the case with your web store. The challenge is to find the best deal that suits your budget, especially when you are a startup.
Before you take the next step, we recommend you sit with your partners and decide on the business model with which you want to work. If you are already done with your homework, do you have a business plan ready? Suppose your answer is affirmative. You are prepared to jump on the bandwagon of selecting the platform to build your ecommerce store.
To get your website designed, you can rely on self-hosted ecommerce platforms and hosted ecommerce platforms. The selection of either of the two options, depending upon the business model you choose and the budget you set aside. Here, we will talk specifically about hosted ecommerce platforms.
Hosted Ecommerce Platforms
Hosted ecommerce platforms are dedicated to hosting several online stores on their cloud server. Most, if not all, the hosted ecommerce platforms are designed to be used for laymen’s use. So, you need not have technical skills to create your store, and you can even manage to customize your store and update things at the backend on your own.
These platforms give you access to all the valuable ecommerce features and the mandatory ones like payment gateway integration, security patches, ease of catalog & order management. The advanced functionalities of integrated CRM and marketing ease your burden of opting for third-party apps to streamline your business activities.
If you plan to go ahead with traditional B2C, B2B, or dropshipping model, hosted ecommerce platforms will be the best deal. The top hosted ecommerce platforms of 2020 are listed below:
● Builderfly
Builderfly is the most promising hosted ecommerce platform ideally for startups and medium-sized businesses. The DIY platform is designed to be used at its best without any coding skills. You can register your business and start selling for free with a starter pack. You will get access to the pre-designed, ready-to-implement templates to tweak the look and feel of your store.
Further, you can count on the Builderfly’s business plans to improve the functionality of your store. The starter pack accounts for $35/month. Moreover, you can connect the marketplaces by upgrading with $75/month and $195/ month. With the features like real-time shipment rate calculation, you can improve the conversion chances with ace level transparency with the potential customers. By integrating your sales channels and social platforms, you can multiply the opportunities to grow your business network.
Builderfly is the only cloud-based ecommerce platform that gives you access to mobile app builder. Thus, you can build your native m-commerce app on your own and launch it for iOS and Android versions. You will get the liberty to customize it and test the build before you go live.
● Shopify
Shopify is the fame name in the ecommerce industry is known to assist businesses from their first sale to full scale. You can build your online store with Shopify by making the minimum investment of $29 every month. To add more features, you need to upgrade your business plan with advanced plans like $79 and $299/month. In addition to free themes, the Shopify marketplace has collected paid themes that you can purchase to transform your store’s look and feel. You will be charged with 2% of the order value transaction fees while selling via your Shopify store.
With Shopify, you can manage your business by adding third-party apps with enhanced store functionalities. It is your wish whether you like to align POS orders with your online store or not. If you want it, you can do do it.
● BigCommerce
Design your store with BigCommerce and start selling for zero transaction fees. Like Shopify, BigCommerce gives you easy access to all necessary and valuable ecommerce features. You can start building your store with the basic business plan of $29.95/month. Usually, registering on BigCommerce gets you to access a 14-days free trial of the platforms. Still, these days they are allowing you to use it for 2 months. You can take the benefit of this opportunity to lay the foundation of your dream business.
You can sell unlimited products across the major marketplaces and integrate powerful apps to your website to boost your store’s performance.
● Volusion
Volusion is another cloud-based ecommerce platform with the help of which you can design your ecommerce store. Starting at $29/month, you can start your first 100 products. The greater the count of products you will be adding in your inventory, the greater the investment you need to make in your pricing plan. They don’t charge any transaction fees to let you sell through the platform, so you can count on it to get started.
You can upgrade your business plan to count on advanced ecommerce features like sales channel integration, abandon cart recovery, advanced business reports, live shipment rate calculation, and payment gateways.
These were the major picks for ecommerce enthusiasts in 2020. Using the hosted ecommerce platform to design ecommerce store gets you full control over your store’s front-end and backend. You can customize it as per your choice and add your personal touch.
If you need assistance from the ecommerce experts to guide you before making a choice, you can write to us at support@builderfly.com, and we will get in touch with you.
