When it comes to choosing the best ecommerce website development platform¸ the right solution goes a long way in maintaining the competitive advantage of your website strategy and business. In other words, it is important to ascertain the impact of an ecommerce deployment on the future of your business in terms of marketing and customer retention. There are various ecommerce website development platforms available in the industry, each with its own features and characteristics. When choosing an appropriate ecommerce website development platform, opt for one that you can support and one that will provide your customers the right features to run a successful online store. Some well known platforms are Magento and OsCommerce.
eCommerce Website Development Platforms: Open Source Options
OsCommerce:
The features of OsCommerce [http://www.oscommerce.com/] include:
- Wide support for many products and categories
- Multicurrency support
- Support for physical and virtual products
- PHP backend
- Browser install and plug-in support
ZenCart:
ZenCart [http://www.zen-cart.com/] is similar to OsCommerce and integrates payment gateways like Paypal and LinkPoint. Its features include:
- Frontend is validated to XHTML 1.0 Transitional
- Any PHP code change is protected during upgrades
- Integrated with phpBB
- Meta tags and keywords can be controlled at the product level
Magento:
Magento [http://www.magentocommerce.com/] is a popular ecommerce website development platform and is feature packed. Some of the features of Magento include:
Analytics and Reporting:
- Google analytics integration
- Admin dashboard for reporting
- RSS feed for new orders
- Invoicing and shopping cart reporting
Catalog Management:
- Inventory management
- Product batch updates
- Tax rates per location
- Search results rewrites and redirection
Mobile Commerce:
- iPhone optimized theme generation
- Flat rate shipping per item and order
- Free shipping
- Table rates for number of items and destination
Order Management:
- Create, view and update orders from admin panel
- Print invoicing
- Email notification of orders
- Call center order creation
LiteCommerce:
LiteCommerce [http://www.litecommerce.com/] supports easier code maintenance and has 97% of its source code open. The notable features are:
- 27 payment gateways including PayPal, HSBC and Wells Fargo
- FLEXY template engine
- No programming required to setup
- Control panel for Windows
Before Magento was released, OsCommerce was one of the most popular ecommerce website development platforms. Magento needs dedicated severs, while OsCommerce only requires a shared web hosting account. Both of them are easy to modify. While Magento is preferred to OsCommerce in programming structure, code updates and easy upgradation, OsCommerce is highly customizable and the latest releases have product support options, time zone conversions and fixes for issues in previous releases.