Thinking about taking your business to a whole new level? Then, open an online store with the help of the best e-commerce website builder and bring in big bucks.
Taking your business online is one way to make your business flourish. It will help you take your products and services globally. With the help of an e-commerce website, you can take advantage of the ever-increasing online shoppers.
Starting an online store or e-commerce website can seem difficult for an ordinary person, but when done right it can be gratifying. Unless you’re a developer or already have a website, e-commerce website builders are the fastest, easiest, and cheapest way to start selling your products online.
Every business has unique needs and requirements, thus the website builder that works for one business might not work for another business. Ensure the website builder you choose works well for you and your website. It should help you tackle the hurdles of e-commerce and also present you with a beautiful online store that will impress your visitors.
There are numerous eCommerce website builders to help you make your online presence. From building an online store to running your business, they have your back. Let’s check out the best eCommerce website builders available around the web.
Top 5 E-commerce Website Builders
Here, let us introduce you to the top e-commerce websites that can help you easily sail through the newest online endeavour you are taking up.
1. Shopify: To Scale Your Business
Create, launch, manage, and scale your online store with Shopify!
Shopify offers the most popular and fully customizable e-commerce website builder, powering over one million online stores. It offers a platform where you can build hassle-free and beautiful online stores for your products. You can easily build an online store without any coding skills or a big budget with a Shopify e-commerce website builder.
It offers a feature-rich platform where you can use the drag-and-drop page builder to easily create your desired website. Shopify provides the most powerful tools to make your online store successful for small business owners to large enterprises. The tools range from a simple logo maker to software and apps that will help you manage day-to-day operations.
Shopify’s native market integrations allow you to sell unlimited products through your e-commerce platform and across multiple platforms like Amazon, eBay, and Etsy.
Additionally, Shopify payments make online payments easy and simple for your customers with over 100 payment gateways. You can use over 8000 Shopify apps to make your store exceptional. Also, the 3-day trial allows you to get familiar with the features without giving your credit card details.
2. Squarespace: For Creatives
If you are a creative person and you prefer a highly visual design approach for your e-commerce website, then Squarespace e-commerce website builder is the best option for you. But, they are more expensive than most website builders.
They offer modern and classy website templates designed by professionals. You can customize the colour, font, and images in these design templates to align with your brand. Nevertheless, they require very less editing as they already look amazing.
On top of all this, the templates are mobile-responsive. Thus, you don’t have to worry about creating another website just for mobile phones.
To utilize e-commerce functions you need to upgrade to a paid plan. If you’re ready to start marketing your store, Squarespace provides a variety of tools to help you connect with potential customers on social media.
3. Weebly: The Best FREE Alternative
Weebly is simply the easiest e-commerce website builder. It is the best choice for small businesses and independent sellers who are looking for stress-free solutions to their aim to build an online store.
With Weebly, you can set up your online store in less than an hour. Listing your products and pushing them to your customers, all done in minimal time with less fussing over the technicalities. All this is in the free plan itself!
However, with a free plan, you can’t connect a custom domain name. Also, with both free and lower-tier paid plans, they display square ads on your website. Upgrading to a higher-tier plan will allow you to have an ad-free website. So, Weebly will be a great option for you if these factors are not a deal-breaker for you or your business.
4. Wix: Limitless Selling
Wix offers everything you need to create and launch your online store which includes a free domain name and lots of pre-made templates. It helps even non-designers to design professional e-commerce websites with incredible designs and features. That’s how simple it is to work with!
Wix offers secure payment options and all the data collected by the website is kept safe with its top-level security practices. This will in turn help you in building your brand name and trust factor.
Another astounding thing that makes Wix stand apart from the rest of the e-commerce website builders is that it doesn’t charge any additional transaction fees. Others charge you 3% or more on top of the processing fee.
They allow you to sell unlimited products and there are no revenue limits even on the lowest plan. But a plan upgrade will get you more storage space and added features. So, upgrading as you grow is truly a choice.
5. BigCommerce: For Enterprises
BigCommerce, just like the name suggests offers the best online store builder for big companies or enterprise-level companies. Their clients include Procter & Gamble (P&G), GE Appliances, etc.
If you are a tech-savvy business owner, you can take advantage of its web hosting and customization options and use them for your rapid growth. You can use it for free for 15 days, then you will have to pick a plan. Every plan includes unlimited products and unlimited staff accounts without ever paying extra. But, they have placed revenue limits on each of its plans. So, you will have to upgrade as you grow.
BigCommerce offers complex and advanced features including a single-page checkout process, international selling capabilities, SEO-optimized e-commerce websites, and multichannel sales capabilities.
However, domain names can’t be registered through BigCommerce, so you’ll need to register domain names elsewhere and connect them.
How to Choose the Best Website Builder?
We will help you with a simple methodology to decide the best website builder option for you. Have a look at these factors and think deeper about what you need for your e-commerce website or online store.
- Pricing Options: Gather an overall idea about the cost of each plan and the extra features offered by the website builder. Make sure the cost is affordable for you now as well as in the future if you are expecting growth and you have to upgrade to a higher plan.
- Limitations: E-commerce website builders often put some limits on revenue generated or no. of products listed on the website. Every platform has some kind of limitations, so make sure you are choosing the website builder after understanding the limitations. These limitations may seem irrelevant when you are just beginning. But as your business grows it can be a problem. So, make sure these limitations won’t handicap you when you have to grow bigger.
- Site-Building Skills: Building an online store from scratch needs mad skill if you are using some website builders. Then there are also the ones that make it a walk in the park. So, first of all, you need to have a clear understanding of your site-building skills. Wix, Weebly, and Squarespace are the best option for inexperienced and first-time website builders. Shopify is also a good option for beginners, but it takes longer to get a hang of it. BigCommerce is suitable for experienced builders.
- Tech Support: A tech support team that is available around-the-clock, respectful, and knowledgeable will make your journey through e-commerce easier.
- Platform Policies: The website builder’s policies regarding refunds and cancellations need to be taken into consideration. Make sure they are considerate and humane.
- User Interface: How do you want your website to look and feel? This is one of the most important factors to consider. The only way to know for sure is by trying out each of your top choices for a website builder.
Start Building For a Better Tomorrow
Online presence and e-commerce are the way forward for any business. That is the case if you want growth.
Traditional and local businesses have the potential to grow exponentially with the right e-commerce website. Create an online store and let your products and services reach a wider audience.
If you want to ensure hassle-free entry to the online arena of business, you can easily do that by giving our earlier blog “The simplest guide to build and host a website on the Internet” a thorough read!
Focus on website design and marketing features to ensure smooth e-commerce. Do consider the factors we mentioned above when choosing your website builder.