advice needed for building my ecommerce shop

[nivrito]

I want to develop my own eCommerce shop (grocery, family need etc.) with beginner knowledge. i have little knowledge with wordpress and elementor. but i will be brave enough to use any platform if needed and take time. what will be my platform and processed to begin with? my points are:

1. not a multi vendor shop.
2. it should be lightweight. but should have all the features of a good ecommerce shop and future proof.
3. preferably non complex to develop and customize for my need and skill. i m basically a design enthusiastic. page builder friendly, not a coder. so design, features, and customization is my need.
4. should be compatible with cross platform mobile applications.
5. even if there is a solution with all packages it will be very welcome solution for me.

thanks in advance.

 

[Medw1311]

You need woocommerce, free and lots of tutorials on YouTube.

 

[nivrito]

there is myths that woocommerce/wordpress is slow and less secure!

 

[Medw1311]

there is myths that woocommerce/wordpress is slow and less secure!

No it's absolutely the best ecommerce solution for wordpress.

 

[guguk]

Normally i would advice woocommerce for like you beginner but this time i can advice prestashop

 

[nivrito]

absolutely u r right. but if i m ready to think beyond wordpress?

 

[Medw1311]

absolutely u r right. but if i m ready to think beyond wordpress?

Then yes prestashop as mentioned above.

 

[nivrito]

vs laravel ? and what will be my ready mobile solutions? can u suggest a bit more detail? thanks in advance.

 

[Medw1311]

vs laravel ? and what will be my redy mobile solutions?

Laravel is just a PHP framework.

I've never used prestashop but I would imagine it is responsive for mobile.

 

[guguk]

Prestashop is ready-made ecommerce solution but woocommerce is simple and it's just plug-in for wordpress which is blog based CMS. I'm using woocommerce too but i accept it's not complete solution sometimes.
If you want to make beautiful and complete ecommerce website you should add extra plug-ins or add-on to woocommerce and you will start to complain after 1 year that "my website is very slowly etc"

 

[nivrito]

how would u compare other platform's ready theme solutions ( like laravel, magento etc.) for a wordpress friendly developper? and what is the preferable framework for cross-platform native mobile application? or ready-made suggestion?

 

[guguk]

For ecommerce there have 3 options if you want real, native complete ecommerce solutions:
1- Magento
2- Prestashop
3- Opencart
If you want more basic than above there have 3 options too (CMS options):
1- Woocommerce
2- Joomla virtuemart
3- Drupal Commerce

CMS Advantages:

• CMS options you can change design easily you can modify modules/plugins easily and more cheaper than native ecommerce platforms.
• You can learn and apply easily via Youtube or something because there have a lot of tutorials.
• If you want something different design or functions you can find a lot developers for CMS platforms and these are really cheaper than native's
• You can easily maintanance and more cheaper than native's
• You can easily integrate mobile application and more than cheaper native's

Disadvantages

• CMS options have to build with base system (wordpress, joomla or drupal) and it means that will be loads unnecessary files
• CMS options builded with more simple websites than ecommerce
• If you want to make complete system you need extra add-ons ( even most simple features)
• You probably will use content builders (like wpbakery or elementor or etc) and it will decrease DOM numbers and it automatically negative impact your pagespeed

So, let's review native ecommerce platform.

Magento is builded more complex system and it managed XML files and if you want to use Magento you are really consider about PRICE. Because creating and maintanence is really pricy!

Opencart is ecommerce platform but it's really so simple. If you want to learn something about opencart you will find few resources about that more than others.

So Prestashop is more reliable system than others and it's really complete solution. What you think it's necessary for ecommerce website than you will find when you install it and you dont need any extra add-on or modules mostly.

 

[Hackerino]

PrestaShop can become expensive really fast. I prefer Wordpress + WooCommerce, you have tons of free plugins to work around. But in terms of loading speed, i think PrestaShop could win that race.

Just my personal opinion

 

[nivrito]

For ecommerce there have 3 options if you want real, native complete ecommerce solutions:
1- Magento
2- Prestashop
3- Opencart
If you want more basic than above there have 3 options too (CMS options):
1- Woocommerce
2- Joomla virtuemart
3- Drupal Commerce

CMS Advantages:

• CMS options you can change design easily you can modify modules/plugins easily and more cheaper than native ecommerce platforms.
• You can learn and apply easily via Youtube or something because there have a lot of tutorials.
• If you want something different design or functions you can find a lot developers for CMS platforms and these are really cheaper than native's
• You can easily maintanance and more cheaper than native's
• You can easily integrate mobile application and more than cheaper native's

Disadvantages

• CMS options have to build with base system (wordpress, joomla or drupal) and it means that will be loads unnecessary files
• CMS options builded with more simple websites than ecommerce
• If you want to make complete system you need extra add-ons ( even most simple features)
• You probably will use content builders (like wpbakery or elementor or etc) and it will decrease DOM numbers and it automatically negative impact your pagespeed

So, let's review native ecommerce platform.

Magento is builded more complex system and it managed XML files and if you want to use Magento you are really consider about PRICE. Because creating and maintanence is really pricy!

Opencart is ecommerce platform but it's really so simple. If you want to learn something about opencart you will find few resources about that more than others.

So Prestashop is more reliable system than others and it's really complete solution. What you think it's necessary for ecommerce website than you will find when you install it and you dont need any extra add-on or modules mostly.

wao! great details! i never tried or searched pristashop. definitely will try.

 

[nivrito]

PrestaShop can become expensive really fast.

can you explain a bit more?

 

[johnwick]

Building a self managed eCommerce store can get really tricky with all the available options.

If you want to go with WP+WOO route just try to limit the number of plugins to 20 max + 5 more only if they are really needed for your site.

Apart from that good hosting is essential for any eCommerce store.

If you got time to learn more you can look for the below mentioned options other then which are already shared by members.

Shopware: https://www.shopware.com/en/ (PHP Based)
CraftCommerce: https://craftcms.com/commerce (PHP Based)
Saleor: https://saleor.io/open-source/
ReactionCommerce: https://reactioncommerce.com/
SpreeCommerce: https://spreecommerce.org/

These are more enterprise level & suitable for operating large scale project but also require some learning curve with different tech-stack requirement. All of of the above have selfhosted, community or opensource based version which is free to get started other then CraftCommerce but still it offers a free trial.

 

[Hackerino]

can you explain a bit more?

PrestaShop lacks free modules. So if you want something more specific or customized, you would need to pay for a module.

WP + WOO in another hand, haves tons of free and good plugins to customize your eCommerce.

 

[johnwick]

@silent Bro @Hackerino is correct all the other options apart from WP+Woo have very few free modules/extension or plugins whatever they call them.

I find Magento extensions to be most costly that is the reason Woocommerce became the preferred choice of many users, as the availability of extension is more for most functions a store requires.

Even forum has a dedicated section for WP & WOO plugins to get started : https://babia.to/forums/plugins.5/
Most important part of process is to start & market, so faster you know details about your target audience.

 

[ahezkhan]

WP + WOO without any headache to start with, once you scale you can easlity switch or get better server yourself to overvome the speed and other issues till than go with WP + WOO FREE and Easy to setup.

WP + WOO and Paid like free themes from thembay https://thembay.com/product-category/thembay-free-theme/ they have one of the finest Elementor theme for Woocommerce that's also FREE. im not promoting them i love what they do.

 

[Graphic46]

use Martfury Theme for WooCommerce OR Zeexo - Premium Theme for OpenCart .
bro.