Do you want to set up an online store to complement your physical store activity? This may be a good option, as online sales have been growing exponentially for some time. It will offer you, besides additional outlets, an increased visibility.
There is a wide range of tools to create an online store. Here is an overview of the best tools available in this field.
An e-commerce platform to set up your online store
In the world of e-commerce, there are SaaS platforms. These are e-commerce solutions that offer you access in the form of a subscription without any need for maintenance. You have all the necessary features to manage and sell your products online. But your customization possibilities are greatly limited.
PrestaShop
This e-commerce solution has the wind in its sails. It has become a major player in e-commerce, probably because of its advantages. It is indeed very functional, free and open source. Its many innovative tools to manage and sell your products are not to be neglected either. If the possibilities offered by the platform are plethoric, it is necessary, as it is often the case, to pay at the checkout to benefit from some features.
Shopify
The Canadian firm is an ultra-complete e-commerce platform for creating a merchant site. It charges a monthly subscription fee as well as a commission on your sales.
The platform offers a large number of very qualitative merchant site models. Moreover, its interface, very intuitive, is easy to use. What is not a guarantee in this field.
Many other alternatives to Shopify exist, but the best is probably this one. The other alternatives are mainly ClicBoutic, Bigcommerce, Weezbe, Virtuemart, Os Commerce, Oxatis, Opencart, etc. You can ask around and test the tools to see what you like best.
Wizishop
The Wizishop platform is based on accessibility. You have at hand a professional solution that does not require any specific skills. To be paid, the platform takes a commission on the turnover you generate. The registration is therefore free.
Magento
It has the reputation of being particularly powerful even if we consider its handling more difficult than the others. If its interface can be less pleasant, Magento still allows to manage several stores and several currencies. Extremely customizable, it is aimed at sellers who want to make important merchant sites.
A CMS to create an online store
The interesting alternative to e-commerce platforms is to create your merchant site easily through a CMS. There are a lot of them like HubSpot CMS Hub, Drupal, Blogger or Webflow which have modules dedicated to e-commerce to help you create an online store. However, the best of all is certainly the combination Woocommerce and WordPress
Woocommerce from WordPress
Leader of the CMS market, WordPress has a powerful plugin dedicated to e-commerce: WooCommerce. This free extension allows you to quickly configure an e-commerce site. From customization to payment through the various management of orders and shipments, WooCommerce is very complete.
WooCommerce is very easy to use. Of course, you will probably need to master HTML and CSS to go further. Moreover, like WordPress, WooCommerce is free. However, some specific modules are not free.
Other tools to run an online store
Once your website is created, you will need some tools to manage the store. Here are some very useful tools to finalize the creation of your online store.
Simplypay to multiply the means of payment
You need to offer the right payment methods and also those that match your customers’ needs. You can integrate a multi-currency payment solution into the creation of your online store in order to allow a large number of customers to complete their purchase process.
Mailchimp to manage the newsletter of the online store
Several solutions exist to help you manage the emailing of your store. But Mailchimp competes with the best. It is a very complete solution for emailing management. You can use it to build and manage your contact lists, to design a newsletter or to run emailing campaigns. Mailchimp is very easy to use and facilitates the analysis of your activities thanks to the statistics it produces.
Google Analytics to study the traffic of the online store
If you don’t analyze your sales pages, you can’t know how to adapt in a relevant and effective way. The Google Analytics tool is truly a must when it comes to online stores. It is the solution for tracking the performance of your store’s flow. It can be customized to perform a specific analysis. The tool provides you with a regular measurement of the number of visitors to your sales site, the conversion rate, etc.
Semrush to work on the SEO of the online store
You need to be visible on the web and for that, it is fundamental to be well referenced. The Semrush tool offers different analyses so that you can position yourself on the right keywords. In its free version, you won’t have many options, but the paid version, much more complete, is an ally to boost your SEO strategy.
Buffer to share posts on social media
Like Hootsuite, Buffer allows you to schedule your various social media posts. This allows you to organize a precise posting schedule for the main social networks. Even in its free version, small online stores have enough features to successfully market themselves through social networks.
Canva for compelling visuals
You should have a graphic charter that helps you take care of the appearance of your site. The graphic charter defines the visual principles of your website. It will be important to maintain visual consistency, which instantly gives a professional image to your site.
With Canva, you can easily create visuals for your online store, but also for its social networks. You don’t need to have special skills in graphics to make illustrations, logos, images, … Moreover, you have many customizable templates even in its free version to boost your inspiration.
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