E-Commerce software opinions?

[cruiseroutfit]

I need to implement a small e-commerce site for a project I am working on. Likely no more than say 10-15 products total, so very simple. I'm just starting my research and was wondering what your using, what you've setup or what you've seen at a vendor that you thought was clean and easy. It does not have to have credit card processing built in, all the orders will be manually processed.

If you can post some examples of sites you like, does not have to be automotive based at all and given the low number of products I'll be dealing with off the bat your examples likely won't be.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Skylinerider]

I use Godaddy right now. It's cheap and easy. You can pick how many products, ie up to 20, 50, 100 etc. It has templates to set up your store front, and you can customize from there. It's easy to set up for CC's as well (I do it through paypal)

www.drycanyonmaps.com

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Thanks Curt, seems that GoDaddy is one of the more popular options out there and your site does fir the bill for the clean look I'm going for My wife Candace is using it for a small side business too. I don't know why I am so picky but I somewhat loathe the idea of paying a monthly fee :-\ Though I don't want to pay more than a few hundred to get this up and going as its not going to really do 'much' for me in the way of added business if that makes sense?

For reference this is for my Helton line of products. Seeing as they are not Land Cruiser specific I figured it made sense to put somewhere on their own so customers don't have to wade through my Cruiser site to look at the Helton if that makes sense? I don't know that it will really do much for sales as much as it will provide a cleaner look and a place to put the tech, etc??

 

[Skylinerider]

What about OS Commerce?

http://www.oscommerce.com/

I haven't really looked into it, but I do have a small aversion to paying monthly fees so it may be an option in the future.

 

[Caleb]

For small simple store fronts, you may want to take a look at the Wordpress plugins. They should be free (or quite cheap) and it will also give you a backend that allows you to have informational pages on products, usage, etc. I'd avoid OSCommerce, it's far too bloated and rarely updated. ZenCart is a fork of OSCommerce that is more promising (I used it for a short while and was happy with it), but again, there's a lot of stuff included that you don't need/want. If you're going for a more complex solution like OSCommerce/ZenCart I'd suggest Magento Commerce. The issue with it, is it IS a complete solution and along with that comes complexity. Once you learn and understand it, it just makes sense to do it the way they do, but until you grasp how it handles everything, it's tough. The other issue (and I guess this applies to ANY self hosted solution) is skinning it.

 

[waynehartwig]

I've used OSCommerce for 6 years now and like it better than others taht I've tried - XCart, ZenCart, Magento, etc. There is a reason the others are based off the OSCommerce backbone.

OSC is very easy to work and modify. I know nothing about PHP, but yet I can figure out how to change stuff when I want.

I too refuse to pay a monthly/yearly maintenance fee to use someone elses shopping cart software.....

 

[Caleb]

I've used OSCommerce for 6 years now and like it better than others taht I've tried - XCart, ZenCart, Magento, etc. There is a reason the others are based off the OSCommerce backbone.

Well, First, Magento isn't based on OS Commerce, you couldn't ever mistake that if you've used the two. Magento was built from the ground up on original code. Second, the only real noticeable (interface, etc) difference between OS Commerce and ZenCart is that ZenCart gets regular updates and patches. To say OSC is better is crazy, their backends are almsot identical. Yes, ZenCart is forked off from OSC, BUT there is a very good reason and it's not because OSC is so great. Infact it's forked because OSC is flawed and a ton of the developers for OSC got sick of how the project was run and could see much better ways of handling things (for both performance and security) but OSC refused to change their model...so you have a forked project.

It's great that OSC has worked for you (as it has for many others) but to even begin to say it's a great shopping cart software is nuts. For 15 items, like Kurt is talking about, it'd probably be fine (overkill) but if he's going to install OSC he may as well save his time and use ZenCart or Magento (all of which are overkill for what he's looking for though)

 

[Herzog]

For small simple store fronts, you may want to take a look at the Wordpress plugins. They should be free (or quite cheap) and it will also give you a backend that allows you to have informational pages on products, usage, etc. I'd avoid OSCommerce, it's far too bloated and rarely updated. ZenCart is a fork of OSCommerce that is more promising (I used it for a short while and was happy with it), but again, there's a lot of stuff included that you don't need/want. If you're going for a more complex solution like OSCommerce/ZenCart I'd suggest Magento Commerce. The issue with it, is it IS a complete solution and along with that comes complexity. Once you learn and understand it, it just makes sense to do it the way they do, but until you grasp how it handles everything, it's tough. The other issue (and I guess this applies to ANY self hosted solution) is skinning it.

x2.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Would OSC, Zen, etc (purchased software) allow me to build multiple sites? Say this small one works out and I like it... could I use the same software to build a second one or is it similar to say vBulletin in which each site would require another purchase? Just thinking down the road.

 

[Caleb]

Would OSC, Zen, etc (purchased software) allow me to build multiple sites? Say this small one works out and I like it... could I use the same software to build a second one or is it similar to say vBulletin in which each site would require another purchase? Just thinking down the road.

OSC, Zen, and Magento are all free. If there is a chance you may have multiple stores, I'd HIGHLY recommend using Magento. The way it handles multiple store fronts is awesome. Everything is managed from a single backend, but you can have multiple domains with unique templates. You can even share products (selectively choosing what products cross over) between stores. I've never seen any shopping cart software that even comes close. So, of the choices so far I believe Magento is the only one that will allow multiple unique store fronts using a single install of the software. That's not to say you couldn't install the others multiple times, but that just uses additional server resources.

If you want to see some examples of Magento in action check out the store front on Summit Machine's site (Shane did that one) or check out the Tera Flex Plus site. Like I said originally though, Magento handles things (products, etc) differently than any other software. If you were very proficient with an existing cart, it may seem odd, but since you aren't it won't be that big of a deal. Once you learn it though, it makes complete sense and you begin to wonder why the other carts don't do it the same way. Also, if you would like, I could setup a test Magento cart (in fact I may have one already setup, with sample products and all) that you could play around in to see if you like it or not. I could also through up a ZenCart as well (or an OSC but I'm firmly against OSC) and you could compare them to see which you like better.

 

[Stephen]

I've never set up an e-commerce site, but I've used WordPress quite a bit. So if there is a plug-in for it, I'd say that is the way to go for the kind of site you are thinking of Kurt.

 

[jruss]

If you want a real simple solid solution check out www.ecwid.com. They have a great platform and simple user interface, it is easy to manipulate on the back end and, it's free. You could plug it into a wordpress site or a simple html site. You don't have to buy an SSL certificate either.

 

[Caleb]

You don't have to buy an SSL certificate either.

You don't ever have to buy an SSL cert for any shopping cart but if you plan to take CC's then if you want your customers to trust your site, then you better have one. Infact I'd say if you are taking personal info I would make sure I have one. $20 from GoDaddy isn't a big deal.

 

[Caleb]

If you want a real simple solid solution check out www.ecwid.com. They have a great platform and simple user interface, it is easy to manipulate on the back end and, it's free. You could plug it into a wordpress site or a simple html site. You don't have to buy an SSL certificate either.

I really like that cart for a simple solution. Thanks! I'm going to play with it this weekend and see if I can answer a few questions I have about it.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

I really like that cart for a simple solution. Thanks! I'm going to play with it this weekend and see if I can answer a few questions I have about it.

It looks pretty straightforward, clean and simple. Let me know what you think of it, you've got the eye for this stuff.

 

[Caleb]

It looks pretty straightforward, clean and simple. Let me know what you think of it, you've got the eye for this stuff.

Well, after playing around with Ecwid for a bit, I've found a few limitations, but I've also found a lot of things I like. The things I don't like is you don't have any control of the underlying software. For many, that's fine, but I like to be able to have full control of the software that's going to be making me money. Also, because you don't have full control of it, it's limited in how you can set it up. The things I do like about it are it's simplicity in setting up and implementing. You copy in a couple blocks of code that's pre-generated for you and you've got a store front. Add the products, Payment gateway info, Store info and you're rockin a fully functional store front...you can be up and running in just a few minutes. I like the admin interface, but again, because it's hosted you don't have access to your own data which makes pulling any kind of customized report impossible. You do get basic stats though. It's also limited to 10,000 products, which is plenty for most people, but for some that would be a problem. Being able to bulk upload (from a spreadsheet) is a must, and this handles it just fine. A downside is you can only do a single storefront per backend, this is supposed to be changing in the future but until it does, that's not an option. Another nice thing is it can very easily integrate with Wordpress (infact they even offer a plugin if you want) which allows you to easily integrate it with any pre-existing sites or just to have a CMS system.

Overall, for a small simple store front, I'd consider Ecwid to be a very viable solution. You will want to customize the look before going live, but that's all controlled with a css file. If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Thanks for the update Caleb. Sounds like it may work out nicely for what I have in mind.

 

[waynehartwig]

Yeah, that and right now it's free. What do you bet once they get a few on their system, they all of a sudden start charging for their service. Then your only choice is to pay it, or completely start over with another software and host.

..And thats if they don't go out of business and close up shop leaving your site down.

no thanks. I get bitchy when my store goes down for a few minutes. I couldn't even imagine the company turning off the lights and going home...

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Is Ecwid a setup where you upload all your content to their server? Or is it something where I can download the software, build the site and never have to worry about them again?

 

[waynehartwig]

Is Ecwid a setup where you upload all your content to their server? Or is it something where I can download the software, build the site and never have to worry about them again?

The first one....