[Neji]

I'm creating a site for the sole reason of making use of e-commerce but I'm not really sure on the best option to use so any advice would be good.

I was thinking - because I'm familiar with it - of using Wordpress and then making use of one of the plug-in shopping carts available. The obvious bonus is that I get a CMS as well as a shopping cart.

My other option is using something like Magento or Zen Cart - it does need to be free, btw. I'm really not sure how flexible these options are but I'm guessing they're so popular for a reason? The other thing I need is something that is user-friendly, so if a customer wants to change things on site - they would be able to do so fairly easily.

What's my best option here?

[BlueDreamer]

Neji, on 14 January 2012 - 12:55 PM, said:

My other option is using something like Magento or Zen Cart - it does need to be free, btw. I'm really not sure how flexible these options are but I'm guessing they're so popular for a reason? The other thing I need is something that is user-friendly, so if a customer wants to change things on site - they would be able to do so fairly easily.

What's my best option here?

They're popular because they have free licences!

Choosing a shopping cart really needs you to do some background work...

1. Can it cater for the type of products you're selling?
2. Is it extendable should you need to modify the way it works?
3. Is is easy for whoever is managing it to update it?
4. What developer support options do you have if something goes wrong?

Find out about your clients requirements, then analyse as many cart systems as you can ticking off the ones that match your needs. You'll then have a shortlist of options to present to your client so they can make an informed choice as to which one will suit them.

[Neji]

Quote

They're popular because they have free licences!

Fair point! I meant they must the most popular of the free ones for a reason

Atm, the purpose is for me to educate myself rather than jump straight into producing sites for people but I'll definitely keep this in mind.

Thanks!

[Renaissance-Design]

For larger sites selling a wide variety of complex products, Magento's great. It's very powerful and flexible.

The downsides: it needs to be doing enough business to justify sticking it on a VPS, so you can use something like Varnish. It's complex to develop because you have to familiarize yourself with its innards. It's also not particularly user-friendly for the client.

You'll need to familarize yourself with more than one package, because horses for courses.

[rallport]

Neji, on 14 January 2012 - 12:55 PM, said:

The other thing I need is something that is user-friendly, so if a customer wants to change things on site - they would be able to do so fairly easily.

You can cross Magento off of that list straight away then

Every time I transfer one of those sites I feel sorry for the store owner having to update it.

Always have a few wtf moments when I see things like config settings in an XML file - so ott

[Neji]

Have been reading and Magento being complicated seems to be a common theme, but then again it seems to be with others too.

Going to have a play around with one of the Wordpress plug-ins for now, then give Magento (and maybe a few others) a try afterwards. Always good to learn new things

Thanks for the input.

[Rashenter]

Hi, Neji,

i'd recommend OpenCart. It is easy for programming and there are a lot of free features/modules.

[Dx3webs]

I don't get this whole magento is too hard to use argument.. we have hundreds of non-techy store owners who manage just fine.

magento does not need a vps or varnish just a host who has their server setup correctly and is not greedy.

[rallport]

Dx3webs, on 27 January 2012 - 09:43 AM, said:

I don't get this whole magento is too hard to use argument.. we have hundreds of non-techy store owners who manage just fine.

I've never had a customer able to use the Magento admin effectively. The one person who was able to use it gave up as it way taking them 45 minutes to add a product.

Their whole admin area is aimed at developers as opposed to front end users.

From my experience and hearing what customers I inherit say, a lot of companies favor Magento because it can do pretty much everything out of the box (bar SEO - it's pretty weak on that aspect) and when a customer asks for help they simply say "there is an in depth guide on the Magento website".

I don't care what anyone says tbh, Magento is not aimed at your average user, it;s aimed at developers and other technical people. For me, Magento is a case of "build by developers, for developers".

I'm not saying Magento isn't a good platform, because it clearly is for sites with very complicated product options.

This post has been edited by rallport: 21 February 2012 - 12:33 PM