Top 15 eCommerce Platforms to Look for in 2023

Online shopping has become the norm for our daily lives and the eCommerce industry has grown to become one of the biggest and most lucrative business models in our new digital world. With the eCommerce market expected to reach?over 4.8 billion users by 2025, transitioning from a traditional brick-and-mortar store or starting up online businesses is more lucrative than ever. However, knowing the right tools for the trade is quintessential to succeed in this ever-growing hyper-competitive eCommerce market. Knowing the top eCommerce platforms, and the features they offer and identifying the ideal platform that works in sync with the business can help enterprises achieve greater heights of success in this ever-turbulent industry of online commerce.

What are eCommerce Platforms?

For a company to manage its businesses online, it needs a platform to host the webstore. An eCommerce solution is a Content Management System (CMS) that provides a platform for vendors to carry out transactions of products or services through a digital storefront. Through an eCommerce platform, sellers can manage cataloged products, register purchases, and manage customer experiences.

Most modern eCommerce platforms are SaaS (Software as a Service) applications and offer robust cloud-based shopping features with prebuilt marketing, content, and sales frameworks that integrate seamlessly into existing workflows from which both B2B and B2C companies can benefit.

Why Use eCommerce Platforms?

Starting an eCommerce business mandates the need for a webstore to allow vendors and customers to sell and buy online. To set up an eCommerce platform, there are three ways to do it. The first is to contract a website developer or an agency which often necessitates a large budget, which most new businesses starting out may not have at hand. The second is to dedicate in-house resources to develop the webstore from scratch, which requires extensive technical knowledge and is time-consuming to implement.

This brings us to our third option, using a trusted eCommerce platform. eCommerce platforms come in as pre-packaged solutions with all the necessary features to seamlessly set up an online webstore, without the need for complex coding or an eCommerce expert. With the complete set of features provided by eCommerce platforms, businesses can get started faster and improve their time to market. Thus, eCommerce platforms offer more operational flexibility, improved ROI (Return on Investment), and better business scalability. Additionally, another benefit offered by eCommerce platforms is that it allows sellers to deliver effective multi-channel shopping experiences to customers through both desktop and mobile platforms. The functionality to provide discount coupons and?use pop-ups to boost sales?also often come packaged with most modern eCommerce platforms.

All modern eCommerce platforms offer a myriad of functionality to businesses to boost their growth and deliver effective and memorable customer experiences. However, the ideal eCommerce platform comes down to the unique needs and growth plans of the business. With 2023 right around the corner, here is a comprehensive guide to the top eCommerce platforms to look out for.

The Top eCommerce Platforms for 2023

Shopify eCommerce

Founded in 2006, Shopify is one of the most popular eCommerce platforms currently in the market with a very intuitive, drag-and-drop webstore builder. Shopify is also an excellent go-to choice for setting up a dropshipping business. The platform allows effortless import and listing of products on the Shopify store from the third-party retailer, edits a listing, and allows both individual and bulk order placement.

Being a SaaS eCommerce platform, Shopify offers the benefits of managing PCI compliance, mobile-friendly designs, and pre-made design templates for creating a customized webstore.

Pros:

• Years of experience and expertise in the industry with over 1 billion active webstores.
• 70+ professionally designed responsive templates to design an eCommerce website.
• Built-in feature for abandoned cart recovery.
• Over 6000 add-on apps from the Shopify App Store for additional functionalities.

Cons:

• The additional transaction fees for third-party payment gateways.
• A limited number of countries support Shopify Payment

Pricing:

Starts with a 14-day free trial with the pricing packages as Basic Shopify: $29.99/month; Shopify: $79/month; Advanced Shopify: $299/month

Shopify Plus

In 2014, Shopify launched Shopify Plus to offer eCommerce functionalities to bigger enterprises. While the basic Shopify platform is designed for small to medium-sized businesses. Shopify Plus aims to manage online sales for larger brands with high-growth, high-volume transactions.

Businesses evolving into bigger enterprise-grade businesses often find it difficult to upscale their existing eCommerce infrastructure to adapt to their newer business strategies. This is where Shopify Plus comes into place to provide a more scalable solution. Some of the well-known brands using Shopify Plus include RedBull and Budweiser.

Pros:

• Provides greater scalability of business operation with unlimited bandwidth and sales capacities.
• Shopify Plus comes pre-packaged with a wide suite of apps and extensions to boost operations.
• Shopify Plus provides unparalleled premium Customer Support and Account Management.

Cons:

• With most of the webstore being managed by Shopify, user-end customization is limited.
• Shopify Plus requires a more hands-on approach with a certain level of expertise to operate the store.

Pricing:

Starting at $2,000/month with a variable fee for higher volume businesses

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