Wordpress cms which is one of the most easiest CMS has gained a lot of attention due to its ease of use. So mostly people wonder if this CMS can be used for building a complete Ecommerce website.
Well the answer is a definite Yes.
Few ways to build and develop a wordpress ecommerce website are:
1. Use of the following plugins:
a. Instinct/Getshopped plugin–By far the oldest and most used wordpress ecommerce theme. Merits: Its free (only grid view and drag and drop is add on).
Demerits: Lack of support and proper documentation. Also localized languages not properly done. If properly used can be handy in developing a 100 product store with categories, paypal, authorize.net etc payment gateways and also have fedex, ups and usps integrated. So this is recommended plugin and we have also used it with more than 20 stores till now. gift card/Coupon system, ssl, ratings, and reviews also supported for a product. Multi currency and also shortcodes.
b. PHP Purchase–Paid plugin and doesn’t offer anything unique in terms of price.
c. Shopp–Paid plugin but has many features. Only demerit is all of the add ons like fedex integration etc are for $25 making the plugin very costly if all features are required.
d. eShop–Very simple plugin and for free does the work for very small stores.
e. Quick Shop–Simple plugin, its freely available in Wordpress plugin repository and integrates with cforms II. So if you want to have a simple shop with a contact form underneath each product you can go for it. There is still many things missing in the plugin so not recommended for more than 10 product store.
f. ECWID–Fancy wordpress plugin with drag and drop, lightbox feature for products, variations etc. Has everything that ecommerce store should have. Limitation free only upto 100 products. Then $17 per month for using it for upto 500-1000 products which is expensive apart from the hosting.
g. YAK for Wordpress–Has gallery of products and integrates with common payment gateways. Uses posts in order to make products and has a handbook. With respect to product selling with shipping via 3rd party this plugin is handy. Doesn’t have csv upload, shipping and taxes.
h. WP Auctions— Want to set up auctions on your blog then you got this solution handy. Has paypal integration. Free version is handy for just simple auctions, for more complex ones $129 paid version is required.
i. Artpal–As name suggests was developed for artists. Shows the transactions and lets you add it via posts. But that’s it nothing special or extra. No taxes, custom features, no extra gateways other than paypal.
j. FatFreeCart–Used only for Google Checkout and PayPal. Developed by E-junkie is the basic wordpress shopping cart with addition of variations and a cart for products. The redirecting to paypal for payment. Taxes, csv uploads, shipping missing.
k. ShopTab eCommerce Cart–One of the latest to enter ecommerce stores for wordpress. The best feature of shoptab is it allows for a facebook shop as well. So you want to sell online as well as on social networking site like facebook. Go for it.
l. Lockpress plugin–As name suggests charging customers for viewing protected posts or pages. I know you will say Wishlist member and S2 member is also the same and does the same kind of job.
m. Firestorm Ecommerce Cart–This is a handy wordpress plugin with similar features as Instinct or Getshopped but some features like reviews, ratings, and coupon system are yet to be developed.
n. WP Store Cart–Paid shopping cart with widgets, shortcodes, coupons and multicurrency. Lacking localized languages, csv upload, reviews and ratings (which can though be added to a post separately via plugins) and variations.
Conclusion:
Instinct/Get shopped is free and has most features that other plugins have. But it is not something one can do it on his/her own. So if you are getting some developer build your site in wordpress go for getshopped. Trying it on your own then simple ones like eshop or artpal is recommended.
2. Use of premium themes from some of the following:
a. Templatic–One of the best resources for Wordpress themes has many premium ecommerce themes listed. One can select how one prefers the product to showcase and then hire a designer or developer to tweak it as per their own needs. Costs: $65 to $99 per theme. Disadvantages: Doesn’t include all features of a wordpress ecommerce site but yes the main advantage is someone can select a particular theme and then get it tweaked as per own needs.
b. Shopperpress–Available with more than 20 designs and has its own admin panel. Available for $70. It has everything that a store/ecommerce should have. Only disadvantage is, yet to have functionalities like Fedex, UPS and USPS integrated.
c. Themeforest–One of the cheapest theme resources out of any site. The major advantage of themeforest is that independent providers submit their work and sell it on themeforest so themes with many advanced features cost from $12 to $35. You can select, view demo of a theme and then get it online for your store.
d. Premium WP–It is another resource for good themes. All have common pricing though.
e. Woo Themes–All themes cost the same tag of $200. So choose properly which you think is the best one for you and then pay for it.
Conclusion: Themeforest is cheapest and best but major disadvantage is support. Since they are private providers who are selling their work support may differ from seller to seller. If you have a little more budget and need support, templatic.com is the best one to choose from for Wordpress ecommerce themes.
3. Need something custom? Call us or contact us and we will create a custom theme just for you (at par with Themeforest and Templatic) and use one of the ecommerce plugins and create your own shop just for you.
We offer unlimited revisions on the design concept and you get PSD design files, all the source code and unique shopping site just created for you.
Sonal S Sinha is managing director of Shri Krishna Technologies. He has been writing about website designing, digital marketing and WordPress ecosystem for the past 15+ years. He handles the overall operations and in his free time writes suitable blog posts which are knowledgeable and informative.
