Shopify is always one of the top answers for this question. in 2019 90% merchants use Shopify for their online store and couldn't be happier with its abilities. you can easily customize your storefront and link your store to your social media account so you can sell on Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter.
we will go into detail about exactly why everyone love Shopify. But first, we are going to list other ecommerce platforms you may want to test out before making your final decision.
Shopify is our favorite ecommerce platform because of all its advanced capabilities. Not convinced? Forbes wrote an article about how Shopify is an awesome ecommerce platform because it is very user friendly and easy to customize to the brand of your business. Seriously. we chose Shopify for our online store because
a) we wanted a beautiful store front and
b) we needed a user-friendly interface.
These are just a few of the of the awesome ecommerce features your online store will have with the Shopify selling platform:
This is a huge plus! i love Shopify apps. The app store allows you to add special capabilities to your store and sync your online store with other web tools you use.
Here are a few of my favorite tools that can be connected via the Shopify app store:
Freshbooks - (bookkeeping / expense tracking software)
TaxJar - (automated sales tax reporter)
Aweber - (email marketing)
LeadDyno - (affiliate and influencer marketing)
Write blog posts and share product photos on your Shopify blog to engage your customers and make more sales.
Add social media accounts to Shopify and start selling on Pinterest with buyable pins, sell on Twitter with the bug now feature and integrate your products into a Facebook shop to start selling products on your Facebook page.
Your customers are able to purchase gift cards as a gift for others. Also use gift cards to issue store credit when handling returns.
View reports showing visitor information and track where your visitors come from and how they found your online store.
So which Shopify plan is best for your online store? we recommend the Shopify plan which has some essential capabilities that the basic Shopify plan does not offer including gift cards and abandoned cart recovery.
we issue gift cards as store credit to customers who wish to return an item if it is beyond a certain amount of time. This ensures that my store will not lose the sale and will encourage the customer to make another purchase of their choice. Everyone wins. we also love gift cards because they can be purchased as gifts. The customized gift card is sent directly through email.
Customers won't always make a purchase on their first visit. Or they may leave their browser open while they make a final decision about purchasing. If they return to your website to find their cart is now empty then their mind has been made up for them. Shopify tracks how many items are placed in carts and if carts are being abandoned. we have had customers return to make a purchase that sat in their cart for a long period of time. This capability has been essential in completing sales.