Creating an eCommerce store is a fantastic option for anyone who is looking to start making more money online.

This is the perfect business model and one that is probably much more within your reach than you realize!

Think you need to be a massive retail outlet to make money from eCommerce?

Think again!

Add a store to a website and you can make a few extra dollars in the evenings buying things you bought in bulk, or even selling your arts and crafts!

If you already have a small store on the high street meanwhile, adding eCommerce to your website will give you the means to reach a much larger audience and to reduce your overheads at the same time.

With the right eCommerce platform + plugins, you can even synchronise your stock across both your online and physical shops!

All you need to do is create that store, which means selecting the right platform first and foremost…

OpenCart, WooCommerce and Magento–Understanding the Similarities and Differences:

In this post, we will be comparing three specific ecommerce platforms: WooCommerce, OpenCart and Magento.

Why?

Because the three of them are all large ‘self-hosted’ options.

This means that you will completely own your own store and will be able to edit the files as you wish – just the same as you do for your existing website.

This is versus something like Shopify, where the store exists as a page on an external site (like your Facebook profile!).

While there are benefits to hosted options, serious businesses should choose self-hosted so that they have the option to grow and develop in future.

Where these platforms differ though and what sets them apart from one another is the details.

And there are many small details that make each of these unique unto themselves…

Basically, these differences are in the execution – in the way that the sites have been designed, the way they have integrated their search optimisation and the way they’ve been programmed!

This then comes down to a matter of preference and a matter of knowing what you need.

There’s no right answer, rather the best platform will change from user to user…

For Tech Savvy Individuals

If you consider yourself somewhat tech savvy, you’re happy to go it alone and you have a moderately small-scale business at least for now, then OpenCart might be a good choice.

Why?

Because it’s completely free and open source.

That means you can do whatever you like with it and even sell it to other clients; just like you can with WordPress.

Of course this also means you’re expected to do a lot more yourself – which is why you need to be a developer.

For Marketers and Small Businesses

For marketers and small businesses, WooCommerce has a ton of great benefits.

The main appeal here is that WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin.

That means you’ll be instantly familiar with how to use it and will have tons of support and help available.

It also means you can use hundreds of plugins created by the community to extend your store’s capabilities!

And as though that wasn’t enough, WooCommerce is also ‘tried and tested’ in as much as it has been shown to be able to quickly generate profit for many other marketers.

For Large Corporations

Finally, if your goal is to become the next Amazon, you’ll need Magento.

This is a much more complex form of online store but also comes with the ability to store as many items as you need.

Check out this solution if you want to migrate from Magento to WooCommerce

It’s highly customizable too – which is partly why there’s so much work involved!

Below are some more good resources comparing OpenCart vs WooCommerce vs Magento:

• Opencart, Magento, or WooCommerce: Take your pick
• Magento Vs. OpenCart Vs. WooCommerce: Which Should You Choose?
• WooCommerce vs Magento: Which E-Commerce Platform Is Right For You?

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But don’t worry – whichever platform you choose, ColorWhistle is here to help and will get you set up! Ask us for a free website consultation.

Check out this post for more of our thoughts on selecting eCommerce platforms!