What Makes Shopify A Preferred E-Commerce Startup Platform

The choice of platform for creating an online store can make a huge difference in making an e-commerce startup a success. Shopify comes up as an excellent choice as it comes with an array of user-friendly features. A Shopify store is easy to create and manage. The platform also provides security, affordability, excellent customer support, and much more.

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Support Your Online Business With The Right Online Payment Options

Online payments make an integral part of the checkout process for every single e-commerce transaction. The success of an online store depends greatly on the payment options it makes available. The smart buyer today looks for variety in them so that he can avail a solution that is secure and simple, yet practical. A better shopping experience promises high conversion rate as well as long-term customer retention.For this reason, online sellers want to offer multiple payment options on their store so that users get convenience and flexibility. Choosing the right web development platform is important in this context too. Prestashop is an ideal choice as it has add-ons that help you integrate multiple methods to streamline the online payment process. A large number of sellers are opting for Prestashop ecommerce development in India to make the best of this feature.

Here are the most popular payment methods that most sellers want to incorporate in their stores:

• Credit cards and debit cards make the most popular way to pay for the online purchase of goods and services. An online seller can accept the payment through a dedicated merchant account or have an intermediary holding account for this purpose.

• Another preferred method is direct bank transfer, which enables the buyers to make the payment directly from their bank account. It is a secure and convenient method.

• Mobile payment apps have become a widely used option in the wake of m-commerce boom. Consumers prefer this method as it is convenient and time-saving. 

• Alternative online payment solutions like PayPal make a useful add-on for e-sellers as they do not require a merchant account. Payments can be accepted conveniently via debit cards, credit cards, and e-checks.

In addition to these methods, Prestashop developers in India suggest the inclusion of Cash on Delivery mode too. It is so because a large number of buyers are not fully comfortable with the concept of online payments and prefer this mode instead.

Tips For Choosing The Right Payment Options For A Successful Online Store:
The choice of payment methods for your e-commerce store can make all the difference in the experience it provides for the users. Here are some tips to help you make the best selection:

Offer An Optimal Mix: Ideally, you should offer a mix of four to five diverse alternatives. Look for the ones which are the most popular in your region.

Study User Preference: The choice of payment options should be done according to the preference of the targeted users. For instance, a women's fashion website would have female shoppers and the payment methods should be picked according to their preference.

Security Is Crucial: The credibility of your online enterprise depends upon the security you offer to the buyers. Therefore, it is crucial that you choose payment methods that are highly secure.

Risk Management Is Important Too: Besides ensuring buyer security, it is vital to safeguard your store against fraudulent transactions too. Choose a payment service provider who offers fraud prevention services along with the basic acquisition services.

The right combination of online payment methods can expand the sales potential for your online business and take it to the next level. Therefore, careful consideration of available options is essential to get a combination that works for you. A reputed ecommerce website designing company can help you make the right decision regarding the payment methods to be integrated into your store.

Prestashop and Shopify: Which one would work for you?

E-commerce is the booming trend today. More and more businesses are cashing in on the trend by coming up with specialized online stores to sell their goods and services. E-commerce software solutions have made it easy for them, as they provide all the basics that are needed to go online. These include customized templates, shopping cart, SEO, analytics, and e-mail marketing, to name just a few. When it comes to e-commerce development platforms, you would definitely be spoilt for choices. Amongst the most popular ones are Prestashop and Shopify. If you are looking for picking between Prestashop and Shopify ecommerce development in India, there would be several things to be considered. Here is a comparison between the two:
 

Appearance

With regards to the appearance of these platforms, it is the themes that are to be considered. Prestashop offers a wide array of customizable themes, but they lack in terms of aesthetics. There are around 1500 in number and most of them are free. The high-quality ones are professionally designed and are expensive.

On the other hand, Shopify offers nearly 100 professional-looking themes which are designed by experts. A few of these come free. These themes offer numerous settings that can help you customize them with ease. Moreover, these are compatible with multiple screen sizes.


Features and Pricing

The advantage of opting for prestashop development in india is that it is open-source. All you need to do is download and install it and you are ready to go. It makes a great bargain, considering that you get features like theme customization, adding items, tracking orders, and versatile SEO tools, all for free. You will have to pay if you need some extra features for your website.

Shopify is comparatively pricey as it is available in three paid versions, Basic, Professional, and Unlimited. All of these come with a 14-day free trial, unlimited products, round the clock support, blogging tool, and more. The extra features it offers, in addition to the core Prestashop features, make it effectively cheaper (as you may have to pay more if you add them to Prestashop platform).


Store Management

Both Prestashop and Shopify offer useful store management features for your online store. These enable you to design the pages according to your requirements. You can upload images, edit items, and use various payment gateways. Though these platforms share common store management features, Prestashop emerges as a winner on this one because it incorporates more shipping modules. Additionally, it offers impressive checkout services such as one-page checkout, gift wrapping, and shopping cart saving.


Flexibility and Scalability

Prestashop is flexible yet it lacks in terms of scalability. It can be customized according to your business's requirement but scalability is determined by the user skill. It entails so many options that these can overwhelm you when you have to scale the store according to the growing needs of your business.

Scaling up is relatively easier with Shopify. You need to buy an advanced package that provides new tools for your growing business. With Prestashop, you would have to research and find out all the new tools that are needed. Though the community focus of Prestashop does help, it is easier with Shopify.


In conclusion, the choice between these two platforms purely depends upon your business and its requirements. Whichever you choose, it is important to look for a reliable Shopify or Prestashop development company where you get the best services.

Tips for Choosing the Right Magento Theme

The interface of your online store determines whether the buyer would stay on it or leave without making a conversion. An attractive, accessible and functional e-commerce website is sure to engage visitors and earn revenues. Choosing the right theme to design your website is the best decision you can make. With a myriad of options in pre-built Magento themes offered by every e-commerce web design company, here are a few things to bear in mind to select the right one:

Compatibility with the Latest Version
Compatibility of the theme with the latest Magento version is essential and so is its adaptability to the constant upgrades as they are released. If you choose one which is not compatible with the newer versions,  you may get in trouble as some of its functionalities may not work.

Product-Appropriate Layout
The layout of the theme should be product appropriate because you cannot follow the “one size fits all” approach with online stores. With a fashion website, you would require high-quality images, zoom functions as well as color and size options in the products.  There are specific themes in Magento that are designed to present specific products and you have to find the one which works for your products. Knowing your customers and their preferences are also important so that you get a theme that appeals them visually.    

Responsiveness and Cross-Browser Compatibility
When you contact a Magento website development company for their services, ask for a Magento theme which is responsive; in other words, the website should look as good and run as well on mobiles and tablets as it does on a desktop. Similarly, there should be cross-browser compatibility with the theme because not every user runs the same browser. The aim is to give a seamless browsing experience to the users, whichever browser or device they use.

Scalability
Scalability is another key element that you should look for in a Magento theme because you may need to upgrade the online store from time to time. It should offer you the flexibility of adding or removing products, changing prices or transforming looks/adding banners for sales or seasonal promotions.

SEO-Friendliness
SEO-friendliness plays a vital role in the success of an e-commerce website. This makes it crucial to look for a Magento theme that is structured according to CSS/HTML requirements so that it supports SEO. An SEO-friendly store has better chances of success due to high visibility on the internet. Having a blog within its framework would be a plus-point for the theme.

Social Media Connectivity
Social media serves as an excellent platform to build your online brand as well as promote customer loyalty. Choosing a theme that supports social media channels can help you get the benefits of these platforms for growing your online business. 

Following these tips would help you get the best theme for your online store. At the same time, you should choose a reliable Magento web development company in India or abroad. Avail the services of one which offers you support and expert assistance with the store setup.

Magento Favors the Furniture Store to Make a Successful Business Online

 Customized furniture has been a dream for many people and the Internet revolution has realized these dreams to the core and beyond their imagination. This has been achieved with consistent efforts of the researchers and the developers.  Apart from customizing the furniture, there are several websites which offer to make the products self through Do It Yourself (DIY) model without the use of instruments and equipment. The stickiness of the website is very low, yet the product selection and carting has been very successful with Magento web Development Company. There has been continuous up gradation as per the customer requirements in design representation, user interface, and user experience.

The only variation is the cost factor which evolves logistics, taxation, and insulation. These websites help to reduce cost with the help of DIY model apart from simplicity of the product. The websites are created in a particular pattern in accordance with international standards to meet not only the taste of regional consumers, but the foreign residents too who wish to relocate. Tense websites also offer special furniture customized for patients. The websites make multiple currency payment options developed by Magento e-commerce development enabling the payments faster, easier and simpler.

The websites also run many analytics software to understand the customer requirements and accordingly make the website user-friendly. These analytics understand the customer geography, time, and visit. In addition, this has been helpful in gathering many other customer related information without touching the privacy of the customers within the Internet regulation. Experts from various domains related to the human psychology share their thoughts on how the website has to be customized keeping the requirements across the globe. They also suggest the sensitivity of the user by understanding the visiting pattern. They also put the website into a different eco system for furniture store web development by not only producing more results, but also lessening the time outs. The higher website hits has been a result of this enormous efforts by the manufacturers and developer experts.

The logistics automation also created magnificent results right from click to door step delivery. All these website and investors have also made the purchase experience from a complicated arrangement to simplest methodology of achieving the customers’ expectation. There has been many checks, controls and qualitative measures which have been put in place by these organizations to ensure the availability, and scalability of the website in accordance with the taxation authorities besides making  it a on the go purchasing experience.

With this kind of efforts and qualitative measures, all these furniture based organizations are reaping the best results from ecommerce website development companies.

Step-up your eCommerce website for Black Friday deals

 Thanksgiving Day is around the corner and I bet all of you must be equally excited about the festival. What sets our pulse racing equally is the Black Friday sale that follows consecutively to the Thanksgiving. This year's big sale is on 25th of November and is being anticipated with eagerness. The Cyber Monday sale follows this event on the consequent Monday. These two are the big events for both the customers and the eStore owners.

It's time for all you online store owners to buckle up your laces to provide an exhilarating experience to the customers and to make the maximum profit out of it. As always, the sale will start early morning and customers will be flocking to the online store till midnight.

Preparing your eStore for an exquisite Black Friday Sale

Just like every year this year's sale is going to be a super hit as 2015 witnessed a massive revenue of 1.66 billion US dollars. You can increase your eStore's revenue by adhering to certain guidelines. Hiring an eCommerce Website Designing Company could reap amazing benefits for any online business.

Main points you need to focus during  this year's sale would be:

1. A mobile-friendly website: The users of mobile devices are surging by each passing day because of its portability and ease of usage. Around half of the overall traffic on eCommerce sites come from smartphone and tablet users. So if your interface is mobile-friendly, there is a higher chance of customers placing the order rather than switching the website.

2. Ensuring proper speeds: It is really frustrating to navigate on a website that offers higher page loading time and lags in between. So keep your website up and running by using performance enhancers. Test the server load capacity frequently to ensure a flawless performance of the website.

3. Butter smooth Order processing: The user experience is equally essential in all sorts of business. Let the customer experience a smooth and quick transaction while placing the order. Include an option of Guest checkout and integration of multiple Payment gateways for a wonderful user experience.

4. Solid online marketing for a wider reach: Advertise your product in an efficient way such that the customers come to know about it. Integrate helpful keywords in your content and assign a team for enhanced Search Engine results. Run a publicity campaign about the offers and coupons available for different products on your website. Choose stunning images that are also informative to attract the customers in large numbers.

5. Tweak your home page theme: Customize your home page and other web pages with respect to the Black Friday sale. Hire some developers to assist you with the customization process. For example, if your website is based on Magento, you can hire a Magento Web Development Company from India to expand the eStore as per your needs.

Thus, following these points you can prepare an store to perform in a sturdy and jovial fashion this Black Friday Sale. So optimise your website and have a good social-media promotions along with email marketing for a rock solid performance this month.

Improve Your Magento Store’s Design & Speed To Increase Converts

You could be having the best prices for your online store products but still fail to generate a significant conversion rate. Despite offering better rates than your competitors, what could be possibly driving your customers away? The answer could be a bad user-experience or simply put, a bad online shopping experience. A bad user experience implies poor performance and a poor user-interface design. Let us see how to ameliorate these two aspects for a Magento store:

Improving The UI Design
Ideally, the UI design for your store should be a mix of what is ‘in’ these days and your own unique store requirements. A unique store requirement could stem from the kind of items that you are selling. For instance, if you are selling items for teenage girls, then a relevant girlish design theme becomes your store’s unique design need. But, in addition to addressing your store’s unique design need, it is important that you check if your store looks on par with the looks of your competitor stores. Does your website give a fresh and modern look? To enhance your store’s look, you must consider incorporating some of the latest e-commerce design trends such as the use of hover effects, flat design, grid layout, white space, and large background images.

In addition to the look of your store, you must check if its layout offers a simple and intuitive user-experience. Ask yourself: can you find call-to-action buttons such as the buy button easily? Can you figure out what an icon means within a microsecond of you looking at it? Is the check-out process streamlined or complicated? Does a user have to invest a lot of time to find what they are looking for? In addition to addressing these questions, you could also perform an A/B test for the elements of your store. Is a green buy button more effective at converting a visitor or a red button? Answers to such questions can be found out through A/B testing.

After figuring out what kind of improvements your store needs, take the help from an experienced ecommerce website designing company which can implement improvements.

Improving The Performance
The performance of your store can be improved by adopting a variety of measures such as:

1. Caching: Caching is the most popular means to improve the performance of any website. The process implies delivering a saved copy of a page every time a visitor returns. It is worthy to note that Magento makes an extension available that especially serves this purpose. The extension is named Full Page Cache Extension.

2. Maintain Store Database: A Magento store records user action in the form of a database that must be cleaned regularly in order to ensure quality speed. Fortunately, a Magento web development company in India can perform such regular clean-ups on your store database and thus, help you achieve performance.

3. Use Compressed Product Images: While quality product images positively affect a store’s success, it is important to note that heavy images can compromise store performance. So, make sure that you use compressed product images that are also not weak in quality. Both attributes can be ensured by using a relevant image compressing module.

4. Update To Latest Version: Updating your store to the latest Magento version is one of the most effective ways to improve performance. Update as soon as a latest version is available.

By improving the design and performance of your e-commerce website, you can render an optimum user experience, which can further help you win more converts. Just make sure that you avail the services of an experienced Magento website development company for improving both of these aspects.