Ecommerce: The Advantages of Magento Over Shopify
Christopher Moore — December 3, 2016 Follow @cjmoore— December 3, 2016
Choosing the right online store platform is very important for business owners.
The two most popular choices for e-commerce are Magento and Shopify.
While both offer many features and benefits, Magento runs 14 percent of the top one million shopping sites, and 10% of all ecommerce online.
Let’s take a look at the advantages of Magento over Shopify:
Differences
The most important thing about the two platforms is how they are used.
Magento runs very large websites such as Olympus, Ghiradelli and Nike.
Shopify is used by the Los Angeles Lakers and Tesla but is usually the choice of smaller businesses.
Magento wins for SEO, generating much higher interest than Shopify.
Another large difference is coding flexibility. Magento is an open-source application written in PHP. This means it can be easily modified for individual business needs.
Shopify’s code is proprietary, meaning it cannot be altered. This makes Magento a better choice for more complex stores that require extensive customization, such as seasonal templates, special URLs and meta descriptions.
Pricing
Shopify is a hosted service that requires a monthly subscription fee.
Magento is a self-hosted platform that is maintained by the business or a developer.
The pricing scheme for Shopify starts at $ 29 per month and goes up to $ 179 per month. While the higher-priced Shopify tiers offer benefits like payment gateways and abandoned shopping cart recovery, the service also takes a percentage of each sale in transaction fees, which can quickly cut into a company’s bottom line.
Magento’s community edition is free to download and host wherever the business wants to, according to need and budget.
Both platforms are very basic out of the box and require add-ons to build a store.
Magento is the leader with over 5,000 add-ons, compared to 100 for Shopify.
Magento also offers more upfront features for customers, including wishlists, coupons, related products, gift cards and a fast checkout.
Scaling
One of the biggest challenges for an e-commerce presence is scaling as the business grows.
Shopify is limited in its ability to scale, while Magento can be as large and flexible as a company needs, making it the right choice for future expansion.
Magento is also 20 percent faster than Shopify, which provides a better user experience for visitors.
Administration
While both platforms include tools to build an online store.
Magento makes it very easy for administrators to access reports, set up payment processors, organize products and manage customers.
Easy management frees up time to expand the business and increase profits. Magento also has a strong community behind it that always available for help and advice.
When it comes to e-commerce platforms, the goals of the business and the budget at hand will decide whether Shopify or Magento is the better choice.
For stores with a small number of products, Shopify is a good starting point. When a company wants unlimited growth and flexibility with a large inventory, Magento is the clear winner.
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