So, you’ve decided to set up an online store, and you’re presented with a few options for a place to build it. Among the front-runners are Bigcommerce and Shopify. Both of these ecommerce builders will give you a seamless startup experience, but of course each has its strengths and weaknesses. It depends, to some degree, on your business’ goals; however, Shopify tends to come out on top across all bases.
Superior Analytics
Here is the one category where you will find that Bigcommerce shines through. You can tell that it was created with the intent of providing an expansive platform to facilitate the growth of an e-business. Shopify gives you everything you need to be up and running fast with the necessary tools to serve every customer, but Bigcommerce has better built-in analytics and SEO tools to help you see not only where you are, but where you’re going, while leaving room for massive growth.
Payment Options
Bigcommerce affords the ability to accept nearly every kind of online payment under the sun, including PayPal, Stripe, and Square, but you won’t be optimized for payments on social media sites—Shopify has it.
Use Shopify to Sell Products Directly from Pinterest, Twitter, and Facebook
This is a pretty exciting, recent development that is hugely beneficial for ecommerce businesses because a lot of your customers will probably be finding you on social media. Now, those who found your product on Pinterest can impulse buy without leaving Pinterest; if a customer finds a Tweet with a new sales item, then they can buy it on Twitter; Facebook customers can do the same. This is groundbreaking because it doesn’t give your customer time to have second thoughts while they navigate your website or an outside merchant, but instead they can buy it right now.
Shopify POS
Once again, Shopify proves its worth by giving an online business the easiest possible solution for in-store purchases. Not everyone sells strictly online. If you are a business with a store in the real world, who just wants to add online purchasing, then Shopify is perfect for you. Shopify POS is a pre-integrated point-of-sale system that allows you to use a smartphone, tablet, or laptop to process electronic payments from anywhere. Bigcommerce only directs you to third-party providers which you will have to independently set up POS payments.
WordPress Sites
Yet another reason to sign up with Shopify is its compatibility with WordPress. If your business already has a self-hosted WordPress site, then the process of merging a Shopify store with your WP site is that much easier because the development interface is basically the same. As is the case when it comes to any tech company servicing online businesses, longevity and experience are the keys—and this is why Bigcommerce can serve your online business efficiently. All things being equal, however, our pick for ecommerce businesses has to be Shopify.
Shopify: Our pick for building an ecommerce site.
SUMMARY:
Shopify is best for any business selling products online, especially those who also have a real-world store.
Bigcommerce best serves startups, as well as any scalable business who anticipates significant growth, over time.
Looking for more business tools? Here’s a list of 121 small business tools for everything from payment solutions, to web design:
121 Small Business Tools to Help Increase Revenue
Stephanie
Stephanie is the Marketing Director at Talkroute and has been featured in Forbes, Inc, and Entrepreneur as a leading authority on business and telecommunications.
Stephanie is also the chief editor and contributing author for the Talkroute blog helping more than 100k entrepreneurs to start, run, and grow their businesses.