As an ecommerce business owner, it can be hard to find the right platform for your needs. Whether you’re a one-person operation or an SMB with dozens of employees, choosing the best ecommerce platform can be confusing and overwhelming. You want something that’s easy to use, but is also customizable; something that has great support and lots of integrations. Luckily for you, we’ve done our homework.
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Benefits of Using an Ecommerce Platform
More and more companies are seeing the benefits of e-commerce sites in terms of increased revenue and streamlined processes as the world becomes increasingly digital. There are numerous advantages to conducting business online, and they are only increasing in value as time passes.
The opportunity to reach more people is a major perk of e-commerce. The world becomes your oyster when you can reach multiple continents with your products. This creates possibilities for broader reach and higher revenue generation.
Streamlining the sales process is another advantage of an e-commerce platform. Automated shipping and inventory management are only two examples of the time and money-saving services offered by many e-commerce systems. This allows them to devote more time to expanding the company and less to mundane administrative responsibilities.
Best Ecommerce Platforms Canada
Below are 10 of the best Ecommerce platforms in Canada right now that can help power your online business.
1. Shopify
Shopify is an innovative ecommerce platform that enables users to create and manage their own online stores. It has become one of the most popular digital solutions for entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small business owners looking to build an online presence. The Shopify platform provides a wide range of features designed to make it easy for even novice web developers to design attractive websites with powerful tools for managing inventory, processing payments, marketing products, and shipping orders. This article will discuss how Shopify can help businesses grow in today’s competitive environment.
The ability to quickly build a website using the intuitive interface offered by Shopify is invaluable for any business owner who wants to have an efficient presence on the internet. From creating custom product pages and integrating payment gateways to setting up email campaigns and automating order fulfillment processes, this comprehensive platform offers everything needed for success in the world of ecommerce. Additionally, Shopify allows companies access to valuable analytics data which can provide insight into customer behavior so they can refine their strategies accordingly.
With its advanced capabilities and customizable options, Shopify stands out as a premier solution for anyone looking to establish or expand their digital operations. By providing smooth user experiences across devices while offering state-of-the-art security measures such as encryption technology and fraud detection algorithms, this cutting edge ecommerce platform equips businesses with all the necessary tools required to succeed in today’s market place.
Shopify Benefits:
- Easy to use: Shopify was built with small businesses in mind, so it offers an easy-to-use interface and app library along with customizable themes.
- Unlimited products
- Great user interface: Whether you’re building your own website or using one of the many themes available through Shopify’s app store, there are lots of ways to customize how your customers interact with it—and they’ll find it intuitive too!
- Payment processors are available. The key component to any store is ensuring you get paid! Shopify can help handle that with their financial processors, which have moderately low transaction fees. Shopify offers three pricing plans: Shopify Basic costs $29 per month, with 2.9% + 30¢ per online transaction.
- Ideal for Print on Demand products, physical products, digital products, and more!
2. BigCommerce
BigCommerce is a popular ecommerce platform that allows you to create a professional online store. This platform is great for businesses that are looking to sell products, services, and subscriptions. BigCommerce has the ability to integrate with over 400 payment gateways, including PayPal, Stripe, and Authorize.net. This means you can easily process credit card payments on your site without having to worry about setting up an account with each individual gateway yourself.
BigCommerce also offers a variety of inventory management tools such as multiple taxes for different locations or states within Canada or the U.S., multi-location shipping options based on address location (i.e., if someone lives in Toronto but wants their package shipped from Vancouver), and batch uploading of product photos into your inventory so you don’t have to upload each image individually every time you add new products into your store catalogs at once rather than doing them one by one which saves time & effort!
3. WooCommerce
WooCommerce Benefits:
- WooCommerce is a free ecommerce plugin for WordPress. It is the most popular ecommerce plugin for WordPress, powering over 2.5 million online stores. This makes it easy to add an online storefront that works seamlessly with your existing website without having to hire web developers or designers to make any changes.
- If you have a small business or startup and want to sell your products online, WooCommerce is perfect because it’s simple and easy to use. You can install the plugin on your site and launch an online store in minutes!
4. Wix Ecommerce
Unlike Squarespace, Wix is a website builder that allows you to build a website with no coding. If you don’t have any experience with code and want to create an ecommerce site, this is the platform for you.
Wix is easy to use and has a very intuitive user interface (UI). They also offer many templates for their stores so that users can customize their sites without having to hire someone professional.
5. Magento
Magento is an open-source ecommerce platform that’s popular among merchants, particularly due to its flexible design and powerful ecommerce solutions. Magento has been around for over a decade and is used by some of the top brands in North America, including Toys R Us and Newegg.
The platform offers features like multi-channel management, which allows you to integrate your online store with other channels such as mobile apps or social media. You can also create personalized experiences based on customer preferences and behavior through a custom loyalty program or personalization tools like dynamic pricing based on location or past shopping history.
6. Square Online Store
If you already use Square, this is a great way to integrate your ecommerce site into the POS system. If not, it’s a good option for those who want to keep their website separate from their POS system.
7. X-Cart
X-Cart is an open-source ecommerce platform that allows you to build a customized online store. It is one of the most popular ecommerce platforms in Canada and is used by more than 20,000 businesses worldwide.
X-Cart has many features that make it a good choice for any size business:
- Open source, so there are no fees associated with licensing fees or support contracts
- You can customize your site however you want through the use of extensions or custom code (this requires some technical knowledge)
- Lots of built-in features like multi-currency support, tax calculations based on geographic location, customer group management so you can create different prices for different groups of customers (like students), and order tracking so you know exactly where each order stands in your workflow process etc…
8. 3DCart
3dcart is a cloud-based ecommerce platform that offers a wide range of features and functionality, making it easy to use and set up. It’s also a good choice for small businesses, as well as those who need to sell internationally.
3dcart offers several plans depending on the size of your business, but all feature the same core features such as shopping cart management; inventory management; payment processing; shipping methods; reporting tools; social media integration; website customization tools; order fulfillment options (e.g., drop shipping); and more.
9. Weebly Ecommerce Platform
If you’re looking for a drag and drop website builder, Weebly is a great option. It’s easy to use and affordable, which makes it a good option for small businesses on a budget or non-technical users who want to get started with an eCommerce website without having to spend too much time learning how to code.
Weebly comes with most of the features you would expect from an eCommerce platform: unlimited bandwidth, SSL certificate included at no extra charge, built-in shopping cart functionality that supports multiple currencies and languages, payment integration with Stripe (a popular online payment provider), pre-made templates for different types of stores like clothing shops and bookstores so you don’t have to start from scratch when creating your own store design.
Finding the right Ecommerce platform can be confusing, but we’re here to help you find the right platform for your business needs.
Now, the first question you should ask yourself is: what do you want to sell? If you’re looking to sell just one type of product, then an ecommerce platform specifically built for that kind of product may be ideal.
For example, if you’re selling a variety of pet products and equipment like cat trees or dog beds, it might make sense to go with BigCommerce’s PetStore app. But if your business sells multiple types of products—like clothing and accessories—then having the option to build out multiple storefronts could come in handy so that you can maintain separate inventories for each category.
Another important consideration when choosing an ecommerce platform is whether or not it offers integrations with other apps in your business ecosystem (for example: order management software). An integrated solution will save time on implementation and upkeep by allowing seamless communication between different services used by your company (for example inventory management systems).
Statistics & Usage Rates
According to the “7 Best Ecommerce Platforms in Canada (2023)” from FounderJar
1. Shopify is the most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 40.2%.
2. WooCommerce is the second most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 18.7%.
3. BigCommerce is the third most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 8.3%.
4. Magento is the fourth most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 7.2%.
5. Squarespace is the fifth most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 5.1%.
6. OpenCart is the sixth most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 2.3%.
7. PrestaShop is the seventh most popular ecommerce platform in Canada, with a market share of 1.7%.
Conclusion
We hope this list has helped you narrow down the best ecommerce platforms to start your online store. As you can see, there are many options available for your business, and choosing one can be a daunting task. If you’re still unsure about which platform is right for your business, we’ve created an easy guide to help answer any questions you might have about the ecommerce platforms listed above.
