Are you thinking about starting an ecommerce store? If you are, then you must have thought about doing it through some ecommerce platform. There are various ecommerce platforms available on the market with Shopify and WordPress remaining the most dominant. So before getting into the technicalities. Lets focus on the first question, Which one should you choose? So here we are writing some key points for Comparing Shopify vs. WordPress. Read it till the end so that you can find the right answer.
Well, you can leave it to us to compare Shopify and WordPress as ecommerce platforms. In this blog post, we’ll compare these two excellent ecommerce platforms. Knowing their differences will help you decide the best ecommerce platform for starting an ecommerce business.
Understanding the Difference Between Shopify and WordPress
The main difference between WordPress and Shopify is what these platforms actually are. The former is a Content Management System (CMS), and the latter is an ecommerce website builder. Still, it doesn’t mean that you cannot build a great website using WordPress. Many people have done it in the past, and you can do that, too. For this you can get a step by step guide of making a website from scratch. Remember , it takes much time and patience and a bit of money as well (ofcourse).
However, it is important to know the key features of Shopify and WordPress as ecommerce platforms before starting. It will certainly help you choose the right platform for building an ecommerce store (website). We’ll talk about them in the next.
What are the Key Features of Shopify?
Here we have collected for you the top 10 key features of Shopify:
1. Easy Store Setup and Management
Building an ecommerce store through Shopify is not like a walk in the park, but its not a tough deal as well. Thanks to its user-friendly features, and easy steps such as a drag-and-drop store builder!
Shopify is also compatible with mobile commerce. Even if you aren’t a tech geek, you can go for Shopify as your website building tool, simply by looking for online videos and tutorials
2. Automated Shipping and Tax Calculation
You can be carefree about calculating shipping charges and taxes when you choose Shopify. Since it can automatically calculate them for you based on certain factors, making your work easy.
This includes your location and priority of shipment, to mention a few of those factors. What’s more? Shopify allows you to automate reminders to customers who add products to carts but don’t checkout. Free soft reminder!
3. Remarkable SEO Tools
Another prominent feature of Shopify is the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) tools they provide to the users. Not to mention, SEO plays a super important role in increasing the online presence of any business, and helps reach clients and customers globally in no time.
The same holds for an ecommerce store, which you may build using Shopify. As Shopify supports the best SEO practices, you can tweak its SEO tools to drive more customers to your store through proper strategy and planning.
Apart from SEO assistance, Shopify allows the integration of ecommerce stores with social media channels. For instance, you can have your Shopify online store linked to your social media accounts such as Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok and Pinterest.
So, Shopify is not only effective for SEO purposes but also for selling on other well-known social media sites.
4. Advanced Analytics
Advanced analytics of Shopify just like any other search engine gives you live results of sales ad spending at once. Thanks to the fact that Shopify offers powerful analytic tools! With Shopify analytics, you can get a detailed view of the following:
- How is your store performing?
- Insights into sales, traffic sources, and customer behavior
The analytics offered by shopify are equally important for an ecommerce business to consider so that it can run their business from data. This is yet another that you can not afford to overlook when developing a site with shopify.
5. Robust Security
Prioritizing the security of customer data is one of the most important aspects when you run an online business. For this reason, Shopify has integrated a robust security system to maintain the data of users on their platform. Here are some of the facts that make this ecommerce platform more secure than others:
- Shopify provides all ecommerce websites hosted with a free 256-bit SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate.
- Shopify is fully PCI DSS compliant (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard), ensuring swift and secure transactions.
6. All-inclusive Customer Support
Comprehensive customer support is another feature of Shopify that helps the owners and the customers all the same. The support team at Shopify is there to assist you 24/7 and address queries.
Apart from this, Shopify offers online discussion groups, allowing you to connect with business owners from throughout the globe and share experiences. What’s more?
Shopify offers plenty of educational resources through “Shopify Academy.” The aforenamed resource is supposed to provide guides, tutorials, and free tools, which you can use to succeed in your journey to success.
7. Abandoned Cart Recovery
Abandoned cart recovery is another handy feature that Shopify offers. It plays a very important role in increasing sales of the stores and retaining customers through various techniques and offers
Here is how it works: When customers add items to carts and leave without completing purchases, Shopify steps in. Shopify sends a reminder email to customers about unfinished transactions.
8. Multilingual and Multi-Currency Support
Through Multilingual and multi-currency support, anyone from around the world can shop from your website and pay you directly without any hassle.
Moreover, Shopify allows you to enable multiple languages from your Shopify admin dashboard so that a larger number of audiences can checkout your store. ( of course not everyone on earth can understand and read the English language) . At the same time, it allows you to create separate URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) for translated content.
Shopify provides multi currency support for those customers who prefer to be shopping in their currency. By improving the shopping experience, shopify also allows stores to seamlessly enter the international market.
9. Shopify POS (Point of Sale)
Shopify point of sale is certainly one of the strongest features that shopify has to offer. It ties online and offline sales together in one perfect place and is just what you need for businesses that operate both online and offline. You can also use it in traditional brick and mortar stores, pop up shops and even at markets.
Furthermore, Shopify POS is available as an application (app) for both Android and iOS devices. It means it allows you to sell your products in person irrespective of your location.
10. Personalization and Customization
In today’s ecommerce landscape, your ecommerce store does not just need to reflect brand identity. Besides reflecting your brand identity, it must cater to the individual preferences and needs of your customers. This is where Shopify comes in handy with the following features for your ecommerce store personalization and customization:
- Shopify Theme Store, Embracing a Wide Range of Premium Themes
- Customizable Email Templates
- Custom Profiles (Which Shopify Allows You to Create)
Moreover, Shopify also offers a wide range of free themes besides premium ones. So that, you do not have to worry about creating your Shopify store even when you have a limited budget.
What are the Key Features of WordPress for eCommerce?
We have already mentioned you need to understand the key features when comparing Shopify vs. WordPress ecommerce platforms.
Now let’s discuss in detail about the key features of WordPress as a website developing platform.
1. A Wide Array of Plugins
Plugins are the corner store of WordPress for web design and development. The same holds for building an ecommerce website through WordPress. WordPress offers many ecommerce-focused plugins, and WooCommerce is one of the most popular among them. WooCommerce allows you to do the following things, which have contributed to its popularity:
- Eye-catching Storefront Creation
- Web Pages’ Optimization for Search Engines
- Product Pages’ Customization
- Multiple Payment Gateways to Choose from
- Setting Shipping Options
- Sales Tax Calculation with Ease
Apart from WooCommerce, WordPress offers various other plugins to enhance ecommerce stores. TrustPulse, Cart Recovery, and WP Product Review, to mention some.
2. Dozens of Templates
Another handy feature of WordPress is the large number of templates it offers for building websites. For instance, you may want to build an ecommerce site through WordPress that embraces your unique brand identity. Then, you cannot go wrong with WordPress, as it offers templates in that respect.
As a matter of fact, WordPress offers over 13000 themes to choose from besides dozens of e-commerce-focused templates. You may want to create a website focused on digital marketing services, content writing services, ecommerce, etc. WordPress offers templates to let you accomplish that. So, you can easily build a customized website, an ecommerce store, easily and rapidly through WordPress.
3. SEO-friendly
WordPress allows you to create an SEO-friendly site. So, How can you create an SEO-friendly website or an ecommerce store using WordPress? Simple, You can utilize its plugins, among the few most used are Yoast SEO etc, to boost your reach and be visible to a large number of audience.
The above-mentioned plugin allows you to optimize your web pages to perform well on search engines. At the same time, it can help you achieve desired results based on how you optimize your WordPress site for SEO. So, you can confidently take advantage of WordPress to make your ecommerce store SEO-friendly.
Pros and Cons of Shopify vs. WordPress
Now you know the key features of Shopify and WordPress as ecommerce platforms. It is time we compare these two in light of their pros and cons. We have shared below the advantages and disadvantages of Shopify and WordPress in that respect:
What are the Advantages of Using Shopify?
Here are the advantages (pros) of Shopify as an ecommerce, website building platform:
- Shopify requires no coding or technical knowledge.
- In particular, this platform is targeted at building ecommerce websites.
- You need no external security or hosting platforms with Shopify.
What are the Disadvantages of Using Shopify?
You should know the disadvantages (cons) of Shopify:
- Based on your plan, you need to pay 0.5 to 2 percent extra transaction fees unless you use Shopify payments.
- You will need to reformat your store content, provided that you change your theme.
- Drag-and-drop feature of Shopify isn’t that simple, as you cannot always drag and drop objects where you like.
What are the Advantages of Using WordPress?
Here are some of the advantages of WordPress as we know:
- WordPress lets you totally customize your ecommerce store compared to Shopify.
- It is much easier to use with its block-based page builder-like content editor “Gutenberg.”
- In addition, WordPress provides you with endless resources to tackle any problems you face using it.
What are the Disadvantages of Using WordPress?
Some disadvantages of WordPress as an ecommerce website:
- You need some technical ability to build advanced websites or ecommerce stores using WordPress.
- In no time at all, you can find WordPress a little pricey when you need to add extra features to your site.
- Further, you need external web hosting, such as Bluehost, with WordPress.