If you’ve been toying with the idea of starting an eCommerce store, let us be the first to say: congratulations! You’ll love running your own business. It’s fun, challenging, and rewarding all at once.
But before you get too far down the rabbit hole of starting this next venture, it’s important to remember that an eCommerce business isn’t a beginner’s investment. It takes the right person with the proper resources and drives to turn an eCommerce site into a successful business.
And one of the most crucial things to get right from the start is choosing an appropriate platform to host your business.
If you don’t choose wisely now, it could come back to bite you later down the road when your site has grown exponentially, and you are generating millions of dollars in revenue.
That’s why we’ve put together this list of five different eCommerce platforms so that by the end of this post, you’ll know the key features of each platform to make an informed decision on which one is right for you.
Let’s dive in.
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Growth of the eCommerce industry
The eCommerce industry has seen a steady increase in worldwide sales since 2014. By 2025, research shows that total retail eCommerce sales should reach $7.4 billion.
Several factors drive this growth:
- Increased speed and reliability of internet connections
- Improved mobile phone technology
- Reduced barriers to entry for small businesses
- Rise of social commerce
- Seamless integration of new payment processing technology
The COVID-19 pandemic also had a significant impact on eCommerce trends around the world. When brick-and-mortar stores closed in droves, shoppers flocked online to buy their things. Experts say the pandemic accelerated an existing shift to online shopping by five years.
There are a lot of large eCommerce players in the game like Amazon, Walmart, and eBay, who collectively make up more than 50% of total eCommerce sales in the United States.
But that doesn’t mean small eCommerce sites can’t be widely successful. An average eCommerce site in the United States generates over $150,000 in monthly revenue after three months and almost $330,000 in monthly revenue at the end of one year.
Of course, these sales don’t grow on trees. Setting yourself up for success from the start and establishing a solid foundation is critical.
The most important thing to iron out in the beginning stages is your eCommerce website. After all, this website will be your storefront and shopping experience for your customers throughout their buying journey.
So, let’s take a closer look at choosing the proper platform to set yourself up for long-term business success in eCommerce.
Choosing an eCommerce platform
Some entrepreneurs with coding experience say it’s best to build your eCommerce platform from scratch for custom features and a site that’s uniquely yours.
However, it’s crucial to consider all the pros and cons of the common dilemma of “build vs buy”. In this case, choosing a well-known and well-established eCommerce platform is likely the best option to save time and money and an easy way to get your foot in the door to prove your product concept.
With that in mind, let’s review the top five eCommerce platforms in more detail.
1. eWorldTrade
eWorldTrade is a leading worldwide eCommerce platform in the B2B space. The platform matches buyers with sellers — its listings include high-quality products from top suppliers worldwide.
So, say goodbye to cold outreach and email finder tools because eWorldTrade provides trusted buyers and authentic leads at your fingertips.
Key features:
- Best for B2B
- Authentic, fast, and innovative trading solutions
- Value-added services like digital branding, community and reputation management
- One-stop B2B portal with highly secure and transparent transactions
- Global presence with a strong foothold in China, Korea, and the United States
2. WooCommerce
WooCommerce is one of the most popular eCommerce solutions for small business owners. It offers a free version that allows people to create their websites from scratch or with the help of templates provided by third-party developers.
WooCommerce is a free plugin for WordPress that can turn any website into starting an eCommerce store. Whether you’re selling physical or digital products, WooCommerce B2B allows you to easily manage inventory and shipping. It’s easy to set up and powerful enough to run any type of online store. but would require the right online store hosting to get optimal results
Plus, it seamlessly integrates with major payment gateways. So, if you’re selling products targeted toward teenagers and young adults, you can integrate your eCommerce site with a “buy now, pay later” option or partner with a bank that offers accounts for teenagers.
Gen Z has $360 billion to spend, but getting them to buy is the trick. Adding these seamless payment options gives you a better chance at capturing a slice of that $360 billion pie.
Key features:
- Best for small businesses
- Turn any WordPress site into an eCommerce store
- Highly customizable
- Easy integrations: payment gateways, shipping, 1-click selling, and email marketing
3. BigCommerce
BigCommerce is a cloud-based eCommerce platform that allows you to sell on multiple marketplaces and manage your entire business from a single dashboard.
It’s easy to start with BigCommerce since installing software, or writing code isn’t necessary. You can start selling right away.
BigCommerce helps you manage your inventory, customers, orders, pricing, marketing, and many other aspects of your business. It also integrates with third-party tools like Google Analytics so you can measure your success at every stage of the sales cycle.
Key features:
- Best for large businesses
- 24/7 customer support
- Custom domain registration
- Fully hosted and mobile-optimized
- Handles breadth of inventory with ease (up to 600 variants on one SKU)
4. Shopify
Shopify is a powerful, easy-to-use eCommerce platform that helps you in e-commerce localization and allows you to create, grow and manage your online store. With Shopify, you can do everything from selling physical products to offering services.
Shopify’s drag-and-drop editor makes it easy to create a website that looks professional and mobile-friendly. You can also customize your store with apps that integrate with your existing software like the Shopify eBay integration app.
You can start with a free 14-day trial and then pay monthly or yearly, depending on how much traffic you need. Shopify charges $29-$299/month, depending on the features you need, like unlimited bandwidth and storage. Shopify also has a beginner plan. Shopify Starter plan for just $5 a month. It has enough features to sell products on social media platforms.
Key features:
- Best for dropshipping
- Thousands of apps and integrations
- Fast load times
- Fully customizable store
- Easy order tracking
5. Adobe Commerce
Adobe Commerce, formerly Magento, is a popular eCommerce platform that allows you to create a beautiful store and sell your products online. It’s open source and free, so if you want a completely customizable option for your online business Adobe Commerce is the way to go.
Adobe Commerce has excellent scalability and powerful features like inventory management, product variations, multiple shipping options, and coupon codes.
Moreover, it integrates with other apps such as ShipStation or Easy Digital Downloads so that you can manage customer orders from one place. This makes Adobe Commerce ideal for large stores with many orders daily because of its ability to handle complex tasks without slowing down operations.
Key features:
- Best for customization
- Free shipping
- Product bundling and upselling
- Marketplace for extensions such as Edit order, One step checkout, SEO , Store pickup
Wrapping up
If you’re looking to start an eCommerce store in 2022, there’s no shortage of great options.
Ecommerce platforms come in many different shapes and sizes. Some are made for large businesses with thousands of products and SKUs. While others are better suited for B2B companies or small businesses with just a handful of items for sale.
All of the best eCommerce platforms can help you sell online, but not all of them are built for growth. If you think your site could eventually need to scale, choose a platform that can grow with you.
