Round 4: Apps and integrations
Each of the eCommerce website builders provides a great foundation for an eCommerce site. However, depending on your business, you might like to add unique elements to build relationships or improve sales. Fortunately, all of the tools on this list offer apps and integrations if there’s a unique feature that you need to help your business grow.
Whether you are looking to increase engagement with quizzes or you’d like to add video testimonials, you will be able to find free and paid apps designed to integrate with your chosen tool. You’ll even find apps that integrate nicely with your existing inventory and accounting tools.
Shopify apps and integrations
As the most popular eCommerce website builder, it is no surprise that Shopify has a thriving app marketplace. Indeed, Shopify has over 5,000 extra apps available for your store.
One of the great things about Shopify is that it provides the basics, like a CDN, so you can focus on apps that bring value to your store. The app store is set up to make it easy to find everything you need.
You’ll find useful options for not only making sales but also apps that help make managing a store easier. For example, for international sales, or even national sales outside of your region, you can find a number of GDPR and privacy apps to provide protection for your site.
You can install all of the apps with a few clicks. In fact, the hardest thing about the apps is settling on just a few to help your store! The depth and diversity of apps are incredible. From live chats to discounts to loyalty programs, there truly is an app for everything. Shopify gets a 10/10 because of its free tools like a logo maker and a number of different name generators.
BigCommerce apps and integrations
Extending your BigCommerce store is equally easy with around a thousand apps to enhance your site. Like Shopify, you will find apps to help you with major external platforms, like Amazon and eBay, alongside tools that make running a store much easier.
As mentioned, BigCommerce is the strongest eCommerce website builder for customization, so the apps are a good opportunity to enhance your store management. The good news is that some premium apps are included with your BigCommerce account, although they aren’t easy to find.
On the other hand, the BigCommerce connectors and integrations are great tools for sharing your store’s data with inventory tools, like OneSAAS, or accounting tools, like QuickBooks, or email marketing tools, like Mailchimp.
If you’re running BigCommerce stop by their offers page where you can find exclusive offers from marketplaces, like eBay, and developer networks, Codeable, as well as review networks, like TrustPilot.
Finally, if you opt for the WordPress integration, you would also be able to access WordPress’ huge plugin library when it comes to things like email opt-ins, popups, and more.
BigCommerce has a lot on offer for app lovers: 10/10.
Squarespace apps and integrations
Squarespace doesn’t offer the same app range in their official extensions store, I was surprised to see that they didn’t offer site management tools like backups or image optimization. Maybe it is a personal preference, but I’d like to have the option to set image optimization and backups. However, it does show Squarespace has tremendous confidence in their server configuration and theme’s codebase.
The Squarespace app store doesn’t feel like it is built to help eCommerce sites grow. There isn’t an app to help you with social media marketing or any tools to improve SEO for your site.
Even run-of-the-mill things like Facebook Pixel require integrations. Unfortunately, the integrations are only available in the Business plans and above.
You can add a lot of extensions to Squarespace, but the official offerings are underwhelming and some of the Premium integrations should be standard: 6/10.
Wix apps and integrations
Wix has more than 300 third-party apps covering marketing, design, content, selling, and more. If you’re worried about third-party apps, then Wix has an excellent range of in-house apps covering advanced features like multilingual sites, bookings, music, and videos. Finding an app is a pleasure in the Wix marketplace, with navigation that helps you drill down into categories rather than aimlessly scrolling.
The apps in the marketplace are designed to help you dive deeply into various aspects of running a website. Furthermore, the apps are great for building a community without losing focus on business.
The Wix App Market is a 10/10.
3dcart apps and integrations
3dCart has a solid range of apps and modules to help you expand your store. 3dcart seems to be pushing to corner the dropshipping market, so they offer a good range of dropshipping options for both automation and suppliers.
While you will find a few familiar names, like Mailchimp and LiveChat, most of the brands in the app directory were new to me. The prices also seem quite high with one app listed for between free and $500/mo. A similar, well-known, app on Shopify and BigCommerce has a price tag of $49/mo.
3dcart has a lot of categories to help you manage a business, but it would be nice if they were accompanied with more apps to help you promote it: 7/10.
Big Cartel apps and integrations
Unfortunately, Big Cartel has a small selection of apps and integrations for your eCommerce site. While some of them, Powr.io and Elfsight, provide access to more apps like testimonials and contact forms, they are only available to users of Big Cartel’s paid plans.
It is true, the apps provide access to all of the design elements you could need and the Zapier integrations help you access a wide range of services. However, they do add an extra layer of pricing that creates complexity for the beginner user (one of Big Cartel’s target markets).
Unfortunately, this has to be a 5/10.
…
I love options when it comes to apps. While Squarespace’s confidence in their server configuration is great, I’d still like to have the option to automate backups. In the end, Shopify, BigCommerce, and Wix have the best collection of apps for reasonable prices.
Keep reading the article at CodeinWP. The article was originally written by Chris Fitzgerald on 2020-11-16 04:59:15.
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