Articles

How to Make Use of WooCommerce CMS?

by Sophie C. Digital Marketing Manager

The emergence of the global communication network, the Internet, led to a real revolution in the commercial organization and its conduction. Transformations have affected both the external relations between companies and their partners or customers and the internal structure of the companies themselves. Not only new areas of business have appeared, but also those that already existed have fundamentally changed. Recent years has brought out these trends at a new level, as consumers are absorbed by mobile and online channels more than ever before.

Rapid expansion and evolution in information technology in conjunction with a new stage in the development of economic relations is contributing remarkably into the active dissemination of eCommerce. The advantages that new information technologies provide concerning the forms and methods of doing business, making sales and purchases, attract a growing number of participants. Making online shopping a more appealing choice for many.

The active use of information technologies, as well as increased investments on the Internet, leads to the rapid development of electronic commerce systems, the functionality of which is continually expanding and becoming more complex. eCommerce and online retail continue to shoot upwards to new levels. New technologies provide with new capabilities, and advanced more convenient ways to shop online are emerging. The use of Internet technologies in the development of electronic commerce increases efficiency and makes significant adjustments to the organization of trade in goods and services.

In light of the fact, a viable solution has emerged. Content Management System, or shortly CMS, has been created as a fast and convenient digital channel for retailers to reach out to consumers.

WordPress is the most popular free of charge open source CMS. There is a massive number of plugins created for WordPress that allow you to extend its functionality as much as you can, as the imagination is the only limit of what you can think when this technology merges with your skills. WordPress is a system for, the functionality of which can be changed beyond recognition using plugins. Among them, there are plugins for creating online stores, as well. WooCommerce is the most popular plugin for WordPress, which allows you to create online shopping on this engine. WooCommerce, designed for custom loop development, is very flexible and easy to use. Whether you're an experienced coder or a newcomer - any user can handle it at the click of a button — more than 30% of online stores around the world work on this plugin.

However, applying WordPress to create an online store is a controversial decision, which has its advantages and disadvantages. This is our topic today.

Despite the existing stereotype of the exclusively blogging purport of WordPress, with the help of this engine, you can create almost anything you like. And, in many cases, you can do it without even a hint of web programming knowledge, it's enough to select a good template and choose the necessary plugins.

In terms of creating an online store, the most popular fusion is a WordPress + WooCommerce combination. The plugin itself is entirely free, and you can test its work even on the standard WordPress theme.

Regarding the installation and configuration of WooCommerce on the Web, you can find many articles and manuals. Anyway, today we are to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of implementing an online store via this fusion. Therefore, let's talk about it.

Pros of creating an online store on WordPress+WooCommerce amalgam:

Installability

It is enough to download and activate the plugin, and then add a few lines to the template used to enable WooCommerce support. That’s all, simple as that, the store is activated, and you can already move towards its configuration to comb and test WooCommerce website development potential.

Templates

There are loads of designs that initially support integration with the plugin. Most templates are fairly simple, but given the low cost, developers can remit this trifle. What’s more, new quality, stylish themes for online stores on WordPress are published daily. It's all up to you!

Besides, WordPress offers a user-friendly theme customizer to help you see the changes you make at once. The number of settings you can change depends on the selected theme - the more advanced the theme is, the more setting options the theme includes. Thus, using WooCommerce and WordPress, you can create any design of the store that you wish.

Variety of WooCommerce usage

WooCommerce allows you to develop on its basis not only online stores, but also catalogs, ticketing, and pre-order systems, delivery systems, hotel reservation systems, and much more, where there is a need to provide goods or services that you can thoroughly study and pay online.

SEO-optimization

CNC, sitemap, markup meta tags (headers, descriptions, keywords) for each page, the option of compiled analytics - all in one, here.

Various payment methods

WooCommerce comes bundled with the ability to accept most common bank cards, PayPal, BACS (bank transfers), and cash on delivery. Need more options? More than 140 regional gateways are integrated with WooCommerce, including popular ones like Stripe, Authorize.Net, and AmazonPayments.

Usability

Product catalog, product card and various elements of the online store are on WooCommerce. It doesn't take a crystal ball for any user to understand and manipulate this “graver” since everything is implemented quite simply. Artless and convenient admin interface that induces fast, precise and logical setup of the store. It is relatively easy to add new products and manage the product catalog. Besides, there are several payment gateways ready to serve you immediately. A number of different built-in delivery methods with support for the delivery calculator and flexible delivery cost adjustment are your tools to heighten the loyalty of your customers.

Full control

WooCommerce gives you complete control over the online store, from tax calculations and stock levels to managing user accounts. It allows you to add and remove extensions, change the design and the settings, considering the functionality of your store. Built-in convenient analytics system (detailed charts and sales reports) and marketing elements (Apsell, Crosslink, Discount coupons, Sale, various widgets) designed to facilitate the business workflow in the first stages for those who are noobs and do not run substantial funds to hire new people in their team.

Multilanguage

WooCommerce initially has a built-in translator. Without doing any code, you get a website with multiple languages, thus enhancing and expanding horizons towards the target audience.

Extensibility

Extension of the functionality is a titbit. There are a lot of both free and premium extension packs in the WooCommerce repository. For example, Wish List, variable goods, product comparison, integration with the store of various plugins for WordPress (likes, comments on social networks, etc.), and many more. If necessary, all of these can be used. For WooCommerce, it is created a large number of extensions and additions, such as Google Analytics, Delivery notes, PDF invoices, New product emblems, etc. No matter what size of store you want to create, WooCommerce will scale according to your needs. With a growing collection of more than 300 extensions, you can improve each of the store's functions to meet the unique needs of your customers, or even create your own solution.

Free of charge

For many of us, this factor is a compelling argument, especially if you have not yet made it clear with the theme area, or you have no experience in promotion, as well. In this case, the WordPress + WooCommerce fusion will be an excellent option for experiments.

Security

Regarding security, WooCommerce and WordPress offer you plenty of data protection plugins, for example, iThemes Security. Also, you can always install a free SSL (e.g., Let's Encrypt) or buy an SSL certificate from another provider. Check and other ways to protect your WordPress, such as password protection.

 

However, as it has already been mentioned above, there is always a limit, and the case is not an exception. When using the WordPress engine with the WooCommerce extension for developing to create an online store, certain shortcomings begin to appear in the process of work. To help you navigate this tool for eCommerce development process we will list some of those defects:

Possible conflicts

The need to install various plugins, to edit and change something, can cause one plugin to conflict with another. So when customizing and expanding the functionality, most likely, you will have to call for the specialists.

Resource-intensive

After installing the plugin on WordPress, the load on the site will seriously grow. In the case of weak hosting, this will lead to an increase in page load time.

Orientation to the West

The default payment options and delivery methods are oriented mainly to the Western market. Therefore, the adaptation to a specific region should be implemented manually. A similar situation with available currencies, it is not available for all countries displaying local money.

Speed

The performance of your store built on WooCommerce in terms of speed depends on your hosting. Take care of quality hosting, so as not to encounter problems with access to the online store. The best start is hosting, optimized for WordPress, on which you will not face the problem of 503 service unavailable errors, which is low speed and idle time.

Not absolutely free  

WooCommerce is a gratuitous plug-in that after installation can be used as a full-fledged online store without paying for premium extensions.

However, some costs are to be incurred to run the store, such as:

A domain name that costs about $10.

Hosting, the cost of which starts from $ 2 (You can always change the tariff for more advanced as the store grows)

SSL certificate for secure data exchange (for free from Let's Encrypt), however, the SSL certificate starts at $ 9 per year, which is a very approximate cost, as prices are subject to change.

Premium WordPress theme, which costs $ 59 in one payment

Although WooCommerce is gratis, still there are extensions to be paid. On WooCommerce.com, there are more than 300 extensions for WooCommerce with different prices, withal most plugins cost less than $ 60.

 

We have described the main advantages and disadvantages of using Woocommerce for WordPress, which should help you make certain conclusions and make your choice when executing a custom eCommerce software development.

Since both WordPress and WooCommerce projects are with open source code, you have almost unlimited design options at your disposal. However, the engine of the online store does not cost a penny without those who can serve it, that is, without a person or a team that will be able to provide you with stable work, improvements and additions, updates at least once a year, bug fixing and so on.

That is, an engine is just a tool, and if you feel like drawing your business to a new level, but you don’t have an in-house team to embed the idea then consider a third party addendum to set up a digital store for you to sell any and everything online.



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About Sophie C. Junior   Digital Marketing Manager

4 connections, 0 recommendations, 16 honor points.
Joined APSense since, February 8th, 2019, From Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine.

Created on Feb 19th 2019 10:30. Viewed 602 times.

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