eCommerce Business on Shopify vs. WordPress. Which is better?
Learn which factors to consider when taking a decision to choose Shopify or Wordpress for your dropshipping or other eCommerce business.
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eCommerce business can be established on Shopify or WordPress both, however, choosing the right platform matters a lot especially when you are on a tight budget.
Consider the following factors to choose which CMS you should choose for your eCommerce business of any model: –
#1 – Shopify vs. WordPress Cost Factor
Shopify is not free at all. You need to buy at least one premium plan to use eCommerce functionality provided by Shopify. WordPress CMS is open-source and you can host it on your own server. The average cost of WP server is less than the cost of Shopify plan.
To extend Shopify theme or site features, you need to subscribe to Shopify Apps that you require. This adds nearly $1000+ per month in subscription costs for several highly needed apps for marketing, usability, and growth. WordPress plugins repository is loaded free extensions for marketing, management, and overall growth.
#2 – Shopify vs. WordPress Management Ease
Shopify is straightforward and can be used by even non-technical people. WordPress requires tech person to setup the server, DNS, and WordPress itself on the server. Once setup, non-technical persons can also use WP easily from the admin dashboard.
Shopify has limited management level features, so, for most things you need to buy app subscriptions even for simple managerial automations. WordPress (or WooCommerce) has built-in comprehensive features for most tasks and it is easily scalable for any type of business. Enterprises prefer customized & flexible scalability over forced options.
#3 – Shopify vs. WordPress Payment Gateways for your Customers
Shopify allows almost all major 3rd party payment gateways including Stripe, Paypal, Authorize.net, 2Checkout, Adyen, and more. Shopify also provides its own payment gateway named as Shop Pay that is available on all Shopify premium plans.
WordPress doesn’t have its own payment gateway. You need 3rd party payment gateway for your customers. WooCommerce provides its official Payments extension which is backed by Stripe payment gateway. In other words, to use WooCommerce Payments, you need to have Stripe account.
Both Shopify and WooCommerce provides an integration for Google Pay, Apple Pay, and additional extensions can integrate Amazon Pay as well.
The limitation: Shopify accept merchants from all countries, however, Woocommerce doesn’t support all countries for its Payments extension. Merchants from those restricted or unavailable countries must find an alternate route to sign up for Payments such as having a US/UK/CA company to handle payments.
#4 – Shopify vs. WordPress Community Support, Development Activeness, & Scalability
Shopify & WordPress developer, theme developer, app or extension developer, and support communities are active. Both CMS have their dedicated repositories for free and paid themes, apps, and extensions for individual store owners and even agencies.
Both have their partner programs which gives you access to beta releases, community programs, and special events.
Web and social media are enriched with tutorials for Shopify and WordPress including excellent free and paid courses.
Scaling on WordPress is easier than Shopify when you’re on tight budget or small business. As you grow, Shopify charges you more, however, with WordPress you can just scale your server specs, few extensions, and that’s it. WordPress is budget-friendly, growth-friendly, and widely used CMS by small, medium, and enterprise grade eCommerce businesses. Shopify is a great choice for non-tech, small businesses, and large-scale businesses with open to growth budget pool.
#5 – Shopify vs. WordPress Maintenance Cost & Agency Service Pricing
Service rates for Shopify or WordPress store varies depending upon how complex or simple is your store is. Generally it starts with $250/m for just store maintenance. It doesn’t include SEO, PPC, Email marketing, or custom feature development or revision when required.
The scope of your service requirement is evaluated by the agency to quote you price as per your store complexity, growth requirement, or goals, and time frame.
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