San Diego web design, development and database programming

Selecting the right e-commerce solution:
Out-Of-The-Box vs. Open Source

Building an e-commerce enabled web site has become much easier in the past few years, but with so many products and technologies to choose from which solution is right for you? Out-of-the-box products offer a quick way to manage an online store with very little programming knowledge, however open source applications offer a wide range of flexibility and compatibilty. Below, we explore some of the features and solutions that each have to offer.

Out-Of-The-Box

When shopping for out-of-the-box e-commerce solutions you could easily find yourself lost pretty quickly. There are hundreds of different solutions available. One of the leading edge solutions we offer is called Miva Merchant.

Features

  • Multiple page shopping cart
  • Secure transactions with SSL
  • Base + Weight Shipping, Flat Rate Shipping, Minimum or Weight Shipping, Price Table
  • Based Shipping, Quantity Based Shipping and link to UPS Online for up to the minute shipping costs
  • Store creation and setup wizards
  • Unlimited products and categories
  • Database of customers with their account information for ease of future ordering
  • Export orders to Quickbooks
  • Supported payment versions: COD, Check, AuthorizeNet, Cardservice International, CyberCash
  • CyberSource, Payflow Pro (Verisign), Verisign Payflow Link, Simple Credit Card Validation
  • Modular architecture allows for easy integration of 3rd party modules
  • Multiple stores in a single domain

Advantages

As an out-of-the-box application, Miva Merchant is a dynamic, browser-based program for developing and managing online storefronts. It features a complete set of wizards to simplify the process of building an e-commerce store. Modular architecture allows unlimited customization for your online storefront. Perhaps its most valuable feature is the ability to manage and make changes to an online store without knowledge of HTML. Widely recognized. Simple set up. Easy to manage.

Disadvantages

The code is never yours. It creates dependability of that one source code. Not very flexible when trying to develop custom features. Much of the functionality may be subject to modules availability; upgrades of engine versions, licenses, etc. Need to consider a hosting service provider that supports the product.

Open Source

osCommerce is the leading open source e-commerce application. Because it is an open source application, it allows extensive flexibility so that additional features can be built upon the most basic of online stores.

Features

  • Customizable customer accounts
  • Multiple shipping destinations with one single order
  • Order history
  • Temporary (not logged on) and permanent (logged on) shopping carts
  • Search catalog for products or manufacturers
  • Product reviews by customers
  • E-mail notifications
  • Forseen checkout procedure
  • Secure transactions with SSL
  • Bestseller lists
  • Display what other customers have purchased (relating to the current product displayed)
  • Add/Edit/Remove categories, products, manufacturers, customers, and reviews
  • Configuration parameters in database for remote editing
  • Categories-to-categories structure
  • Statistics for products and customers
  • Dynamic product attributes
  • Tax zones, classes, and rates
  • Any type of payment and shipping methods

Advantages

Any aspects and or features in your store can be built based on your specifications. You own the code.   You can easily move it over to almost any hosting provider. Someone would say that this fits the ideal for those knowledgeable in HTML and comfortable with editing code, and even though that is true, this kind of solutions allow any developer to build a customized admin panel to manage your storefront features with ease and in which case no knowledge of HTML would be necessary. A monkey could do it.

Disadvantages

This kind of development normally requires of a strong preliminary project preparation and documentation on the planning stage before moving over its development phase. That means additional time to the overall developed solution. It could be more costly than a simple out-of-the-box solution depending on what are you looking for.