Magento is an open source content management system which also has an enterprise edition available for the larger businesses out there. With a large customer base the likes of Lenovo, Samsung and 3M, Magento are very much cornering the open source CMS market. Magento are able to provide a whole host of features which many open source systems cannot even compare too, which allows users to have the fuller system.

Why are so many web developers, designers and SEO’s recommending Magento as a suitable platform for ecommerce websites? What’s the benefit for them?

Well as above Magento is open source depending on your requirements so can be a cost worthy solution for many small to medium businesses out there. It must be noted however that the open source versions are unsupported and are mainly provided for experimental purposes, however there are a number of successfully operating ecommerce websites out there using this platform.

The benefits to developers, designers and SEOs are absolutely vast and each will have their own reasons for recommending such a package like:

– Easy to use for web peeps who understand web programming and other web technologies
– Huge development community available to cast your questions too for free
– Large amount of freely available resources online
– Already a huge community established where majority of questions have already been answered
– Design aspects are never limited as it is ultimately separated so the CSS bods can go crazy with this.
– Long list of features enabling easier selling to clients
– Whole of free or paid add-ons to customise either the site or the backend system
– Search engine friendly with all the options a SEO needs to help enhance a sites rankings
– Possible to create your own add-ons for that increased functionality

Its features for the end user are just amazing especially considering it is open source. Some of the notable features include:

– Dropdown menus for products options i.e. colour, size, etc
– Layered one page checkout
– Product comparison
– Multiple shipping addresses
– Ability to have different languages and currencies for one store making it more cost effective
– Product review system

In regards to design there are a whole host of free solutions available which will either allow you to start your store quickly or provide a base design to work from. For developers the nightmare task is inputting products into the store catalogue. Magento makes this easy with its database import and export features which is also great as you can get plug-ins to immediately upload your products to Google shopping.

Whether you are on an existing platform or looking to start an online store, Magento should really be considered as an option. Even if you don’t use all the features it doesn’t matter, just knowing they are available at little or no cost at all is great. Magento is a cost worthy online ecommerce solution for all kinds of businesses small or large. What will you switch too? What are your reasons for using Magento?

Author Bio: Mithul is writing on behalf of Fluid Creativity, specialists in Magento.

Category: Internet
Keywords: ecommerce website design