In the recent past, those looking to invest in developing an ecommerce website often found that the costs involved were prohibitive. Since 2007 this has all changed thanks to the availability of a free open source ecommerce platform called Magento. This ecommerce platform has changed the way in which businesses both large and small are able to bring their retail presence to the web. Why has it proven so popular?

The benefits of Magento are not limited to those small to medium sized businesses who were previously unable to afford an ecommerce solution. For those working on the technical side Magento has proven to have benefits working in the design, development and search marketing sides of the business. Not only is the technology easy to understand for those working in development, but there are vast amounts of resources on the internet for those with questions and who are looking to expand on their knowledge of the platform.

For those businesses using the platform there are a variety of useful features. The user interface is very intuitive so even those who are novices when it comes to content management will be able to navigate their way around with relative ease. The way in which pages, categories and products can be managed is very straightforward. Magento can be customised with a little development work so that the content can be optimised for search engines, enabling your products and services to appear in prominent positions in Google’s rankings. For a platform whose features appear very simple to use, the applications are far reaching. Even if you are not looking to limit the sale of your products to one country, Magento offers features whereby multiple currencies and languages can be supported.

Magento isn’t just easily customisable from a developer’s point of view, but it is also flexible enough to allow designers to get as creative as they like without compromising the usability of a customers online shop. There are many design templates available for Magento and they are all 100% customisable so there are no restrictions whatsoever when designing a new Magento site. These new templates can then be uploaded throught the content management system. There is also a theme management system which can be very useful features if you wanted to change the design of your site to coincide with the various season.

The popularity of Magento isn’t merely opinion, figures from Google trends show that Magento is gaining on traditional ecommerce in terms of interest. Its popularity has grown to such an extent that it has even outperformed eCommerce in the initial stages of 2010 where in the first quarter Magento became the most highly searched for eCommerce term on the web.

Not only is it easy for developers, designers and site managers to operate but it is also very easy for web users to navigate the finished site. Magento incorporates all the features you would expect of an ecommerce site and on top of all this it is extremely secure. So with all these features and usability it is extremely obvious as to why Magento ecommerce has become the preferred platform for thousands of ecommerce retailers already!

Author Bio: Trevor Richards is writing on behalf of Fluid Creativity, a UK designer of magento ecommmerce websites.

Category: Business
Keywords: ecommerce, magento, website, web design, retail, business, web development