BigCommerce is an e-commerce platform that allows any web beginner to set up and run an online store from anywhere in the world.
The platform frees up your time to do marketing for your store. It makes you worry less about performance and appearance.
According to BuiltWith, 66,661 online stores use BigCommerce.
With BigCommerce, you can publish product information in seconds.
Accept credit cards.
Use different shipping methods.
Run remarkable marketing campaigns.
And do even more.
Magento is a professional open-source e-commerce platform that gives you complete freedom over your store.
The platform provides you with all the tools you need to create online shops as well as eCommerce Mobile App.
There are no limits to what you can do with Magento.
BigCommerce and Magento are both terrific e-commerce platforms.
If you’re thinking about where to set up your online store between these two, this article will help you decide.
Soon, you’ll know which platform is right for you.
Let’s start with pricing.
BigCommerce versus Magento: Pricing
Now, let’s check out their pricing models and find their differences.
Here are what you pay for with BigCommerce:
- Monthly subscription fee starting at $29.95/m
- Apps and extensions if you want to use them
- Any integrations in other systems
And here are the things pay for to use Magento:
- Web hosting fees
- Extra hosting fees in cases when your site traffic exceed the average
- Additional costs to fix bugs or patches for any software updates
- Security and PCI compliance costs
- Apps and extensions
- Any integrations in other systems
Looking at the above, you’ll notice that there are a few things you have to worry about when using BigCommerce.
There are a lot more to take care of if your store is running on Magento.
Magento is expensive because it gives you 100% control over your shop. That is not something you’ll get with BigCommerce.
However, it’s faster to launch your store on BigCommerce.
You don’t have to pay to download Magento Open Source (formerly Community Edition).
However, you’ll have to install it on a web hosting service, which costs money.
BigCommerce’s starting plan costs $29.95 per month.
On this plan, you can sell an unlimited number of products. You’ll also get an unlimited storage and bandwidth.
Note that on this plan, you’ll pay 1.5% for every transaction.
On the BigCommerce Plus plan, which costs $79.95 per month, you won’t have to pay any transaction fee.
The checkout will be hosted on your page.
The BigCommerce Pro plan, which costs $249 will make you get even more.
The Pro plan offers you high volume security and analytics, fraud monitoring and product filtering.
If you want more, you’ll have to speak with BigCommerce customer service. Their support system is open at all hours of the day.
BigCommerce is an out-of-the-box e-commerce solution.
Magento is a little more complicated.
The software itself is free, but you’ll have to pay for web hosting.
BigCommerce versus Magento: The Design of Your Online Store
Good design increases profits for e-commerce sites.
Shoppers don’t buy from ugly sites on the web.
BigCommerce offers 7 free templates. They also have beautiful templates that cost between $145 to $235.
Because Magento is open source, premium themes are available on the Magento Marketplace.
Magento allows you to customize any aspect of your theme.
BigCommerce only lets you modify certain parts of your template.
You have more options and freedom with Magento when it comes to design.
The disadvantage is that you need to understand HTML, CSS, and PHP to alter their themes.
The Frontend and Backend features of BigCommerce and Magento
Every e-commerce platform has two parts:
- The frontend
- And the backend
The frontend is what the user sees. These include the site’s design, product details, polls – just everything the shopper can see on your digital store.
For example, below is the screenshot of the frontend of Munchkin, an online store for baby supplies.
Everything you see when you visit a website is referred to the frontend side. Another name for frontend is the “client side.”
Backend (also called server side) is how the site works, where you update the site and make changes. It’s everything the shopper can’t see when they visit your site.
For example, below is a screenshot of the Magento backend side.
Magento backend is powerful but looks complicated.
The BigCommerce backend is easier to manage for beginners.
Creating products is pretty straightforward in BigCommerce.
When you sign in for the first time, you’re greeted with a nice tour.
The tour is a step-by-step process to building your store.
You can do a lot of things quickly.
Like change settings for:
- pricing,
- bulk pricing,
- titles,
- custom fields,
- videos,
- inventory,
- product details,
- images and more.
If you sell a few hundred items and you’re a complete beginner, BigCommerce is the perfect option for you.
But if you sell thousands of products and want heavy customization, then Magento is the ideal platform for you.
Choosing BigCommerce is like buying a built house and moving in your furniture. Maybe, you also want to paint the walls.
Consider Magento as buying a parcel of land. You need to design and build your own house. That is so much work and money.
If you’re a web developer, then you shouldn’t be scared of Magento.
But if you’re just starting out, BigCommerce is the best option. You’ll be able to handle many things by yourself.
BigCommerce is more affordable and less stressful.
If you have 500,000 products, then use Magento. Hire a Magento developer to take care of things for you.
Magento is just the perfect choice if you sell products with lots of customer lengths, sizes, and measurements.
BigCommerce and Magento can get the job done.
The one you choose will greatly depend on your needs and financial budget.
BigCommerce versus Magento: Which platform is the best for marketing?
Which e-commerce platform is the best between these two when it comes to marketing?
Magento supports multi-currency, multi-language and multi-store setups in a single instance.
That enables you to manage multiple international stores from one account.
It means that as your business grows, you can easily open stores for Europe, US and more without creating new merchant accounts.
Everything is managed in one spot.
When you use BigCommerce, the features you get will depend on which plan you’ve subscribed to.
BigCommerce has third-party apps and integrations that can extend the functionality of your store.
There are lots of apps and integrations to choose from.
But these BigCommerce apps won’t give you what you’ll get from Magento extensions.
It’s not possible to run multiple stores from a single BigCommerce account.
One of the biggest advantages BigCommerce has over Magento is that you won’t need to buy extra server capacity to deal with traffic and sales fluctuations during peak seasons like Christmas, New Year, Thanksgiving and others.
If you’re on Magento, your web hosting provider may force you to upgrade to a higher plan.
Sometimes, your website could suddenly go offline or be too slow because of heavy traffic.
That means losing potential sales.
Your store’s performance when powered by Magento will depend on your hosting provider.
If your web hosting service is having internal issues, it may have a big impact on your revenue.
For example, if your Magento store is slow, some shoppers will abandon their carts, and may never return to your online store.
So, when you compare both platforms on marketing and sales, BigCommerce may have a big edge over Magento.
But if you can host your store with a reliable, fast and secure web host, you’ll enjoy much more sales than if you use BigCommerce.
Another important thing to keep in mind when using BigCommerce and Magento is that you’ll need an additional tool to help you increase conversion and sales.
This is where our tool comes in:
Most visitors to your online store won’t buy on their first visits.
Instead of watching those visitors leave, you can collect their emails.
When you have their email addresses, you can always reach out to them to sell your products.
GrowthFunnel helps you create powerful popups that collect email addresses on your site.
Now you can use our popups on BigCommerce or Magento.
To get started, sign up for a free 14-day trial.
After doing that, sign into your GrowthFunnel account.
On the top-left side of the GrowthFunnel dashboard, you’ll see “Opt-in Funnels.”
Click on it.
Then you’ll see “Create New Funnel” on the top-right side of the screen.
Click on it to create your first funnel in GrowthFunnel.
After clicking on that, you’ll have options to select one of our high-converting popup types.
GrowthFunnel has five funnel types. They are:
- Full Screen
- Pop up
- Slider
- Inline
- And Bar
For example, you can select “Pop up” for your first funnel.
After choosing your funnel type, you’ll have to select a template for it.
GrowthFunnel has premade templates to help you get started.
After selecting your preferred premade template, you’ll be prompted to the GrowthFunnel Editor. This is where you will design your funnel to meet your needs.
Inside the GrowthFunnel Editor, you’ll be able to create steps in your conversion funnel.
These steps are for visitors who have given you their email addresses.
For example, the first time a visitor lands on your store, he or she will be asked to give their email address.
Offer visitors’ something in exchange for their emails. That way, your conversion funnel is more effective.
In the second visit, you can ask a visitor to follow your store on social media and get a discount on your products.
In the third visit, you can ask a visitor to share your store on social media.
They should get another benefit for doing that.
Continue enticing visitors with rewards when they complete a step in your GrowthFunnel.
Both Magento and BigCommerce don’t offer a tool like this in their app stores.
Conclusion
So, let’s end the debate:
BigCommerce versus Magento, which e-commerce platform is the best?
It depends on your needs.
If you’re a beginner and you want to sell a few hundred products, then BigCommerce is for you.
But if you have big long-term goals for your store and want to sell thousands of products, then you should consider choosing Magento so you won’t have to migrate in the future.
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