Intro Lego Store
Have you ever Wondered if you are using the right ecommerce platform for sale on the internet? Do you occasionally stumble upon a new service that’s more practical and more economical than what you’re using today? Starting a small business is all about keeping your prices low, and finding an ecommerce platform to help you with that is half the battle. Unfortunately, when you operate a small company website it often becomes tricky once you want to attract on a brand new ecommerce platform or perhaps just alter your site at all. Read our Ecwid review to discover more about this solution. Lego Store
Click Here to register up to Ecwid today!
Many solutions Purposefully create a closed system, which is tedious to maneuver away from once you begin. But with a stage called Ecwid, you no longer have to worry about it. In fact, the whole goal of the company, which began in 2009, would be to quickly and inexpensively make an online store system on your existing websites.
You don’t have To make a completely different site. Just implement Ecwid on any platform, CMS or social network (in five minutes) and you are good to go.
This raised my Attention, since I understand the struggles that come along with attempting to migrate websites, especially when it comes to ecommerce. So, I needed to gather a comprehensive review of the Ecwid system to see whether it is worth the time.
How Many Men and Women Use Ecwid?
It’s quite Remarkable what Ecwid has achieved since 2009, with over 1 million retailers getting signed up. What is even more cool is that the Ecwid retailers span over 175 distinct countries, showing that this isn’t only a platform for people in the US or Europe. Even companies in developing countries have a chance to get an online store going, and you do not have to squander your previous website if you have one.
The usership Continues to grow, particularly considering Ecwid is now PCI DSS Level 1 certified. If you are not certain what this is, it is pretty much the gold standard for safety in the ecommerce world. You can rest easy knowing that you and your clients’ information is safe and protected.
Along with The overall merchant count, over 20,000 active users are utilizing the Ecwid Shopping Cart for WordPress. The gap between that 20,000 and also the 1 million is the fact you don’t need a WordPress site to implement Ecwid. So, the 20,000 simply refers to WordPress users using the plugin.
What is Ecwid, and how does it work?
Ecwid is a hosted Solution for building an internet shop. Unlike competing products such as Shopify, Bigcommerce and Volusion, which permit you to build a new site with e-commerce performance, Ecwid is geared more towards people who currently have a website and simply wish to add an internet store to it.
Much like other E-commerce programs, Ecwid lets you install’catalogs’ of products, and add photographs, pricing, weight etc. for each. You can define shipping rates, accept credit card payments and so on — all of the key things that you’d expect to be able to do using an e-commerce solution.
However it differs Significantly from competing products like Shopify, Volusion, Squarespace and Bigcommerce in that it isn’t really designed to let you create a fully-featured, standalone e-commerce website; instead, it’s intended to allow you add an online store to an present online existence.
(That said, Ecwid have Recently added some new functionality, called’Starter Website’, which does allow you create a one-page standalone offering. We are going to chat through this in more depth later on in the inspection.) Lego Store
Click Here to register up to Ecwid today!
The Product works by giving you a widget that gets placed on other sites — hence the title Ecwid: it’s short for’E-commerce Widget’. You get a few lines of HTML code (the widget) to add into an present website or societal media profile, and your shop is displayed wherever you’ve added this code.
Features
Ecwid makes Strides in the market by catering to businesses that don’t need to begin a brand new website. The main feature is that you can choose your old site and immediately integrate the Ecwid system within a few minutes.
You can also Mirror the machine onto several different websites if you plan on selling elsewhere on the web. Manage all of these sites from one place rather than switching between multiple dashboards.
Another nice Attribute is that the syncing between multiple devices. Sell on-the-go with your smartphone. This usually means that you can visit a tradeshow to make a few sales and all of these sales are represented on the back part of your site.
The system is Also made to integrate well with social networks, and that means you can sell your things on Facebook if needed. 1 part of Ecwid that we especially enjoy is the delivery aspect. With real-time shipping integrations you constantly know what is happening with your orders and where they are being sent to.
What other trendy Things are included with Ecwid?
It runs on a super quick frame
It comes with an address book to get customers and clients
The machine has over 43 translations for sale round the planet
You receive lots of promotional tools like coupons, discounts, bulk pricing and much more
Produce your personalized email alerts
Utilize the automated tax solution (automatic tax rates at checkout, tax reporting and filing)
Point-of-sale performance
Thank you Into Ecwid’s point-of-sale (POS) performance, you can use your Ecwid store to market not just online but in bodily places too — in stores, market stalls, at theatres and so on.
Together with Ecwid’s POS Performance, regardless of whether or not a customer purchases a product in store, online, on their phone or via Facebook, everything stays in sync – i.e., the merchant’s catalogue, inventory and customer / transaction information.
There is a couple of ways you can take advantage of this feature: the simplest is likely to use’Paypal Here.’ This entails downloading the Ecwid iOS app from the Apple’s App shop, connecting it to the Paypal Here service, then taking payments utilizing a cell card reader (pictured above).
You have two choices when it comes to POS Hardware and Paypal This: you can either buy a chip and swipe reader (for $24.99) or a processor and tap reader (for $79.99). Both may be arranged direct from Ecwid.
There’s a few Things worth noting about the Paypal Here integration: first, it’s only available to merchants in america and UK. Secondly, it is not yet available on Android apparatus. (On their site, Ecwid say it’ll be available soon — but they’ve been saying that for quite some time now). Lego Store
If you’re based outside The US / UK, or want to work with another mobile device type, the good thing is that Ecwid also works with the Vend, Clover, NCR Silver and Square POS systems. These all facilitate utilizing a larger selection of hardware at a physical retail location (full-sized card readers, receipt printers, cash drawers pill stands etc.) and are usable in more nations.
Although you could avail Of the Paypal Here POS option on all paid-for plans, you will want to be to the most expensive’Unlimited’ program if you would like to avail of a Vend, Clover, NCR Silver or Square admin.
Responsive storefronts
Ecwid Storefronts are responsive, meaning they will display correctly across apparatus — desktopcomputer, tablet computers and cellular. In an era where smartphone internet browsing is eclipsing desktop surfing, this is important.
Free program
Unlike many similar Products, Ecwid offers a completely free program.
Granted, it’s a pretty Standard plan, where attributes such as discount vouchers and support are not available, and it merely lets you sell up to 10 products in two categories — but this could actually be adequate for some customers, and using it’s a good way to try the system out.
However, A key point to notice about the free program is the fact that it isn’t good from an SEO point of view — you have to be on a paid program to make certain your product pages speak to search engines accurately (more on SEO below).
Language detection
Ecwid is forward of the Pack because its storefronts can be mechanically translated into nearly 50 different languages — customers can view your store in their own language, without you having to worry about creating alternate versions of it. Ecwid provides this functionality by detecting visitors’ language automatically based on their browser preferences / IP address.
Competing products like Shopify And Bigcommerce are nevertheless to provide this type of functionality — that they force you to rely on third party programs, the creation of multiple stores or Google Translate to supply different language variations of your shop, which can be less than ideal. Therefore a definite win for Ecwid here.
Ecwid and search engine optimization
Search engine Optimization (SEO) in Ecwid is a pretty straightforward affair. You can edit the title of your webpage and its own meta description; the relevant fields are pre-populated for you automatically, but you can tweak them to suit your SEO objectives.
As far as I could tell But you can’t manually change the URL of a product — you have to make do with the one that Ecwid generates for you. This is not ideal because keywords in URLs are used by some search engines to categorise content through indexing.
But, The URLs which are automatically generated by Ecwid comprise the name you’ve given to your own product – so if you include some keywords on your product name (maybe not a bad idea anyway) your URL will include them too. This serves as something of a workaround, but I’d prefer whole control over URLs. Lego Store
1 place where Ecwid doesn’t perform quite so Well on the SEO front entails AMP — accelerated cellular pages. As the name suggests, AMP pages load faster on cellular devices. This motivates people to stay longer on your page, thus increasing’dwell time’ –something that’s believed by many SEO experts believe to be rewarded by Google with preferential treatment in search results. Additionally, Google sometimes highlights AMP pages in carousels in search results, providing AMP content an extra little boost.
Regrettably However — and unlike most competing products like Bigcommerce or even Shopify, you can not create AMP versions of your products using Ecwid.
Importing and exporting data
Like many competing Goods Ecwid allows you to import and export your data in CSV format.
The Export option allows you to export product data, orders and customers (again, in CSV format) and means that should you feel the need to migrate your store to another e-commerce platform, you should not have any significant problems doing so.
Using Ecwid with other platforms
Ecwid and WordPress
WordPress doesn’t Supplied any e-commerce functionality out of the box, so anybody wishing to market on the platform will require a third-party solution like Ecwid. There is an Ecwid plugin available, therefore adding an Ecwid shop to your WordPress site is quite straightforward — you can get up and running with a couple clicks.
You simply sign up for an Ecwid account and then install the free plugin.
Ecwid and Squarespace
Squarespace comes with Increasingly good e-commerce attributes, but the amount of payment gateway options is very limited — you need to use Stripe or Paypal. (And using Stripe only functions if you are selling products from certain countries). Another principal problem with the built-in Squarespace selling tools is that they don’t facilitate dropshipping, and complete export of merchandise isn’t currently possible.
Integrating Ecwid with Squarespace allows you to bypass these limitations, and adding it to some Squarespace site is very easy: it is a simple matter of adding a code block to a page and pasting some HTML into it.
Ecwid and Wix
As With Squarespace, there’s currently no dropshipping choice for Wix users, therefore again Ecwid can provide a good workaround. A dedicated app is provided by Ecwid to allow you integrate the product on a Wix store easily.
Apps and plugins
Ecwid provides a pretty Restricted number integrations with other well-known apps. Integrations do exist with services Mailchimp, Xero and Freshbooks; but to be honest the assortment of integrations could be more extensive — competing products like Shopify offer a much broader range of apps. Notable omissions from the Ecwid store comprise Quickbooks and Zendesk, such as (that said, a Quickbooks integration is coming soon).
The Image is better when it comes to CMS plugins: these are offered for WordPress, Wix and Joomla, allowing for you to set up Ecwid on these platforms very easily. Lego Store
Interface and ease of use
Ecwid’s Interface is pretty user friendly. Like many similar online store builders, you get a vertical menu on the left which lets you access key functionality, and the area on the right is used to display or edit related products, website content and reports.
Much like any e-commerce tool, you’ll need to Spend a fair amount of time getting your head about creating catalogues and product variations, establishing transport prices and so on…but there is nothing that should represent too a lot of a learning curve.
Matters are helped by an ‘onboarding checklist’ that’s provided to you when you log in for the very first time.
If You’re stuck nonetheless, you could always get in contact with Ecwid’s support staff — more on that later — or, if you’re on a’Business’ or’Unlimited’, you can take advantage of this included customization support (you get 2 hours and 12 hours customization period from Ecwidon these plans).
Ecwid and GDPR
I’m not a Lawyer, so please note that the below observations should not be interpreted as legal advice, but I am planning to do my very best to spell out some of the key GDPR problems facing Ecwid users below.
With the introduction of The EU’s new GDPR legislation, there are many legal steps that site owners now should take to ensure that they are adequately protecting EU customers’ and visitors’ privacy. There are serious financial penalties for not doing so (to the point where it’s usually a good idea to speak with a lawyer on what to do); and even when your company is not based in the EU, you still will need to obey the regulations where any site visits in the EU are worried.
According to my Understanding of the crucial GDPR principles, the main priorities for potential Ecwid store owners would be to:
· Provide sufficient privacy and cookie cutter notices
· Process and store information safely
· Get explicit permission from those signing up to mailing lists that it is fine to send them e-newsletters
· Provide a means to opt in or revoke permission to use of non-essential cookies onto a website (and to log that consent).
There doesn’t Appear to be Anything that stops you fulfilling the first few requirements easily enough with Ecwid, although you will have to spend time and possibly money creating adequate notices and crafting information capture forms so that they are GDPR compliant.
Where things get Complex with Ecwid is the fourth requirement — cookie cutter consent. To ensure GDPR compliance, You Have to display a cookie cutter banner to your customers which
· Allows them to choose which cookies they want to run BEFORE those cookies are conducted (i.e., to give’prior permission’)
· Logs their consent to run cookies Lego Store
· Allows them to revoke consent at a later point
So for example, if you Utilize a Facebook Ads cookie in combination with your Ecwid shop, you’ll be breaking GDPR legislation unless you have a banner set up which does all of the above.
Nowout of the box at There is not a means to deal with the cookie approval issue with Ecwid. Nor is there an adequate app available from the Ecwid app shop (the only alternative on this front I can locate, the’EU cookie banner’, doesn’t seem to supply the necessary functionality — despite costing $1.99 a month to utilize ).
It Seems to me that the only option available to Ecwid consumers would be to use a specialist product such as CookiePro, which does provide all the necessary functionality to make cookie consent fully GDPR compliant. Despite being a powerful product however, Cookiepro does require quite a great deal of configuration and you’ll want to put quite a great deal of time aside to set this up.
Installation and Design
I Truly like The fact which you’re able to run a web site without paying for anything. This makes the installation process that much simpler, since you simply have to punch in your email and make a password to proceed right to the backend interface.
The system has Wizards for every platform that you would like to set your shop on. If you’ve got a WordPress site, simply walk through three steps to get up and running. You can even click on choices like Facebook and Joomla, based on where you would like to sell.
The backend Design is flawless, since it walks you through each site creation and integration measure with some nice photos and text. As soon as you get your shop implemented on a site or social page it appears fairly slick.
The layout Depends upon the subject you have on your website, however as you can see below, it shows photos well and appears clean and easy to navigate. I particularly enjoy the Shopping Bag place, which can be prominent and easy to find for clients when they wish to checkout.
Although many Sites are going to be cellular friendly, it;s fine knowing that Ecwid involves a native shopping program for both iOS and Android. Merchants now receive a native shopping application for iOS and Android.
This means you Can mange your store and sell on the go, while also giving your clients an opportunity to get products from the cell interface.
The final Design item which makes sense to mention is your vocabulary tool. Since conducting an internet store generally requires you to reach out to people from all over the world, you are bound to stumble upon a few customers who’d like to read product webpages and other content in their native tongue. Ecwid supports 45 languages, so if a user would like to translate from English into Spanish, that’s not a problem at all.
The Ecwid Program Market
Possessing the Chance to put in software is a sure fire way to scaling your ecommerce site in a fair way. Ecwid includes a location known as the Ecwid App Market. It provides 65 software, helping retailers extend their shop performance easily. Lego Store
A Few of the apps Will help you out with reviews and rating, rewards programs, automatic ad tools, analytics, custom design themes and much more.
SEO and Marketing
Ecwid is a Third party remedy to your present site, so you would normally need to employ additional SEO and advertising tools to really get out the word. Nevertheless, Ecwid provides quality SEO features to help retailers increase their visibility in Google searches.
Moreover, Google now indexes AJAX websites, therefore all Ecwid shops are indexed by Google without any excess work. It gets better with WordPress websites, as you acquire access to additional search engine optimization plugins as well as the default search engine performance around the dashboard.
Managing Your Inventory
The Ecwid Inventory process is as simple as they come, because it doesn’t seem to include any of the unnecessary bells and whistles you may find on other ecommerce platforms.
Each step is Clear and concise, so you may just go in there and type in a product name, price and image then save the product for later. Of course you could always open the More Powerful Options, but they separate these for if you’re ready to get started ramping up your store.
As an example of the inventory Rich direction toolset, you gain access to items like from stock product monitoring, mobile device inventory management, barcode scanning and much more.
Customer Support
Ecwid offers A Chat With Earnings attribute that is one of my favorite ways to talk with companies. Only send them a question and you can work on something else until they respond.
The Business also Provides a powerful support department with FAQs, a knowledge base, email capabilities and a forum.
Overall, the Support outlets include telephone support, online chat support and email support, maintaining the response time short and encourage quality high.
In my mind, the Platform has everything you might want in terms of support.
Payments and Security
It’s not necessarily Easy to locate an ecommerce platform which doesn’t charge transaction fees, but that is just what you get with Ecwid. They never control any kind of trade fee with any of those programs they provide, which makes it desirable for any shop that’s trying to keep costs down and also to improve margins.
Remember that Ecwid is not a payment processor, so you have to setup something such as PayPal or Stripe to process all the trades that come through your website. It’s pretty easy to employ these systems, since Ecwid integrates with over 40 international payment choices. However, each of those processors have their own trade fees so that you need to prepare for these.
It is rather Evident that Ecwid takes security seriously, because the company is a PCI DSS Level 1 accredited supplier. The business also states that each trade that includes sensitive information is transferred via a secure HTTPS channel. Lego Store
What if you Would like to collect both online and offline payments? Maybe you’d prefer a point of sale integration?
Ecwid Integrates with with Square, Clover, Vend POS, iZettle and PayPal card readers, allowing Ecwid to turn your performance into both an offline and online system.
Benefits and cons of using Ecwid
Benefits
· Ecwid signifies a very simple way to add e-commerce to any present website.
· Point-of-sale performance is available, and there are quite a few strategies to apply it.
· The item is cheap compared to other solutions.
· It supports multi-language variations of your shop.
· The store layouts are responsive.
· Plugins / programs are available for major platforms (such as WordPress, Drupal and Wix).
· It allows users of website building products that don’t facilitate dropshipping to begin doing this (i.e., Squarespace, Jimdo, Wix etc.)
· The’starter site’ option is a fantastic stopgap measure for retailers who need a store quickly, but have yet to create a full site to add the Ecwid widget to.
· The free Ecwid plan is not time-limited, includes support, and is rather generous in terms of attributes.
Cons
· The Paypal Here POS system is Limited to the US and UK.
· The Paypal This POS process is limited to iOS users.
· Telephone support is only available on the more expensive plans.
· There’s a limited number of apps / integrations available in the Ecwid Program store.
· You can’t alter merchandise URLs, which can be slightly annoying in the SEO point of view.
· You can’t create AMP versions of product pages utilizing Ecwid.
· Making Ecwid GDPR-compliant (with respect to getting cookie consent) seems hard.
· The free version doesn’t let you get any of the SEO tools.
Pricing
Ecwid comes With four strategies, among which is totally free. They market the free plan like crazy, and mention that a number of other platforms drag you in free trial, where you will eventually need to pay.
That is where Ecwid stands out, and you’ll be able to see the other payment programs are rather reasonably priced.
The Free plan Lets you sell 10 products, while the Venture plan ups that depend to 100 products and you get items like an iPhone direction program. The company program goes up to 2500 products for a wonderful price and you also get live chat support. Priority support comes along with the Unlimited plan and you might also sell an unlimited amount of products.
Ecwid is one of The most economical solutions on the marketplace. You can see that it’s actually cheaper than a lot of the other platforms we have reviewed previously, so if you’re looking for value, this might be the perfect plugin for you.
Summary
In short, I am Beginning to think that Ecwid is among the best ways to sell online, as long as you employ the best methods to improve your sales online too. Ecwid is a slick system, with super simple implementation measures, making it ideal for the small business crowd. Lego Store
Click Here to register up to Ecwid now!