4 ways to create an online store without the need for a software company

You might be: “All roads lead to e-commerce,” but which one is best for you?

In this article, I will tell you the 4 most popular ways to create an online store with the utmost professionalism, whether you are the one who will build the store yourself or you will rely on an intermediary party, there are 4 most popular ways to create any online store in the world.

I expect 99.9% that you will build your online store in one of these ways {I don’t know why this percentage but I always read it 🙂}

These methods that I will tell you about, you may have heard of before or intended to rely on one of them. But in any case, it is undoubtedly the most popular, and my role in this article is to show you the advantages and disadvantages of each method and how to choose the method that best suits you perfectly.

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1. Reliance on open source software

This is one of the best methods that I like to use in building the online store, which is to rely on open source software, so that you get an open source content management system and then install and modify it to suit your site.

And the meaning of open source is that you get the system to use on your site, without paying any of your money for it, while you have the power to modify and customize the system completely.

The idea of ​​open source software is well known to the general public (most notably: Linux and Android).

Exactly the same concept is provided in  content management systems for websites , so that you get an integrated system and you can modify it to suit your online store. The most famous of these systems for online stores are: WooCommerce and OpenCart.

This method has several great properties for you, which are as follows:

Advantages:

• Low cost for the tools you get
• Provide an easy-to-use control panel
• Providing some open source plugins and templates
• The possibility of development, you have the right to modify the code to make some advanced features later (but the basic features are enough for you at the beginning).

All you need to use these systems is web hosting only (which usually starts at $4 per month), then you install the system on hosting and your store is ready to use.

I explained this in detail during the video “Building an Online Store 101”, I advise you to rely on it if you are interested in knowing this method of building a store based on WooCommerce :

This method is characterized by low cost and ease of use, and you may need some skills to deal with these systems, but the topic is simple and I explained it in detail in the previous video.

Although this method is effective, it is undoubtedly not without flaws

Defects:

• Need some skills

Despite the ease of these systems and the WordPress system, for example (the most popular system) , you will need to learn some technical skills to make some adjustments in the control panel, use plugins, customize templates, and so on.

And I say some basic skills, not advanced skills for programmers, and this is in the event that you make every modification yourself. I also try to simplify the use of WordPress in such explanations on our website and YouTube channel .

• Ensure the integrity of the source

Content management systems in general, like any software system that needs protection on an ongoing basis, you need to ensure the integrity of the additions and tools that are used on the site, and also improve the level of protection on the site in general.

If you have the basic skills, you can know that, otherwise you can hire a programmer to make this modification, and he will take a fee from you for this specific modification.

As I explained to you in the previous video, the process of building an online store through WooCommerce takes place in easy and simple steps. You may need to know some technical steps and you may need to hire some programmers sometimes to perform some specialized tasks on the site, but in the end this system is designed for non-specialists.

In this method the store is built as follows:

1. Obtaining hosting and a domain (you can rely on Bluehost )
2. Installing WordPress and adding WooCommerce
3. Choose the appropriate template
4. Customize the appearance and settings of the site
5. Add different products
6. Add shipping methods, payment methods and discount coupons
7. Install the necessary plugins
8. Add other required features to the store
9. Review and overall evaluation of the store
10. Publish the store to users

This is a summary of the first method of relying on open source software.

Also read: Best WordPress Themes to Choose and Use on Your Site (Complete Guide)

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2. Reliance on ready-made platforms

There are some ready-made platforms that provide you with all the tools necessary to design and manage your online store through the control panel easily, and the most famous of these platforms is Shopify , and there are other platforms such as BigCommerce , Magento , and squarespace , and it starts with a subscription of up to $ 20 per month in most cases, and there are Arabic platforms such as Basket Wa Expand Card and others.

These platforms pay a monthly subscription in exchange for all the tools to build your store, track sales and performance reports, process payment systems, and more.

As is the case in the Shopify control panel, in this way you can manage the store completely and easily

On the other hand, the platform management takes care of the technical details completely, including processing the code, improving the site’s responsiveness, solving problems of protection, security, speed of the site, and all matters related to programming.

All you are responsible for in this process is the monthly subscription that you pay for the platform.

Features :

• Ease of use and customization 

Anyone can manage the entire store on his own without the need for software experience or technical information. Rather, you can manage all technical matters from within an easy-to-modify and customize control panel, and the responsibility for software (Back End) remains 100% with the service provider.

• No need to appoint a special programmer

In the first method, you will need to hire some programmers to do some tasks sometimes, and in the third method, you will need to hire a programmer completely (I will talk about this method in the rest of the article).

On the contrary, here, when you rely on ready-made platforms, you do not need to use the programmer in most cases, and you can manage the store through the control panel easily.

• Provide many templates

You will find the platform provides you with a lot of templates and tools to diversify your options in customizing and managing your store.

Although it is easy to rely on these platforms and you feel that they are the best and fastest option for designing your online store, there are some drawbacks that make you rethink using these platforms.

Defects:

• high cost

You will find that you pay a fixed monthly subscription to own the online store (starting at $30 per month) in addition to having to bear some costs in payment operations and some other commissions.
This means that in the first year you will pay more than $360 or approximately $950 (depending on your choice of plan), although store owners often do not get many sales in their first year.

• Not having all the features

Although these platforms compete to provide you with all the features in customizing the store interface and providing many tools, you remain restricted to the features provided by the platform, and you cannot obtain a feature that the platform does not provide you with.

For example, there are some features that these platforms really lack, such as integrating your store with some email service providers (or Autorsponders).

• You do not own the code

In fact, I consider this matter very important to me, which is having the code for the site, so that I can modify and develop it later to suit all my needs.

These platforms do not allow you to make any modification to the site code (Back End), in addition to the possibility of extracting the code and owning it later. But it only allows you to make modifications to the front end.

You build your store on these platforms through the following steps:

1. Determine which platform is best for you
2. Determine the purchasing plan that you will rely on
3. Get a domain name for your store
4. Get a template for store design
5. Customize the appearance of the site through the control panel
6. Add products, payment and shipping methods
7. Publish the store to users

These steps are done through the easy-to-use control panel based on drag and drop and full customization without the need for any technical experience.

Therefore, this is a summary of the second method, in which you subscribe to a specific company that provides you with all the requirements to build your site and provides you with ready-made tools, and you use them to design your site as if you are designing it with the paint program without writing any programming code. 

Read also: What is the cost of creating an online store? How do you get started with less than $1,000?

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3- Programming from scratch

This method is the most expensive and you pay a lot of money, starting with $2,000 in most cases and paying up to approximately $20,000 or $30,000, depending on the features and capabilities required for the store and the developer’s experience.

The reason for the high cost is that the programmer builds every detail in the store from scratch, writes the code from beginning to end, and until you know the complexity of the matter, this is a picture of the code for the Amazon home page.

As you can see, the code shown to us is more than 3,500 lines, in addition to the rest of the properties and the rest of the code that is not shown to users!

Of course, there are some ready-made codes that the programmer uses to create certain functions, and you will not build the size of Amazon at first, but I give you an idea of ​​the amount of effort in programming the store from scratch instead of relying on ready-made scripts (as I explained in the first method).

You can work in this way through one of the freelancers, whether this programmer is an independent person who works for himself or works with a work team, but the idea is that you ask him to develop the store with the appearance and characteristics required of him, and then you charge him for this work. (instead of hiring a full-time employee)

You can also rely on a software company in this way, but the fee will be much higher than relying on a freelancer.

Advantages

• Store customization

You customize the code, properties, links, protection, and everything completely. The programmer is 100% responsible for everything on the site, and you ensure that there are no problems and customize the store to fully suit your needs, other than obtaining a ready-made template and modifying it.

Exactly as the case of a person who goes to a professional tailor and tailors the clothes for him exactly as he wants, instead of buying ready-made clothes from a factory.

• The site may be developed in the future

You are the one who prepared the code from scratch and have an idea of ​​the next step in developing and continuously improving the features of the store. You yourself have laid the foundation of the store and all the features available in it, and you can improve each of the parts in the best way.

Of course, these advantages are in the case of dealing with a professional programmer or a professional team, but if you deal with a novice programmer, the results will be disastrous!

Defects

• high budget

As I told you, the programmer does every task from scratch, and therefore it is expensive and requires some big money from you compared to any other way to build your store.

• You need a professional team

It is necessary to ensure the professionalism of each member of the team in order to ensure that the store operates without problems, and to quickly solve the problem if it occurs, because this team works in an integrated manner and any defect in any of the team’s tasks in terms of quality or delivery time will negatively affect the entire project .

• You need constant follow-up

You must have programming skill in managing software projects or seek the assistance of a professional project manager in order to supervise the implementation of the entire site programming.

Exactly like the engineer who builds a new house, there must be a professional project manager who supervises the concrete casting, foundation and reinforcement construction, wall construction, architectural implementation, and other matters. Professional supervision of the work team is required to produce the work in its best form.

This is a summary of the third method of relying on a software team that builds the store from scratch.

You can hire a programmer to build your online store through the following steps:

1. Search for a professional programmer through your network or freelancing platforms
2. Interview the programmer and learn about his previous work and level of experience
3. You submit a prototype of your requirement in the shop to get a quote for the work
4. The programmer begins to implement the required within an agreed upon timetable
5. After completing the project, you will get a beta version.
6. The code and site experience are fully tested to ensure that it is free of any bugs.
7. Required modifications are sent to the programmer and problems detected are resolved
8. The location is received back from the programmer
9. The site is launched for users after making sure that it is free of all problems
10. The site’s performance is monitored over a short period (from 1-3 months).
11. Follow-up is carried out continuously during his work period

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Also read: Explanation of e-commerce for beginners – a comprehensive guide

4. Selling through social media platforms

Some believe that they do not need to create an online store or a website at first, and they can suffice with social media accounts (Facebook and Instagram), so that they display the products for the customer to see directly and then communicate with him through private messages or WhatsApp to purchase the product.

There are several people who rely on this method because it is free and easy and helps you reach millions of users on that platform, as well as ease of use and purchase with the customer. You do not need to register a new account or obtain an activation code and move between several pages to complete the purchase.

But the customer sees the product and then buys directly from you. On the other hand, you, as a store owner, get rid of the burdens and costs of building an online store and follow up on many of its programming details.

Is this really the case, so that you can go through a new experience in e-commerce by selling through communication platforms and dispensing with creating an online store?

The short answer: No!

I will give you a quick example, which is any online store that comes to your mind now, has it started to be satisfied with communication accounts? Or did he start by creating a small online store and then develop and improve it after that?

Whatever store comes to your mind now, it started selling through its own website, not through communication platforms.

Regardless of whether the store is small or large, or its nationality, they start selling through electronic stores in the main form, and then Facebook and Instagram come as a secondary source of visits.

There are many reasons why you need to build your own online store (through the three methods we mentioned earlier), and these reasons are as follows:

• You own the asset you are investing in

The idea of ​​owning the site’s files, databases, and code makes you feel like you own an already established business, other than your capital being only social accounts that you don’t own in the end. 

After a year, two, or 3 years have passed, this store will be subject to Facebook according to the terms of use of the platform (Terms of services), which has the right to make any amendments it deems appropriate.

• Possibility of closing quickly

Imagine that the project in which you invest a huge amount of advertising, effort and time may close soon? The idea is certainly disturbing.

Even if you do not violate the terms of use of the platform, Facebook, for example, has the right to close any page, and it may make updates to the platform that harm your account, as happened in Facebook updates that greatly reduced the riches, and there are some platforms in which changes occur, as happened in Yahoo groups and G+

There may even have been an information boom in the techniques used. If you quickly go back to the chat rooms in Yahoo Messenger, Paltalk, and forums, then Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube began to appear, and more recently, Snapchat, Tik Tok, and artificial intelligence platforms appeared. All these technical fluctuations are rapidly developing, changing and new platforms are coming.

However, websites do not disappear in this way, but they are constantly developing (read about the history of Amazon, for example, and web hosting companies).

• Fully customizable

Unlike the communication platforms that dictate publishing terms to you with limited features in displaying specific product photos and videos, you can fully customize your site. 

Whether in the way products are displayed, website design, purchase and payment processing, use of promotional methods and some other features, such as registering a mailing list, sending notifications, showing pop-ups, re-targeting, and other marketing properties that you will only be able to get through your online store.

 

• Possibility of repurchase

It is expected that the customer will return to browsing your site by typing the full name of your site, then look at the latest offers you have on the home page, and start browsing the appropriate categories that show him the products with an attractive design.

Unlike the accounts of communication platforms, it is unlikely that the customer will write the name of your store in the search field on Instagram, for example (which he may have forgotten), and then try to browse the products that he finds stacked side by side, and it is difficult for him to view the products after reading more than 50 posts, for example!

• The seriousness of the client

Through my experiences and the experiences of some friends that I have seen, the possibility of seriousness in the purchase of the customer who purchases through the site is more than the seriousness of the customer who purchases through an account on Instagram.

Perhaps the reason for this is that the customer hastily made the purchase decision through Facebook, but when he browses the site and learns more about the product and takes purchase steps and confirms by phone, he is really serious about buying and wants to buy this product.

Incorrect purchases will definitely cost you more packaging and shipping! It is important to make sure that the customer is serious about buying.

Thus , I am not opposed to using communication platforms, but I do not advise you to be satisfied with them without investing in your online store.

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Conclusion

These are the four most popular methods of building electronic stores. I tried to give you a brief overview of each method so that you know how suitable it is for you.

If you ask me with a clear question what is the most appropriate method for me at first, I will tell you the first method + the fourth method based on the data that I mentioned to you.

I hope you have benefited from this article and I will await your response in the comments by sharing your experience with us in building your online store🙂