In the past few years, dropshipping has become one of the most popular ways for ecommerce entrepreneurs to run their businesses. It’s a pretty simple idea: dropshipping store owners set up their own online stores and work with suppliers who ship products directly to customers on their behalf. This lets the dropshipper sell more products without having to keep more inventory, which can be very helpful, especially for new businesses.
But you’ll need to choose the best ecommerce platform for dropshipping before you can start your business. There are a lot of great ecommerce platforms that can be used to build an online store, but not all of them are the same, especially when it comes to what an ecommerce dropshipping store needs.
Spoiler alert: Shopify is our favorite, and we’ll explain why in this article. We wanted to be fair, though, so we looked at all of the best ecommerce platforms and compared them. Since there are so many ways to build an ecommerce store, we thought it would be a good idea to point out the most important parts of the best ones. So, to help you make the best choice for your business, we’ve put together a list of the best ecommerce platforms for dropshipping, along with all the information you need to know before choosing one for your dropshipping store.
The best e-commerce platform for drop shipping
Before we talk about the best ecommerce shipping platforms, it’s important to know what an ecommerce platform is and what it usually consists of. An ecommerce platform is a simple term for an online service that helps businesses build and run their online stores. This can include everything from hosting your website to managing your inventory, advertising your store, and taking payments.
Even though an ecommerce platform might have a lot of different features, they all have the same goal: to make it easy for businesses to sell things online. Some of the features of ecommerce dropshipping platforms are customizable built-in templates or themes, payment processors, SEO features to help you rank in search results, security measures, and automation tools.
The best ecommerce platforms stand out from the rest because of their features, price, ease of use, and customer service. So, with that in mind, let’s look at some of the best ecommerce platforms for dropshipping businesses.
Most Popular Ecommerce Platforms for Dropshipping
Even though there are probably hundreds of ecommerce platforms that can be used for dropshipping, we would only recommend a few of the best ones. Here is a list of the best ecommerce platforms for dropshipping stores so you can compare them before deciding which one will work best for your business.
Shopify
We’ve already said that Shopify is a service we like a lot. In fact, there are many reasons why we think it’s the best ecommerce platform for dropshipping stores.
Shopify is one of the most popular ecommerce platforms on the market. Hundreds of thousands of stores have been built on its platform. They’re not only one of the easiest ecommerce platforms to use, but they’re also pretty cheap and offer a 45-day free trial to new users who sign up through this link.
When you sign up for Shopify, you get your own online store. You can choose from more than 100 paid and free shopify themes to make sure your store looks good and works well. With Shopify Payments, you don’t have to sign up for a third-party payment processor. Instead, you can use the payment processor that comes with Shopify. This makes the checkout and payment process easy for your customers. When you use Shopify Payments, you can accept all of the major credit cards and PayPal, and you can be sure that the transaction fees will be low. Simple things like a well-designed website and an easy checkout and payment process can make a big difference in how many people buy, so don’t overlook them.
Shopify also has a lot of helpful tools already built in, such as an email marketing service, a way to find carts that have been left behind, SEO tools, and more. Shopify also has an app store where you can find thousands of apps that are easy to add to your store as it grows and expands. You can even download their mobile app so you can run your business from your phone when you’re not near a computer.
We really think that Shopify will have everything most businesses need, especially ecommerce dropshipping businesses.
- The basic plan costs $29.99 per month.
- Prices begin at $29.99 per month
BigCommerce
BigCommerce is one of the best ecommerce platforms. Dropshipping businesses use it a lot. Like Shopify, they have a lot of features that make it easy to start and run an online store without having to know anything about coding or design. BigCommerce is best for larger, enterprise-level businesses, but it can also work well as an ecommerce site for dropshipping.
BigCommerce’s ability to help you scale your business as it grows is one of its best features. BigCommerce is a strong contender for one of the best ecommerce platforms for dropshipping with no transaction fees. It has custom coupons, SEO tools, and the ability to sell on social media, among other things. One problem with BigCommerce, though, is that there aren’t as many good themes to choose from. The free themes are often out of date and hard to use, so if you want to make a good impression with BigCommerce, you might want to use a paid theme or hire a designer.
- Prices begin at $29.95 per month
Wix
Because Wix advertises itself as a “free website builder,” it is often the first choice of people who are just starting out in the online business world. Sounds great, doesn’t it? People who are just starting out tend to choose it because its drag-and-drop builder is easy to use and it has a free plan. Don’t forget, though, that the free plan can’t be used to build a dropshipping store and has a lot of restrictions. To use Wix as an ecommerce dropshipping platform, you will need to pay for a Business plan.
Wix is best known for its website builder, which makes it easy to make a website even if you don’t know how to code. Even though Wix has an ecommerce platform, it’s not as full-featured as some of the others on this list. Wix could be a good choice for your dropshipping store if you only plan to sell a few items and don’t mind manually updating inventory because it doesn’t have inventory management tools.
- Prices start at $27 per month.
WooCommerce
If you use WordPress all the time and know a lot about technology, you might want to think about WooCommerce. You can turn your WordPress website into an online store by adding a free plugin called WooCommerce. It’s a great way to add a dropshipping store to a website that focuses on content, like a blog. If this sounds like your situation, a WooCommerce dropshipping store may be your best option, especially if you already have a website that you don’t want to move.
Because WooCommerce is a plugin for WordPress and not a stand-alone dropshipping solution, it can be harder to set up than some of the other ecommerce platforms on this list, which are already set up and ready for you to customize and add products. It does, however, give people who are willing to spend a little more time learning how to use it or who have more technical knowledge a lot of flexibility and customization options. WooCommerce works best for people who know how to use WordPress and are used to working with plugins and code. If you don’t know how to do this, you might want to hire a developer to help you set up and customize your WooCommerce store so it’s ready for dropshipping.
One thing to keep in mind about WooCommerce is that it is not a hosted ecommerce platform. Instead, it is installed on your website. Also, it isn’t PCI compliant, which is a security risk when payments are being processed. When thinking about WooCommerce, these are both pretty important things to keep in mind.
If you already have a website on WordPress or just love the platform and want to start a dropshipping store, you can add a Shopify Buy Button to your WordPress site to get the benefits and features of a Shopify store while still being able to run your website on WordPress.
- Pricing: WooCommerce is a plugin you can add to your WordPress site that you can use for free. But you’ll need to think about how much extra dropshipping plugins and website hosting will cost.
Squarespace
Squarespace is another popular ecommerce platform known for its beautiful templates and easy-to-use drag-and-drop website builder. Because of this, it is a very popular way to build a website or blog. Some people also use it successfully as an ecommerce platform. Even though Squarespace has some great features for building an ecommerce store, it isn’t one of the best ecommerce platforms for dropshipping.
The main problem with using Squarespace for an ecommerce dropshipping store is that it doesn’t have dropshipping integrations like some of the other platforms. This means that it lacks some of the features and integrations that are useful for dropshipping stores. This means you can’t install apps to help automate your dropshipping business, which makes things a lot harder and takes a lot more time. Also, Squarespace only offers two ways to accept payments: PayPal and Stripe. These are more than enough to process payments, but if you have an online store on Squarespace and wanted to use a different payment gateway, you’re out of luck. There are also tools for keeping track of your inventory, but you may have to manually sync them with your supplier’s stock to make sure you don’t sell items that are out of stock.
One benefit of SquareSpace’s higher-tiered plans is that you can sell gift cards and subscription-based products, both of which can help you make more money from your dropshipping store.
You can also add a Shopify Buy Button to your SquareSpace website if you already have a website there and want to build a dropshipping store. You can still use SquareSpace to host your website and still get many of the benefits and features of a Shopify store.
- Prices: The basic commerce plan starts at $30 per month
Big Cartel
Big Cartel is a less well-known e-commerce platform that is becoming more popular, especially among artists and small businesses. Big Cartel is known for having a simple, easy-to-use interface. This makes it a great choice for people who are just starting out with ecommerce and don’t want a platform with too many features.
Big Cartel has some features that make it good for e-commerce, but dropshipping can be hard to do with Big Cartel. Big Cartel has beautiful, customizable templates and marketing tools, but it only lets you add five product photos per item. This can be a problem when you’re trying to show potential buyers what your products look like.
The best thing about Big Cartel is that there is a free plan that lets you sell up to five items. So, this could work for you if you want to start a small dropshipping store with just a few items. But keep in mind that there aren’t many features, so you won’t get the same tools and automation as you would with a better ecommerce dropshipping platform like Shopify.
- Pricing: Up to five items are free. Plans that cost money start at $9.99 for up to 50 items.
Volusion
Volusion has been around since 1999, making it one of the oldest ecommerce platforms. Volusion is a popular platform for small businesses and entrepreneurs who want an all-in-one solution for their ecommerce needs. With Volusion, you can set up integration with more than 30 payment gateways and build your website and product pages. Another great thing about Volusion is that you can sell as many items as you want.
Even though Volusion has a lot of features, it might not be the best platform for dropshipping. One of the main problems is that it can be hard to find and install apps. Volusion does have an app store, but it’s not as big as the ones for BigCommerce or Shopify. Also, if you want to make a professional dropshipping store, you’ll probably need to either buy a pricey premium template or hire a developer or designer to help you.
- Pricing: $29 per month and up
Features of the Best Ecommerce Platform for Your Online Store
Now that we’ve talked about some of the best ecommerce platforms for dropshipping, you might be able to think of a strong contender. But how do you know for sure that it’s the best ecommerce platform for your needs? Let’s talk about what to look for when deciding which one is best for you and your new dropshipping business.
Features of Ecommerce
The first thing you should think about is what features come with each platform. You’ll want to make sure that the platform you choose has all the ecommerce features you need to build and run a successful dropshipping business.
Starting an ecommerce dropshipping store is appealing because once it’s up and running, it’s easy to do from anywhere and doesn’t take much time. Because of this, you want to make sure you have a lot of features, tools, and automation to help you run your ecommerce site as hands-off as possible.
Some of the most important things to look for are:
- Automated management of products and stock
- Apps for dropshipping are built in.
- Putting in place a payment gateway
- The automation of shipping and fulfillment
- Integrations of Dropshipping Suppliers
- Customer management
- Tools for marketing and advertising
- Help and Live Chat
- Hosted vs. self-hosted platforms
Features of Marketing
When looking at the best ecommerce platforms, it’s best to choose one that has marketing tools or integrations built right in. At the very least, you should be able to add dropshipping apps or plug-ins that help you market your store. When you use a platform with email marketing and SEO tools, you can market your store more effectively and get people to visit your site without leaving the platform.
Reports and Studies
You should also think about the reports and analytics that each platform can give you. Getting information about how your store is doing is important if you want to know what’s working, what’s not, and where you need to make changes to get better. Look for platforms that give you detailed reports so you can decide how to grow your business, make your customers happier, and make more money.
Help for customers
Customer service is another important thing to think about. If you’re just starting out, you’ll probably have a lot of questions. You should make sure that the platform you choose has great customer service so you can get the answers and help you need when you need them. The best ecommerce platforms have customer service available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and a large knowledge base that can help you solve problems on your own when you can.
Shopify is the best of all of them.
Shopify is the best ecommerce solution for your dropshipping store when you are looking for the best ecommerce platform. With an almost endless list of dropshipping apps, built-in ecommerce features, an easy-to-use user interface, and a payment gateway built right in, Shopify payments is a great way to sell online. If you compare it to any other ecommerce platform for dropshipping, it’s clear that it’s the best.
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