4 Basic Things to Look for in a Shopping Cart Solution

With over a million active online stores, thousands of new merchants launching weekly and $47.5 billion in Q3 2013 sales (comScore), it’s no secret that the e-commerce market is exploding. And with this rapid growth comes seemingly countless shopping cart solutions from which to choose. Which one is best for your small-to medium-sized company? Consider the following tips before selecting your partner.

Seamless integration. You’re busy running your business. You know that to remain competitive, you have to get your online store up and running – yesterday. Find a shopping cart partner that offers seamless integration into your site, whether you already have a website or are launching a brand new one.

A comprehensive solution. Look for a full-featured solution that includes multiple options for tax management, shipping and processing international payments. Accommodating international buyers is essential in today’s market, so it’s also a great idea to choose a shopping cart that supports multiple languages, currencies, shipping carriers and more.

Make it mobile. Cloud hosting providers and site builders often urge their e-commerce customers to incorporate responsive design into their online store build. More than half (51 percent according to a recent comScore study) of shoppers browse retail sites on their mobile phones or tablets, making a responsive website that adapts to different devices essential.

Choose the cloud. We’ve said it (several times) before and we’ll say it again – load testing is critical to the success of your online business. For every one-second delay in store page load time, sales conversions can decrease by seven percent. Go with a cloud hosting solution to eliminate the concern over bandwidth overload.

Contact Applied Innovations today to learn more about our e-commerce application hosting solutions, Windows cloud server offerings and other web hosting services.