BigCommerce vs. Shopify
BigCommerce and Shopify are two of the best known ecommerce shopping cart providers. Both boast a large current userbase as well as a number of big-name clients. In terms of what they can provide to users, though, this is just about where the similarities end. BigCommerce and Shopify have very different approaches to supporting clients’ online stores, and each offers its own unique features, advantages, and disadvantages relative to each other and the rest of the competition.
The Basics
The BigCommerce service is primarily web-based and can be used by anyone regardless of operating system. While all of its services require a one-time $49.95 US setup fee, BigCommerce does offer several different monthly pricing options which vary with respect to product slots, available bandwidth, and a few other factors. The standard option is their $79.95/month Gold service, which allows for up to 1000 products, 5GB of bandwidth, 500MB of image storage space, and includes a $75 credit for Google AdWords.
Shopify is also web-based, like BigCommerce and most other shopping cart providers. Although Shopify offers a number of extensions that can be downloaded through its App Store, most of these are also web-based, so there are no concerns about compatibility. The most popular pricing option at Shopify is its $99/month Business service, which includes 10,000 product slots, 1GB of storage, and features unlimited bandwidth. One important thing to note is that for most of its service packages, including the Business package, Shopify also charges a 1% commission on transactions.
The Features
Features-wise, Shopify is more or less in line with industry standards. Its built in SEO, inventory and order management capabilities are adequate, and users do have the option of adding some useful features through the App Store, albeit at a price. (Developers can also use the Shopify API to create their own apps.) Shopify also provides the standard array of shipping and payment options, although they lack some of the more exotic choices (notably any non-US based shipping providers) that are offered by some of the other shopping carts.
BigCommerce, meanwhile, is a bit more robust in most of these respects. It offers integration with a few more payment gateways, which could be of use to some users. BigCommerce also has a strong Google Analytics integration setup, giving users access to a powerful tool for gauging their marketing performance. The area in which BigCommerce really separates itself from Shopify, though, is in shipping options. BigCommerce gives users the ability to calculate and apply shipping costs through services such as Royal Mail (UK) and Australia Post, and as such it should appeal more to non-US users in an area in which many shopping cart providers, including Shopify, fall short.
Ease of Use
BigCommerce is known for its variety of professional-quality design templates, which are available to all users. This makes it very easy to get an attractive, functional store up and running in as little time as possible. Managing your day-to-day operations is also pretty easy with BigCommerce thanks to a clean if unspectacular interface.
Shopify, though, is one of the few shopping cart providers that really manages to outdo BigCommerce in this respect. Shopify’s Mac-influenced interface is widely considered the best in the sector and, particularly if you don’t consider yourself tech-savvy, it could end up saving you a lot of time and aggravation in the long run, compared to most other services.
The best thing about Shopify’s web client is its storefront editor. The Shopify editor is powerful enough to give you a significant degree of freedom and control over your store’s layout without requiring any knowledge of HTML, CSS, or any other web programming language. With most shopping cart providers, including BigCommerce, users have to accept a certain trade-off between design flexibility and ease of use, but this isn’t the case with Shopify. Shopify users get the best of both worlds in this respect: near total-control, and simplicity.
Conclusion
Given that they offer pretty different feature sets, it’s difficult to say which of BigCommerce and Shopify is the better service overall. For users who don’t mind using a pre-designed store template with few or no modifications, BigCommerce is probably the better option, as it offers somewhat better value for money in most cases, as well as a deeper feature set. However, if you need a heavily customized storefront without the need for HTML editing, Shopify is your best bet at the moment.