Review of WooCommerce on WordPress

Quick Facts about WooCommerce:

• WooCommerce launched in September of 2011.
• 6,688,149 DOWNLOADS to-date.
• WooCommerce powers 24% of all eCommerce websites.
• Free open source plug-in from WooThemes.

Benefits:

• Free, quick integration to WordPress.
• Many payment processor options.
• Scalable: good for small or large retailers.
• Many templates to choose from, 3 of them are free.
• Can integrate to Quickbooks.

Challenges:

• If you aren’t familiar with ecommerce, there is a learning curve.
• If you aren’t familiar with WordPress, there is a learning curve.
• You might begin to feel nickel and dimed when you find you need more plug-ins that you thought you might need/want.
• Limited support: may not get answers immediately, especially with plug-ins.
• When there is a WordPress or WooCommerce update, there are usually updates for all of the plug-ins following – and not all at the same time, which can be time-consuming.
• Some plug-ins don’t work when you are using another plug-in it conflicts with, and these aren’t made known to the public due to multiple developers not all working together.
• Integration with Quickbooks is not maintenance-free, requires personal management.

My personal opinion:

Personally, I prefer to go completely custom for ecommerce websites, but that’s not always in the budget. For a free ecommerce platform, WooCommerce gets the job done. While it says free, most people end up downloading plug-ins that are not free, so it really does have a price tag, but it’s not overwhelming like some websites can be.

Hosting Cost:

Depends on where you host it. Here are a couple of examples:

• WP Engine: (WordPress’ own hosting service): Starts at $29/mo, next level $99/mo
• Bluehost: (shared) $6.95/mo (I do not recommend their $3.95/mo package)
• Hostgator: (shared) $5.83/mo (do not use the shared SSL certificate plans)

Some plug-ins along with their cost, as posted at the time of this blog:

• SSL Certificate: $49/annually
• Payment Gateway:
• Stripe: $79/annually
• Authorize.net: $25/mo
• UPS Shipping: $79/annually
• Product Add-Ons (to add drop-downs, input boxes, checkboxes to products): $49/annually
• Yoast SEO: Free
• Social Media Sharing: Many free plug-ins.

About the author:

Lisa Thompson Lisa is a partner, and SEO Manager at In Cart Marketing. Following search engine algorithms and website-coding is her passion. Follow her on Twitter: @TeamLisaSEM