The more popular the platform is the more it is talked about. As online merchant “spinning in eCommerce circles” you have probably heard lot’s of things about Magento shopping cart. The undeniable official facts are:
- the open-source php-based platform was established in 2008 by Varien
- the world famous eBay corporation has made investment in Magento getting 49% ownership share
- currently Magento can boast of more than 125 000 devoted users
- more than 4 million software downloads were already performed
The opinions of users are not as straightforward, though. Some are really satisfied with platform’s rich functionality and powerful modular system. Other find considerable drawbacks of the solution claiming it to be difficult in management. When considering Magento for establishing online store it is important to create an unbiased impression and get away from inaccurate or cliche public talks.
So that your decision wasn’t affected by misconceptions we offer for your consideration 5 common Magento myths.
Myth 1. Magento is slow
The performance of any shopping platform depends on various factors so that’s incorrect to claim that Magento store will run slowly for everybody. The platform is quite complicated, which can influence the load time and performance. However, Magento developers realise the issue and are working on it, so each Magento version gets more optimized in these terms. The users find a lot of ways to make their Magento store faster. This includes:
- Hosting environment. Magento is not lightweight so it requires good dedicated servers to be hosted on. Shared unoptimized hosting will definitely slow down your store. It is recommended to host site in the country where the most of your traffic comes from.
- Templates optimization. If you choose the lightweight templates and resize images, Magento performance will appreciate this. The optimal size of images is below 10 kb. You can crop the unnecessary spaces in images or compress them with special tools. All of these measures will positively result in Magento speed.
- Configuration settings. Not to overload your shopping cart functionality, disable modules which are not essential for you. For this go to : System -> Configuration -> Advanced -> Advanced and change the settings in the dropdown list. Disabling layered navigation may be also helpful.
Myth 2. Magento is a free platform
In official and unofficial source you will find the statement that Magento is free open-source platform. Lots of people understand it to charge no fees for its use and are surprised to find the pricing page on Magento commerce official site. However, it is not the fraud. Magento shopping cart is really free and open-source however free here stands for the idea you have freedom to copy and reuse software rather than with regard to pricing.
Magento offers both free and paid edition. Community edition is not charged for, however it is limited in support and lacks some advanced features you can get with Enterprise edition. If you will require additional functionality you will have to purchase extensions. Two types of Enterprise Magento editions charge considerable amount of money annually, but offer more opportunities to develop. It’s up to you what amount of money you are ready to invest in business growth.
Myth 3. Magento doesn’t provide customer support
It is closely connected with the previous myth, as it has to do with pricing plan you choose. With Magento community edition you will have to rely on support from community members in online forums only. As Magento community is one of the biggest and most responsive in eCommerce industry it will not present much difficulties to find answers to questions you are interested in. Enterprise paid editions provide users with professional support on various issues like platform installation, hosting environment, basic configuration issues. It is available 24/7 and offers different communication channels.
Myth 4. Magento is easily customized
It depends on technical skills and experience of course. However, Magento is built on Zend Framework which is not quite easy to handle. Though the source code is open and can be modified, but the coding system itself is quite complicated. That makes customization time and resource consuming. Moreover, it is complicated by the lack of Magento technical documentation. So, the shopping cart allows customization but the user should be PHP expert and at least be familiar with Zend framework.
Myth 5. Magento is for large scale business only
The platform offers wide scalability. It works equally well for small stores and branched enterprises. You should estimate the level of your technical knowledge and the requirement of business to decide whether Magento is suitable for your store. With steep learning curve it will be more difficult for eCommerce startups to handle Magento, however on the other hand it promises potential business growth.
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Cart2Cart is an online shopping cart migration service designed for straightforward and secure data migration from your current shopping cart to a desirable one. It allows to move store data automatically in only a few hours.
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