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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Optimizely Commerce Connect

    Score6.6 out of 10
    N/AOptimizely Commerce Connect is a PaaS e-commerce backend solution coupled with Optimizely's PaaS CMS to help e-commerce organizations, of any type, create highly customized websites and buying experiences with a two-in-one content and commerce solution.N/A

    Podia

    Score7.5 out of 10
    N/APodia in New York offers their ecommerce platform for managing memberships and selling courses online.

    $39

    per month

    Pricing
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    Mover
    $39.00
    per month
    Shaker
    $79.00
    per month
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeRequiredNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Considered Both Products
    Optimizely
    No answer on this topic
    Podia
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    86%
    Would buy again
    6 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    6 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    71%
    Happy with the feature set
    5 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    86%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    6 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    71%
    Implementation went as expected
    5 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Features
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Online Storefront
    Comparison of Online Storefront features of Optimizely Commerce Connect and Podia
    Feature
    Optimizely Commerce Connect
    8.8
    27 Ratings
    12% above category average
    Podia
    8.1
    2 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Product catalog & listings9.126 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Product management9.126 Ratings9.02 Ratings
    Bulk product upload6.422 Ratings8.01 Ratings
    Branding9.124 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Mobile storefront9.121 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Product variations9.122 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Website integration9.125 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Visual customization9.124 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    CMS9.126 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Online Shopping Cart
    Comparison of Online Shopping Cart features of Optimizely Commerce Connect and Podia
    Feature
    Optimizely Commerce Connect
    8.2
    20 Ratings
    7% above category average
    Podia
    8.0
    2 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Abandoned cart recovery8.216 Ratings8.01 Ratings
    Checkout user experience8.220 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    Online Payment System
    Comparison of Online Payment System features of Optimizely Commerce Connect and Podia
    Feature
    Optimizely Commerce Connect
    8.2
    18 Ratings
    2% below category average
    Podia
    8.0
    2 Ratings
    4% below category average
    eCommerce security8.218 Ratings8.02 Ratings
    eCommerce Marketing
    Comparison of eCommerce Marketing features of Optimizely Commerce Connect and Podia
    Feature
    Optimizely Commerce Connect
    8.8
    26 Ratings
    13% above category average
    Podia
    7.0
    2 Ratings
    10% below category average
    Promotions & discounts8.222 Ratings9.02 Ratings
    Personalized recommendations9.122 Ratings00 Ratings
    SEO9.122 Ratings5.02 Ratings
    eCommerce Business Management
    Comparison of eCommerce Business Management features of Optimizely Commerce Connect and Podia
    Feature
    Optimizely Commerce Connect
    8.0
    26 Ratings
    1% below category average
    Podia
    8.0
    1 Ratings
    1% below category average
    Multi-site management9.121 Ratings00 Ratings
    Order processing7.320 Ratings8.01 Ratings
    Inventory management7.316 Ratings00 Ratings
    Shipping7.317 Ratings00 Ratings
    Custom functionality9.124 Ratings8.01 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Small Businesses
    Ecwid by Lightspeed
    Score10 out of 10
    Ecwid by Lightspeed
    Score10 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Shopify
    Score8.7 out of 10
    Shopify
    Score8.7 out of 10
    Enterprises
    IBM Digital Commerce
    Score9 out of 10
    IBM Digital Commerce
    Score9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Likelihood to Recommend
    7.1
    (27 ratings)
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    4.6
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    7.7
    (8 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    2.7
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Optimizely Commerce ConnectPodia
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Optimizely
    Our experience may be unique because we opted for an Optimizely team to implement our website/console set-up and connection to our PIM and ERP. The experience may have been different with a 3rd party or it may not have. That said, we have been live with our primary website for almost 2 years and I still do not consider it was ever "done". We have been going back and forth on functionality issues and bugs since launch. I have low confidence that changes made the previous day will 100% be online the next - so my team rechecks the work they did the previous day to ensure everything is online. The addition of a second channel and enhancement requests have compounded the issues. I feel this product would work fine with singular or less complex market SKU offerings.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    In my experience, Podia has been well suited in every way! I am a small company with a couple of independent contractors, and I don't know how to build my own website. I am not very techy. I get lots of compliments on how my website looks! I have had some people support me with setting up my group emails for my email list and setting up automations, and these techy people complained that they needed to do more customization in the email formatting and programming, so I switched to Mailchimp for those needs. Otherwise, I have been very happy with Podia and I am grateful to have a platform that offers so many services/features. It's affordable and user friendly. My clients and students are happy using it, too
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Optimizely
    • Episerver has a robust discount engine. This engine, combined with "visitor groups" allow our marketing department to categorize customers and offer a variety of discounts to targeted customers at specific times.
    • Episerver has a full-featured, storefront experience that can handle everything you might want for an e-commerce website.
    • Episerver offers A/B testing that can be helpful for trying out new content ideas and tracking the results.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    • Emails
    • Course hosting
    • Website creation
    • Website chat
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Optimizely
    • Support. Episerver used to have direct support and access to the tech team to discuss and resolve issues. The new support portal is not enough for developer needs.
    • Quality Assurance. We find issues in the Episerver code that should have been resolved in QA before release.
    • Sales. Episervers sells the framework as a solution while showing Alloy. While it helps Episerver sell more, it puts the implementation partner into trouble as the client thinks they bought the solution. Episerver does not provide a solution. It provides a framework that you can build a solution on.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    • I sometimes wish there was more that I could customize on my website and digital programs
    • I wish their email service (for broadcasts/group emails) had more features and customization
    • I would like to use my brand font
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Optimizely
    Really want to be able to spend more time and resources on rolling out new things with Episerver but at the moment we seem to be fixing alot of issues and pain points with the way our system was setup.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Optimizely
    The administrative interface is largely intuitive and relatively easy to use. The complexity of business needs and ability to customize can affect this (i.e. you have to set up and develop with the user in mind), but the basic structure is largely solid. There are some areas of redundancy (such as Commerce Manager overlapping with other administrative areas) that can sometimes cause confusion or offer some functions in one place, whereas other related functions are managed on a completely different page.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    It has a great user interface, it's fast to edit and create courses, to edit and create emails, to find chats, to develop the website. Support has been friendly and I haven't found anything that hasn't worked. It also has basically all the tools you need outside if a complete blog platform
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Optimizely
    We had an incredible team at Episerver Supporting us with the go live, reviewing our integration, and pushing our integration partner to deliver a quality product
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Optimizely
    Fully understand what is OOTB feature of the platform before proceeding to develop. Then implement a customization of key features once you can prove they are working as OOTB to make them more user friendly and productive for the business. Eg pre order and e gift card
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Optimizely
    Optimizely Commerce Connect offers a very wide range of features for admin users. There is less a need for an IT specialist or programmer to be involved when changes need to be made.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    Kajabi had lots of features all in one place. I liked their digital course creator program. I liked the ease of their their membership site program/host, too. It had an app for my clients to use. There were some problems with not being able to customize the look of pages, but they allowed coding/programming if you had training, so I sometimes hired someone to do that for me. I couldn't figure out how to use their website builder, so I didn't do much there. When it came down to it, I could use Podia and it was cheaper and easier to use. GoDaddy was my website host for a few years. I did a lot on there. It was my website builder and host and I liked it. It was easy to use. My website looked great. It had more features than Podia with blogging and connecting to social media. I had a storefront but it wasn't great for selling digital products. Back then, it wanted to show my inventory and shipping options, which don't apply for services and digital products. I did a little with my digital courses on there, but in the end, I liked other sites better for this. It didn't work out. Weebly was just a starting point for me when I create my first digital course. I liked how it looked and it was easy to build, but there are better options for this sort of thing now.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Optimizely
    • Positive: We have a usable website - better than what we had before and we are seeing a constant increase in adoption.
    • Positive: Counter associates are using the website to help customers.
    • Negative: Too much time being spent QCing previous work.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Podia
    • It was the 1st system I used to launch my buisness and we did 100k within 2 yrs
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Optimizely Commerce Connect Screenshots

    Screenshot of the customizable checkout workflow, used to tailor the customer checkout experience.Screenshot of where catalogs, custom attributes, UOM, catalog restrictions, and multiple sites are managed at once.Screenshot of an example of a personalized promotion based on user web activity, used to drive conversion and increase average order value.Screenshot of customized recommendations reportingScreenshot of Optimizely Commerce Connect's personalizationScreenshot of Optimizely Opal, available within Commerce Connect to automate promotion creation by mapping products and variants from your existing product data. Turn tedious campaign work into high velocity scalable promotions.