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Magento CE Solves SMB E-commerce Needs
September 25, 2014

Magento CE Solves SMB E-commerce Needs

Bret Williams | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Magento Community Edition

We use Magento CE for our www.MageRevolution.com website. We also have done many installations for clients. Magento CE allows us to build robust, flexible, enterprise level e-commerce solutions are a much more affordable level than many comparable systems. We have clients with as many as 90,000 sku's and, if installed and tuned properly, Magento is capable of providing a rich shopping experience. In addition, there are so many resources available that a Magento store owner won't feel isolated or restricted by their developer or platform.
  • Flexibility to add or enhance functionality as needed.
  • Great assortment of inexpensive add-ons and designs, although care should be taken to insure compatibility and use.
  • Low cost of entry relative to other robust systems.
  • Despite its popularity, successful implementation requires not only an in-depth experience with Magento, but true knowledge of how e-commerce works. It is a complex platform with poor, Magento-provided documentation.
  • Many — you could almost say "most" — of the add-ons created for Magento are not of great quality. There are plenty that are, but you have to be very careful.
  • Designers may feel overwhelmed by the complex template structure.
  • Greater ability to meet unique customer business rules.
  • Greater flexibility in adding functionality and designs.
  • Greater access to ready-made add-ons and integrations.
  • Bigcommerce,OpenCart,Adobe Business Catalyst,Shopify,WooCommerce
Most of the ones we've looked at (or had customers transition from) are closed, hosted solutions with limitations. Since Magento is open source, we have a lot more flexibility to mold it to the customer's needs. It does require more specialized expertise from an implementation side than a hosted solution, but the end result can be a more customized solution, both for the store owner and the customer.
It's the dominant force in the SMB open source market. With the continued support of eBay/PayPal, Magento will continue to evolve and should be a market leader for some time.
Magento is really for those who have outgrown simpler systems like Shopify or Big Commerce, or who need more complex integrations with ERP, distribution and other systems. If a business is in the $1,000,000 - $100,000,000 sales range, Magento is probably a great choice. Costs of basic implementations run around $10,000 to start.