BigCommerce relies on fixed and unscaled pricing, which makes this alternative to Shopify particularly suitable for small and medium-sized businesses. As your business expands and orders increase, you won’t have to deal with higher costs. So, when your shop grows, BigCommerce's pricing model leaves you with more of your hard-earned cash by the end of the month.
What’s more, BigCommerce provides greater flexibility when it comes to pricing your own items. Products can be priced according to country and currency, which is important for businesses with an international focus. You can also connect various payment service providers, which gives you greater control of your online store. In addition, BigCommerce's pricing can be fanned out according to customer groups, which makes it easier to set up a B2B (business to business) shop. Different discounts can be awarded depending on the customer, which is great for bulk buyers.
APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) are interfaces between different programs. With the help of these interfaces, data is exchanged and compared. When launching an online store, this is often overlooked but becomes a major problem later down the line. BigCommerce begins at around 400 accesses to the API per second, which is sufficient even for medium-sized online stores. This is particularly important when synchronizing between inventory and the dashboard. Synchronization speeds are up to 200 times faster with BigCommerce than Shopify.
Another big advantage of BigCommerce as a Shopify alternative are the product options. Up to 250 product options can be stored with up to 600 article numbers (SKUs). It’s a great feature for a wide range of product categories such as clothing.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a must for any online store. With the right SEO basics you can position your shop successfully in the long run. As a Shopify alternative, BigCommerce integrates all the necessary SEO options. For example, the URL structure, which is an important feature for search engines, can be adapted. In addition, the integration of Akamai, an image software, ensures that uploaded product images are effectively downscaled. This decreases the loading speed of the shop, which is another important – if not the most important – criterion for search engines.
No platform is perfect, and neither is BigCommerce. The provider regularly launches new features and continues to grow as a software provider, but that can have disadvantages. BigCommerce's plethora of features makes it harder to use. This shouldn’t be a problem for experienced e-commerce retailers and for some it may even be desirable, but it can quickly become overwhelming for beginners. Users should plan on a steeper learning curve and longer implementation time for this Shopify alternative.
Another thing that should be considered is BigCommerce’s pricing, because there’s a catch: the monthly package is tied to the number of sales. If this limit is exceeded, the next higher package must be selected. Dealers are forced to upgrade and are less flexible in the long run.
The dashboard cannot be used as administrative surface for POSright away, and added plugins aren’t comparable with those provided by Shopify. For store owners, this can be a reason to keep looking for alternative e-commerce software.