When setting up an eCommerce, there are many programs to make a decision. One of them is PrestaShop, a tool that many choose. But, Have you stopped to think about the pros and cons of PrestaShop?
If you are making a decision right now, or you have just made it but you don't know if it is really the best thing, perhaps what we are going to talk about will help you understand it a little better. Shall we start?
What is PrestaShop
Before talking to you about the pros and cons of PrestaShop, it is necessary that you understand what we are referring to. In this sense, PrestaShop is a platform that allows you to build an online store from scratch, whether it is a small or large corporations.
This CMS aims to offer you a series of tools so that you can build and maintain your website with little training on the subject, beyond learning how to use it. And it is not necessary that you have knowledge of Php or just code to be able to set up the website to your liking, just get around a little with the program and the mouse.
In addition, This program is free and has many pre-designed themes, although you could also purchase templates for your website. Of course, it is necessary to have hosting to host the website, as well as a domain to which it points. Without these two essential elements it is impossible for it to work.
The pros of PrestaShop
Now that you know a little better what type of CMS this is, how about we talk to you about the pros and cons of PrestaShop? We will start with the good, and among the advantages to highlight are the following:
Ease of use
As we told you before, Prestashop is a tool that It does not require an intermediate level or expert in website construction or eCommerce, just defend yourself a little when creating your site. And to do this, you will focus on the visual part, not on codes, formats and so on.
This makes the platform very easy to work with, and intuitive.
You reduce costs
That's how it is. First, because PrestaShop is an open source platform, which means you won't have to pay to use it. But, also, since maintenance is quite simple, as long as you don't have other things to do you won't need to hire anyone to take care of it because you don't understand it; It's so simple that Once you master it, you can make any changes in a matter of minutes.
Multi-store
Another advantage that PrestaShop has is its ability to manage, at the same time and from the same panel, several online stores.
For example, imagine that you have set up an online store for cat products. And seeing the success, you have done the same with one for dogs and another for ferrets. If you had to go store by store managing it you would waste energy and time. But in the case of PrestaShop you can do everything from the same panel, which means you can better analyze situations and work on changes to them without having to go in and out of one and another.
Customization
The possibilities that the platform offers you when it comes to adapting to your business are much greater than in the case of other CMS. Actually It has a wide variety of design and customization options, which means that you do not have to fear that your store will look like others, if you dedicate time to it, you will surely create something unique.
Item Management
Since we are talking about an eCommerce, it is normal that you have a long list of products that you sell. And in the case of PrestaShop the truth is that it has a great capacity to manage thousands of products. In other words, it doesn't matter how many you have, this should never be an impediment to your store being slow or not looking good.
SEO
One of the common problems for many is web positioning, that is, getting Google to crawl the website and place it in a position as high as possible.
Well, in this case PrestaShop It is one of the tools that takes these SEO aspects into account to get it positioned as high as possible on Google.
Support
Another reason why we see that PrestaShop is worth it is because of the support it has. Not only do you have several resources to get in touch with them, but it has a large community that can also give you a hand.
Multi language
When you want to set up an eCommerce and sell to several countries with different languages, PrestaShop stands out because it has this ability so that, Depending on the country in which the website is visited, it is displayed in the native language.
This allows you to create a much more satisfactory user experience and thus build greater customer loyalty.
The cons of PrestaShop
If we have seen the pros before, now we have the cons. And, although it has many advantages, we must not forget some important aspects such as:
The economic issue
And many modules are going to be paid, which will increase the investment you have to make in your website. It is true that they have many add-ons that are free, but there are also others that are highly recommended (and even essential), which require an extra payment.
Greater difficulty
Yes, we know; We told you that it was easy to set up, maintain, manage, etc. But we cannot avoid comparisons. And if we have alternatives like Shopify or WooCommerce in WordPress, the truth is that these are easier to work with.
So here it will depend on how comfortable you are with new technologies.
A marketplace would be in trouble
Remember how we told you that you can have thousands of products? Well, here's the but: 10.000. If you have more than 10.000 items in your store, page performance suffers a lot.
So a marketplace that can host hundreds of thousands would not be a good idea to set up with PrestaShop.
Now that you know the pros and cons of PrestaShop, you can surely make a better decision. How has your experience been if you have ever used it?