Update! The article has won the best nopCommerce article award for May 2016
Having worked with nopCommerce for almost 2 years, I've been able to understand the software and it's features from their very core. This blog post is second in the series Why nopCommerce is a long runner. In this post, I'll share my experience as a store owner.
Why nopCommerce is a long runner - For Store Owners
One-Click Installers
All things are difficult before they are easy.
We all like one-click installers don't we. And nopCommerce has it. So installing nopCommerce is as difficult as clicking the Install button. As a matter of fact, nopCommerce is now actively supported by most hosting companies. It's also available as a web platform installer for IIS.
Clean Documentation
If it's not easy to understand, it's not a documentation at all.
Anybody who wants to use a software needs access to all the documentation beforehand. So if you are new to nopCommerce and want to know how to use it, head to it's documentation and you'll find that it's very neatly written to the level of a novice.
Free & Premium Support
Wherever you go, whatever you do, you'll always have my support.
nopCommerce has a proud community of all kinds of people ranging from developers, designers, architects, store owners, security specialists etc. What that means to you as store owner is that in case you find yourself stuck at anything, there are people to help you out for FREE. And even If you couldn't get a solution on community forum, the core team also provides a paid premium support which has a guaranteed response time of 24 hours. This priority support guarantees that you get your issues resolved or attended as soon as humanly possible.
Live Shops
A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is. It's what consumers tell each other it is.
Before you make any decision to use nopCommerce, you may want to see if anybody else is using right? What better place that their showcase page. There is pretty much every type of eCommerce that's making use of nopCommerce. You may also want to verify this fact by looking at this builtwith trend. Also note that people've been customizing and using nopCommerce to the point of making it unrecognizable by builtwith. So if we include those customizations as well, the count is surely going to be just double.
Mobile Friendly out-of-box
If your plans don't include mobile, your plans are not finished.
"If you want a good Google ranking, make sure that your website is compatible with all devices and screen sizes" is a very common sentence you'd be reading on SEO companies' websites. And nopCommerce literally takes it seriously and their default theme is responsive out of box. In fact most of the themes (including those of third party vendors) that you find online will be mobile friendly.
PCI-DSS
They want what you've got. Don't give it to them.
Whenever there is eCommerce, there is a security breach. And nobody is going to give you his payment details unless they have enough trust in your application. That's where PCI-DSS comes into picture. nopCommerce solution has been includes support for PCI-DSS and implements it out of box. So if you are looking for a PCI-DSS compliant eCommerce software, you should forget about searching any further.
Marketing & Promotions
Google only loves you, when everyone else loves you first.
Marketing is the most feared term for any startup. But nopCommerce is sure to ease your fear to some extent. With features in-built marketing features such as Newsletters, Reward Points, Discount Coupons, you could setup and start promoting your products very quickly.
Payments & Shipping
It's not useful for me if it doesn't support my methods.
One thing that may affect your decision of selecting or rejecting an eCommerce software is the support for different payments and shipping methods. Out of box, nopCommerce supports many different payment methods such as Paypal, Credit Cards, DirectPay etc. Similarly various shipping options such as FedEx, UPS, USPS, Canada Posts and more are available. Also there are many vendors who regularly release new payment methods and shipping plugins, so if you wish to use a particular payment or shipping method, it's possible that it's already listed on nopCommerce extensions page.
Multi-Vendor support
Drop-shipping means more vendors can compete for same category & products and the winner is the end consumer.
With more and more startups joining the eCommerce race, drop-ship model is gaining more popularity than ever. Even giants like Amazon are allowing other vendors to sell their products on their websites. So if you are one of those kinds, nopCommerce out-of-box supports multi-vendor shops. I don't remember any other software based on ASP.NET providing such feature for free.
GPLv3 Licensed
Repeat after me. I am FREE
If you are a startup, you may wish to keep the initial costs down. What'd be a better way to cut costs than a free software. nopCommerce is licensed under GPLv3. So you can customize it however you want. You just need to adhere to their license policy as specified here.
Third Party Support
When people from various domains are working on a software, there is something in it that you must try.
The default solution is complemented by a number of third party companies which provide various themes, plugins, language packs. The icing on the cake is that in addition to their own websites, most of them provide support right on nopCommerce website as well. This makes things easy peasy super cheesy.
Integration with other systems
Customers require effective integration of technologies to simplify their workflow and boost efficiency.
The team is continuously working as per this forum post to integrate with third party software such as Umbraco, QuickBooks etc. By the time you read this post, many of them might have already been implemented. POS integration is also one of the things that's on focus. The nopCommerce site also lists some web services plugins that you can utilize to integrate with practically any system out there. These are my thoughts of nopCommerce as a store owner. Did I miss anything? Let me know in the comments below.
