Shopify, WooCommerce, PrestaShop: which platform for your store?
Your choice of ecommerce platform commits the store for years: it determines what you can do on your own, what will need a developer and what each change will cost. We decide it with you before any mockup, based on four questions: how many products and variants, how many countries and currencies, which software is already in place, and who will run the site day to day.
- 1What you manage yourselfProducts, prices, everyday ordersAutonomy
- 2What needs a developerTheme, features, specific business rulesCustom work
- 3What each change costsApps, modules and integrations with your toolsBudget
| Platform | How it works | A good fit when… | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify | Hosted service, paid by subscription | you want to launch fast and run the store without a technical team | paid apps that add up, customization within the platform's limits, transaction fees outside Shopify Payments, a store that can't be moved off the platform (only the data can be exported) |
| WooCommerce | Free plugin for WordPress, on your own hosting | editorial content matters as much as the catalog | updates, security and performance to monitor |
| PrestaShop | Open-source software, installed on your server | the catalog is large, with many variants and pricing rules | modules to choose carefully, regular technical maintenance |
| Adobe Commerce (Magento) | Full-featured platform, open source or licensed | multiple stores, B2B and complex workflows | a significantly higher development and hosting budget |
| Headless | Custom front end connected to the commerce engine via API | the experience needs to go beyond what a theme allows | two components to maintain, a long-term technical team |
Other platforms, like BigCommerce, may be a fit depending on the target market. Our reviews of Shopify, PrestaShop, Adobe Commerce and WordPress (for WooCommerce) detail each platform's pricing and limits. Our recommendation is written, reasoned and compared with at least one alternative: you choose knowing the trade-offs, not because the agency only knows one tool.
The must-have features of an online store
An online store is judged by its ability to clear up the buyer's doubts at the right moment. Before adding extras, we make sure the fundamentals are in place:
- An easy-to-browse catalog: logical categories, useful filters, on-site search that tolerates typos.
- Complete product pages: sharp photos, a description that answers objections, specs, availability and delivery time displayed.
- A transparent cart: shipping costs and taxes visible before payment, an unobtrusive promo code field.
- A short checkout: guest checkout available, fewer fields, prefilled address.
- Secure, varied payment options: card, mobile wallets, buy now pay later or bank transfer depending on your customers.
- A polished mobile version: the store is designed for the thumb first, the mouse second.
- Fast pages: compressed images, a lightweight theme, apps limited to the ones that earn their place.
- A customer account: order tracking, invoices, returns, saved addresses.
- Trust pages: terms of sale, shipping, returns, privacy information, visible contact details.
- Reliable tracking: sales and journey tracking in Google Analytics, with cookie consent respected.
This list serves as the test checklist before launch: each item is tested on desktop and on mobile, then checked off or fixed.
Payments, shipping, inventory: connecting the store to your tools
A standalone store forces you to re-enter every order, every address and every stock level. That's why we map out the data flows to connect from the scoping stage:
- Payments: Stripe, PayPal or your bank's solution, with refunds handled from the admin.
- Shipping: carriers for the countries you sell to, shipping rates by weight or zone, pickup points, automatically generated labels.
- Inventory and ERP: syncing quantities and prices with your management software, so you never sell an out-of-stock item.
- CRM and email marketing: sending customers and abandoned carts to Brevo, Klaviyo or the tool you already use.
- Accounting: exporting sales and invoices in the format your accountant expects.
- Marketplaces and comparison shopping: product feeds to Google Merchant Center and, if needed, to marketplaces.
Each connection is documented: which data goes from where, when, and what to do if the feed stops.
Selling more: conversion, SEO and AI assistants
Bringing in visitors isn't enough: they need to find the right product quickly and buy without hesitating. Conversion work starts in the mockups, with category pages that show the selection criteria, product pages that answer questions before they're asked and unambiguous calls to action. After launch, browsing data shows where shoppers drop off, and those steps get fixed first.
SEO is also prepared from the design stage. We build the category structure from your customers' real search queries, keep filters from generating thousands of useless URLs, and give every product page a title, a description and product structured data. These foundations save you from redoing everything later; the in-depth work that follows, on content, links and competition, falls under our ecommerce SEO service.
Assistants like ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity now recommend products and stores. They rely on readable pages, precise specs and information that's consistent from one site to another. A well-structured store starts with an advantage, and our GEO agency can then track and improve your products' presence in those answers.
The stages of an online store project
Each stage ends with a deliverable submitted for your approval before moving on to the next. At any time, you know what's done, what's left and what's waiting on your feedback.
-
01
Scoping
Goals, catalog, countries, logistics constraints and existing tools.
Deliverable: The project brief, with a reasoned platform recommendation
-
02
Architecture
Category structure, buyer journey, list of pages and templates.
Deliverable: The site structure and wireframes of key pages
-
03
Design
Mockups of the homepage, a category page, a product page, the cart and checkout, on mobile and then desktop.
Deliverable: The approved mockups
-
04
Development and integrations
Theme, configuration, payments, shipping, connections to your business tools.
Deliverable: A staging site you can test
-
05
Catalog and content import
Products, variants, photos, trust pages; for a migration, transfer of customers and orders and a redirect map from old URLs (products, categories, images) to new ones.
Deliverable: A complete catalog, spot-checked
-
06
Testing and launch
Test orders with every payment method, strong authentication (3-D Secure) included, a test refund, checks on transactional emails, site submission in Google Search Console, launch.
Deliverable: The completed test checklist
The timeline depends mostly on the catalog and integrations: a theme-based store with few products launches in a few weeks, while a custom project connected to an ERP takes months. The schedule is dated in the proposal, along with the time your team needs to set aside, especially for product pages and approvals.
After launch: keeping the store running
An online store is never finished: plugins evolve, vulnerabilities get patched, seasons call for new promotions. We offer three levels of support, which you choose based on how independent you want to be:
- Onboarding: training your team on the admin and a written guide for adding a product, launching a promotion or handling a return.
- Maintenance: updates, backups, uptime monitoring and bug fixes.
- Ongoing optimization: a monthly review of sales, conversion rate and cart abandonment, then improvement tests on the pages that matter most. For traffic, our benchmarks are set out in our SEO KPIs guide.
You remain the owner of the site, the domain name, the accounts and the data: if you change providers, everything is handed over to you.
What determines the cost of an online store
Our online stores start at $2,780, excluding tax: six pages, including the terms of sale and the shipping and returns policy, plus a first product online. Each additional product is added to the quote, which you can estimate with our price calculator.
There's no single price, because no two stores ever have the same scope. We put together a quote after the first conversation, broken down by stage so you can see where the budget goes. The factors that make it vary are always the same:
- Design: an off-the-shelf theme adapted to your brand costs less than a fully custom design.
- The catalog: number of products, variants and photos to prepare, manual entry or automated import.
- Integrations: each connection to an ERP, inventory software or carrier adds development and testing.
- Languages and countries: translations, currencies, taxes and carriers by region; our international SEO page covers visibility abroad.
- Cross-border VAT in the EU: if you sell to consumers in several EU countries, beyond an annual sales threshold the VAT of the delivery country applies and is filed through the One-Stop Shop (OSS). The store must then apply the right rate for each country, a setting we prepare with your accountant.
- Migration: transferring products, customers and URLs from an old store is a separate piece of work.
- Recurring costs: platform subscription, apps, hosting, payment fees and maintenance, to plan for from the start.
The quote separates what you pay once from what you'll pay every month. For a simpler need, without online sales, a small business website may be enough to begin with.
How to choose an ecommerce agency
A few questions are enough to sort through several providers:
- Is its platform recommendation reasoned? An agency that always proposes the same solution, whatever the project, is selling its tool rather than your store.
- Does it talk about your operations? Logistics, inventory, returns and customer service should come up in the first meeting.
- Is the quote detailed? A breakdown by stage and by feature lets you compare and make trade-offs.
- Is SEO built into the design? Fixing it after launch costs more than planning for it in the mockups.
- Who owns what? Code, accounts, domain name and data should be in your name.
- And once the store is live? Ask who fixes an outage on a Saturday, and how fast.
We answer each of these questions in writing in our proposal. Our other website design services also cover redesigning an existing site.
Your questions: Online store
Can’t find your question? Ask us
How much does it cost to build an ecommerce website?
The starting point is $2,780, excluding tax, for a six-page store with a first product. The price then goes up with the design (adapted theme or custom design), catalog size, number of integrations, languages and any migration. Each stage is priced separately, and build costs are kept apart from monthly costs: subscription, apps, hosting, maintenance.
How quickly can an online store launch?
A theme-based store with a small catalog launches in a few weeks. A custom project, with connections to an ERP or several countries, takes several months. Preparing product photos and copy is often what slows things down the most.
Shopify, WooCommerce or PrestaShop: which should you choose?
Shopify suits businesses that want to launch fast without managing a server. WooCommerce is worth considering if your site publishes a lot of editorial content on WordPress. PrestaShop works well for large catalogs with many variants. We compare the options for your specific case before recommending one.
Is it better to hire an agency, a freelancer or a Shopify specialist?
A freelancer works for a small store with a clear scope. A platform specialist makes sense when the tool has already been chosen. An agency brings together design, development, integrations and SEO, and the project doesn't stop if someone is unavailable. What matters is checking the quote, ownership of access and the planned support.
Can you migrate my current store to another platform?
Yes. A migration transfers products, customers, order history and above all page URLs, redirected one by one to keep the traffic you've earned. The process follows the stages described on this page, plus the transfer of existing data; the redirect method is detailed on our website redesign page.
Will I be able to run the store on my own after launch?
That's the goal. Every project ends with training for your team and a written guide for everyday tasks: adding a product, changing a price, creating a promotion, handling a return. Technical maintenance can stay with us if you prefer.
Will my store be visible on Google as soon as it launches?
It will be crawlable and properly structured from day one: categories built on your customers' searches, tags filled in, product data, site submitted to Google. Ranking for competitive queries is then built over several months, with content and reputation.