Category

Platforms & Apps

Our coverage of platforms and apps includes innovations and updates to shopping carts, content management systems, mobile shopping, digital-product selling, headless commerce, social media, and much more.

  • Platforms & Apps

    An Overview of Magento Go

    November 7, 2011 •

    Magento Go is the software-as-a-service ecommerce platform from Magento, a leading open-source ecommerce solution. Magento Go may be an attractive choice for some online merchants. SaaS or hosted ecommerce platforms generally offer a few advantages for merchants. First, many of the he...

  • Platforms & Apps

    10 App Marketplaces for Open Source Shopping Carts

    October 26, 2011 •

    Many open source shopping carts can be customized with extensions or modules, created by an active developer community. Here is a list of app-extension marketplaces and libraries for open source shopping cart platforms. Most of the platforms are free. The extensions are both free and ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    The 10 Best Blogging Platforms in 2011

    October 5, 2011 •

    Online merchants are competing for customer attention and loyalty in an Internet landscape where people create their autobiographies across social networks and businesses have to discover a reason to be relevant in that narrative. Blogging, which some suggest is a waning art for indivi...

  • Platforms & Apps

    18 Useful Extensions for OpenCart

    September 30, 2011 •

    OpenCart is a leading open-source ecommerce platform. With nearly 3,000 free and premium extensions available, OpenCart is also feature-rich and highly customizable. Here is a list of extensions to tailor your OpenCart site. There are extensions to enhance your cart’s functionality, pr...

  • Platforms & Apps

    9 Online Tools to Plan Your Physical Event

    September 28, 2011 •

    I recently compiled a list — "16 Live Meeting and Webinar Platforms" — of webinar platforms to reach a broad online audience. But if you’re holding a physical event, such as a conference, you can still find planning resources you need online. Here is a list of sites to help you plan...

  • Platforms & Apps

    11 Online Meeting Planners

    September 14, 2011 •

    Online scheduling sites offer a simple way to schedule your next meeting. Pick your range of dates on the app's calendar, then notify the other meeting attendees so they can pick the dates that work for them. View the responses, and you’re done. No more wasting time searching for a time...

  • Platforms & Apps

    15 Productivity Apps for Your Google Chromebook

    August 15, 2011 •

    Google Chromebook and its browser-as-operating-system approach to computing have put the spotlight on web-based applications. The Chromebook's Chrome OS represents a completely new approach to computing. On a traditional Mac or Windows-based computer, there is the operating system on t...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Goodsie Helpful for Beginning Entrepreneurs

    July 21, 2011 •

    A new ecommerce platform helps novice ecommerce entrepreneurs get up and running quickly, but it limits choices and, perhaps, creates some marketing challenges. Goodsie — which costs $15 per month — uses a simple web interface and a well-defined set of options to help would-be merchant...

  • Platforms & Apps

    15 Mobile Retail Apps that Enhance Customer Experiences

    June 24, 2011 •

    Retail businesses are building mobile apps that do much more than just display products for sale. Mobile apps can shape the in-store experience, empower the purchasing process, and create interesting and dynamic ways to interact with the customer. Here is a list of mobile apps created ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    34 Ecommerce Themes for WordPress

    June 22, 2011 •

    A WordPress ecommerce theme can take a regular blog and transform it into a dazzling online storefront. Find the theme that’s right for you, then customize it to create your unique store. This is a list of ecommerce themes for WordPress. There are free themes, if you’re just getting st...

  • Platforms & Apps

    20 QR Code Tools and Uses

    June 16, 2011 •

    With quick response codes, businesses and organizations are finding new ways to deliver information and interact with consumers. When you scan a QR code with your smartphone application, you can receive product information. But QR codes can also link to web content, video, social medi...

  • Platforms & Apps

    25 Great Magento Themes

    June 15, 2011 •

    Magento is one of the most popular ecommerce platforms with thousands of live shops, including major retailers. The platform, which eBay recently purchased, also has a vibrant developer community that creates easy-to-integrate themes and modules. In this article, you find a list of 25 ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    35 Android Apps to Run Your Business

    June 10, 2011 •

    In this mobile world, iPhone gets all the love. There are over 400,000 different apps for Apple’s iOS, compared to approximately 200,000 apps for Google’s Android OS. However, according to a recent study by mobile analytics group Distimo, there are now more free apps available for Andro...

  • Platforms & Apps

    24 Ecommerce Plugins for WordPress

    June 2, 2011 •

    Once WordPress was just a place to blog. Then came over fourteen thousand plugins. Today WordPress is a highly customizable platform, with everything you need to run your ecommerce business. Here is a list of 24 plugins to help you run your business on WordPress. These plugins will hel...

  • Platforms & Apps

    10 Essential Shopping Cart Features

    June 1, 2011 •

    There are hundreds of ecommerce platforms that online merchants can choose from. The differences between these carts can be significant, so knowing what features matter is important. In this article, you'll find a list ten "must-have shopping cart features" that either improve the shop...

  • Platforms & Apps

    16 Live Meeting and Webinar Platforms

    May 18, 2011 •

    With web conferencing you can reach a broad audience, whether it’s a 25-person live meeting or a 2,500-person webinar. Here is a list of live-conferencing services. Many of these distinguish between smaller meetings and larger webinars, offering services for both categories. While t...

  • Cloud Computing Future of Web, Says Shopify Exec Platforms & Apps

    Cloud Computing Future of Web, Says Shopify Exec

    May 5, 2011 •

    Cloud computing is frequently discussed and misunderstood. Among the many hosted, cloud platforms, Shopify is an ecommerce leader.

  • Platforms & Apps

    Ubuntu Linux: A User-Friendly, Desktop Operating System

    May 4, 2011 •

    Last week, Canonical — the open-source development firm — released a new version of its Ubuntu Linux operating system, seemingly aimed at offering casual Windows and Mac users a feature-rich alternative. Although it is certainly a bit of hyperbole to say that Ubuntu 11.04 will send Ap...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Internet Explorer 10 Is Coming

    April 18, 2011 •

    Microsoft released a preview version of its forthcoming Internet Explorer 10 web browser at the MIX11 developer conference in Las Vegas last week. The browser preview provides important insights into what might be a new salvo in the browser wars and could affect how online businesses develop websites and applications.

  • Platforms & Apps

    Miva Merchant President on Acquisitions, SaaS Moves

    March 22, 2011 •

    Miva Merchant launched its shopping cart in the late 1990s and the company's evolution continues. An independent investor group acquired Miva Merchant in 2007, and executives there have since been evolving that product to a hosted platform, enhancing the company's revenue, and generally...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Mobile Devices to Alter Retail Landscape; 3 Predictions

    March 16, 2011 •

    Internet-enabled mobile devices are going to have a huge impact on retail sales in just the next few years, especially affecting small ecommerce businesses. Anytime one discusses the future of a particular industry or where a trending technology or behavior may be taking some segment, ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Magento Releases Hosted, SaaS Version

    March 9, 2011 •

    Magento, the open-source ecommerce platform, officially launched a hosted, software-as-a-service (SaaS) version. The Magento platform — in my view — is one of the most robust and effective ecommerce solutions available. If, in fact, Magento has any drawbacks or weaknesses, it is that ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    New Firefox 4 Mobile Released

    February 28, 2011 •

    Last week, Mozilla released a new version of its Firefox 4 Beta for Android and Nokia Maemo-based mobile devices that is reported to be more than twice as fast as the devices' native web browsers. Earlier versions of Firefox for mobile have had some challenges with stability and perfor...

  • Platforms & Apps

    10 Innovative Digital-Download Stores

    February 14, 2011 •

    The Holy Grail of ecommerce is to create a product once and sell it over and over again. Many online stores are achieving this goal by focusing on downloadable products like source code, graphics, PDF files, or ebooks just, to name a few of the digital products available. In this arti...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Google Chrome Links to New Web App Store

    February 7, 2011 •

    Google recently announced several changes to version 9 of its popular Chrome browser, including closer ties to a web store featuring products that blur the line between websites and web applications further and give ecommerce marketers a new sales channel. Google has said in the past t...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Firefox 4.1 Will Shun Tracking

    January 31, 2011 •

    A personal privacy organization praised new features in several leading browsers last week, singling out the forthcoming Firefox 4.1 as the leader in personal privacy. This latest chapter in the effort to inhibit online tracking may also affect some personalization and behavior driven t...

  • Platforms & Apps

    $5 Marketing, with Fiverr.com

    January 24, 2011 •

    How you market your ecommerce business in 2011 may be different than how you marketed in 2010, or before. Unique sites like Fiverr are enabling edgy, entertaining, and engaging ways to reach new customers. On Fiverr, individuals post listings describing what they would do for $5. It's ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Google Chrome Will Drop H.264 Codec, Impacting Future of Video

    January 18, 2011 •

    Google announced last week that forthcoming versions of its increasingly popular Chrome browser would drop support for the patent-entangled H.264 video codec, potentially making HTML5 more open and available, but also challenging competitors like Apple, which is closely tied to H.264. ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Cart Talk: BetterWorldBooks.com Exec on Custom ASP.net Shopping Cart

    December 24, 2010 •

    Merchants have almost 600 online shopping carts to choose from, including hosted carts, licensed carts and open-sourced carts. Each week in “Cart Talk” we interview a merchant that uses a ...

  • Platforms & Apps

    Cart Talk: HipsAndHair.com Owner on the Yahoo! Shopping Cart

    December 17, 2010 •

    With close to 600 ecommerce shopping carts on the market, merchants have a lot to choose from. Each week in “Cart Talk,” we interview a merchant that uses a particular cart — including hosted carts, licensed carts and open-sourced carts — to get frank, real-world feedback on its use: wh...

Popular
Streaming Webcasts
Instant Video

Copyright © 2005 - 2025. Practical Ecommerce® is a registered trademark of Confluence Distribution, Inc.