For ecommerce organizations, there is an apparently endless list of ecommerce tools available on the market, from shopping cart software to marketing automation. To an up-and-coming store, the sheer breadth can be an overwhelming prospect.
By knowing which categories to look for — and what each category can do for your business — ecommerce sites can skip the hassle and find which tools are best suited to their particular niche and business goals.
As ecommerce sales are projected to reach nearly 25% of total retail sales worldwide by 2025, there has never been a better time for ecommerce businesses to excel. With the help of valuable and practical tools, business owners can take the first step to finding success.
Ecommerce Research Tools
For ecommerce businesses, building and selecting quality research tools can help you gain a competitive advantage. If you’re unfamiliar with the techniques and capabilities of your competitors, you’re not likely to perform well.
When deciding on an ecommerce tool, consider the following:
Helium 10.
Helium 10 provides a software suite with a range of capabilities, including product research and listing optimizations.
For ecommerce businesses, their most critical attribute includes their extensive keyword research tool, which allows users to implement features such as multiple keyword search options as well as backend keywords.
Google Insights.
Google Insights provides ecommerce users with a glimpse into how people are finding your business or company on the internet. Because of the use of Google searches and Maps to find businesses, Insights can be invaluable for those looking to find where and how their business is found.
Insights data includes tools such as views, searches and actions from both organic search results and Google Ads.
Ahrefs.
Ahrefs is an all-in-one SEO toolset equipped to help ecommerce businesses with specialized features, from keyword filtering to site auditing.
Its Site Explorer tool is especially useful for ecommerce companies, as it allows users to analyze organic traffic and backlinks on a website.
Keywords Everywhere.
Keywords Everywhere is a paid chrome extension dedicated to keyword research. It measures analytics such as search volume, cost per click (CPC), competition and trend data.
With multiple built-in tools, it can help you increase your keyword awareness in no time.
Salesforce Shopping Index.
The Salesforce Shopping Index provides users with the ability to track global data performance and digital commerce growth.
For those working in a retail environment, understanding online shopping behavior can be critical to ecommerce success. With Salesforce Shopping Index, you can view real-time data and stats to analyze the effectiveness of different sales channels and marketing strategies.
Jungle Scout.
Jungle Scout is an ecommerce marketing tool and extension for Google Chrome and Firefox that is dedicated to helping shoppers on Amazon achieve success.
By providing product research and data insights, Jungle Scout allows users to build and grow an Amazon business from scratch.
Ecommerce Website Builders
There are many ecommerce site builders available on the market that can accomplish the job required. However, there are critical differences that separate them and specify which tasks and capabilities may be best for your organization.
When choosing an ecommerce builder, consider the following platforms:
BigCommerce.
BigCommerce is one of the leading Open SaaS ecommerce platforms for mid-market and enterprise brands.
It has all the benefits associated with multi-tenant SaaS, from web hosting on behalf of businesses and lower total cost of ownership to a faster go-to-market time. With platform-wide APIs, businesses who use BigCommerce can customize their sites and integrate with external applications and services.
Shopify.
Shopify offers many themes and makes it easy to get a store off the ground quickly.
Although over one million merchants are using the platform, those with large catalogs may want to avoid it as Shopify and Shopify Plus both have strict option and variant caps per product
WooCommerce.
WooCommerce is a free, open-source plugin that can be added to a frontend WordPress site to give it backend ecommerce functionality.
WooCommerce may be a good choice if you’re looking to monetize an existing WordPress site. However, it may be challenging to scale as adding additional payment, catalog management and marketing features can become costly and time-consuming.
Squarespace.
Primarily used by the creative community, Squarespace provides various templates to showcase art, video or music products.
Its advanced offering, Squarespace Commerce, delivers more specialized features such as professional templates and automated email campaigns.
From professional templates to automated emails to integration with social media platforms, Squarespace is an excellent option for beginner merchants and smaller businesses.
Wix.
Wix can be an outstanding option for entrepreneurs, startups and small business creatives, offering numerous free themes, easy setup and a simple drag-and-drop interface. It offers omnichannel selling features, abandoned cart recovery, dropshipping capabilities, shopping cart functionality and more.
However, you need the Business Basic plan to sell products, which costs $23 per month. This plan includes a free 1-year custom domain name, 20 GB of storage space and 24/7 customer support.
Adobe Commerce (Magento).
As an on-premise, open-source solution, Adobe Commerce often requires in-house developer resources or an outside agency to set up a store. This platform is preferred by brands with significant IT or development team investments.
Because of this, Adobe Commerce is geared toward more established, larger enterprises and can be expensive. Even a basic store can cost up to $45,000, while an Enterprise-level store can cost up to six figures depending on the complexity of the build, design and integrations required.
Project Management Tools
As digital ecommerce continues to grow, processes to manage them will only continue to become more complex. With the right project management tool, maintaining and understanding the data in front of you can make all of these different.
Some of the best project management tools for ecommerce businesses include:
Notion.
Notion is a workspace program equipped with a significant range of project and task management tools —- all in one location.
Through the use of the program, businesses can assign and track tasks, create PM calendars and establish roadmaps for projects.
Asana.
Asana is a work management platform that helps users to manage projects, focus and specialize tasks and organize their work within a single setting.
This is accomplished through the use of features such as list viewing, timeline construction and task boards.
Trello.
Purchased by Atlassian in 2017, Trello is a web-based project management tool. It is designed to help users collaborate, manage projects and increase productivity metrics through the use of its extensive feature set.
Additionally, Trello finds success in its integration capabilities, working with companies such as Confluence, Slack, Dropbox and Google Drive.
Smartsheet.
Smartsheet is a collaborative project management software service. It was created to track projects, manage calendars, exchange documents and assign tasks through the use of a dedicated user interface.
Used by Fortune 100 companies, Smartsheet provides customers solutions to fit work and projects — regardless of scale.
Active Collab.
Active Collab is a project management solution designed primarily for creative professionals.
It provides its users with complete control over their work through features like work, time, client and resource management alongside business profitability metrics and analysis.
Clickup.
Clickup is an all-in-one productivity and project management solution, trusted and used by companies such as Samsung and IBM.
No matter which features you’re using — from tasks, documentation, chat and goal management — it can all be managed and maintained within a single application.
Monday.com.
Monday.com is a productivity and program management tool that offers extensive features and capabilities across a variety of industries, whether you’re working on marketing campaigns or in creative design.
Through the use of its streamlined UI, integration capabilities and customizability, Monday.com is an excellent option no matter who you are.
Ecommerce Marketing Tools
Regardless of what kind of ecommerce business you are operating, being able to effectively market what you’re selling is critical to the long-term success of your business. Dedicated marketing tools can be invaluable towards reaching those goals.
When it comes to marketing tools, consider the following examples:
Mailchimp.
Mailchimp is an all-in-one marketing solution known primarily for its email marketing automation tools. You can create and send regular email updates about your products, business and services to a list of customers and subscribers.
However, Mailchimp isn’t limited to email marketing. It has grown as an all-around marketing platform that can integrate with other tools, such as Hubspot, Salesforce and Facebook.
Klaviyo.
Klaviyo is a one-stop marketing tool with capabilities that span from email marketing automation to A/B testing and integration with CRMs and ecommerce platforms.
With deep personalization and customizability, businesses can establish marketing plans and workflows specific to their business while connecting to other tools in their arsenal.
Privy.
A subsidiary of Attentive, Privy is an ecommerce marketing platform for online brands specializing in email and SMS marketing.
Privy aims to turn browsers into subscribers and buyers through its extensive feature set and customizable pop-ups, from discount offerings to game-style promotions.
Wheelio.
Wheelio is another ecommerce marketing platform that specializes in email and pop-up marketing. By using a gamified style of pop-ups and emails — alongside a focus on high-value coupons — Wheelio aims to deliver customers.
Additionally, Wheelio has an impressive array of integrations, from BigCommerce to Shopify and SquareSpace.
Skubana.
Skubana is an order and inventory management service that works to unify disparate sales channels with other parts of the business, from the warehouse to fulfillment.
Whether selling B2B, DTC or through wholesale, Skubana allows you to consolidate your entire ecommerce operation lifecycle in a single platform.
Shippo.
Shippo is an ecommerce software company that aims to lower the barriers to shipping for ecommerce businesses, online marketplaces and up and coming platforms.
Through Shippo and its capabilities, businesses are able to connect to multiple shipping carriers — no matter where they are in the world — from one API and dashboard.
Optimizely.
Developed by former google employees, Optimizely is a digital experience platform that looks to equip companies with tools and insights to optimize their sites.
Their A/B testing and analytics Stat Engine is a powerful tool that helps organizations track performances and data over time in order to boost conversions and ultimately improve the customer experience.
StoreYa.
StoreYa is an ecommerce marketing and advertising tool that helps small businesses increase sales, leads and social reach.
By automating marketing processes with StoreYa, businesses can drive traffic and convert visitors — all while engaging their customers on a personal level with a dedicated help desk.
Analytics Tools
Analytics is a critical aspect of the ecommerce business – you cannot grow your store if you don’t know what’s working and what isn’t. Using extensive data, you may uncover new processes and techniques that can transform your business.
Some of the most valuable analytics tools include:
Google Analytics.
Google Analytics is a powerful web analytics tool that tracks and reports online performance and data. Free-to-use, it allows businesses all over the world to leverage Google’s considerable reach to gain valuable insights into how a business and website is performing.
With more than 73 million websites using Google Analytics, it is one of the most popular tools available — and for good reason.
Google Search Console.
Google Search Console is an online service offered by Google to allow users and businesses to improve their performance on Google’s search engine.
Through a comprehensive set of tools and reports, GSC allows its users to measure and fix performance issues, optimize content marketing, and understand how Google searchers view your website.
Umami.
Unami describes itself as an open-source, privacy-focused alternative to Google Analytics. For those worried about the history of privacy violations from Google, Unami may be a breath of fresh air.
Just like Google Analytics, Unami is a free web analytics tool that measures the metrics on a single page, allowing users to track pageviews, devices used and visitor interaction.
VWO (Visual Website Optimizer).
Visual Website Optimizer (VWO) is an analytics platform designed to help users with A/B testing and experimentation.
Its dedicated platform and expansive feature set allow you to launch a new experiment in minutes, A/B test essentially anything on your website to measure impact and success rates.
Other Popular Tools
Outside of the usual categories, there are many valuable tools for ecommerce organizations, including:
Returnly.
Returnly is a platform provider of digital return experiences for direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands and organizations.
If you’ve ever had a difficult return process, then you know how challenging it can be. Avoiding these unnecessary frustrations is a steadfast focus for Returnly, providing its users with a seamless, self-service online return experience.
Campaign Monitor.
Campaign Monitor is an ecommerce software that prioritizes email marketing for small to medium-sized businesses.
With an array of email marketing tools and robust analytics at your disposal, users of Campaign Monitor can send automated, personalized trigger messages to customers based on their location in the customer journey — increasing conversion rates and streamlining customer interaction.
Wishpond.
Wishpond is an all-in-one marketing platform that focuses on capturing and converting leads through the use of contests, pop-ups and landing pages.
With simple, user-friendly marketing technology, users can boost sales and grow their business by identifying and segmenting leads and customers.
Inventory Source.
Inventory Source is the world’s largest and longest-running dropship data solution provider, with a supplier directory of more than 230+ pre-integrated companies, including eBay and Amazon.
Inventory Source automatically uploads products as well as syncing inventory and route orders with dropship suppliers — directly to your ecommerce store.
Miscellaneous
Other lesser known, but still valuable, ecommerce tools include:
How to Increase Ecommerce Sales
Explore our collection of free resources designed to help you scale smarter and accelerate your online growth from $1 million to $100 million.
The Final Word
As we increasingly move into the digital world, traditional methods of marketing and store outreach will not cut it for modern online businesses.
However, this is no reason to fret. Whether it's the use of analytics tools or email marketing automation, ecommerce tools are crafted to help your business and drive conversions.
Ultimately — no matter the size of your business or what you're looking to accomplish — ecommerce tools are a valuable resource and essential to the growth and success of your ecommerce website.