Custom eCommerce development is undergoing continuous changes. As this environment keeps transforming and evolving, different challenges arise, and businesses face new issues.
Building custom eCommerce functionality into your Drupal site can take up many resources, especially when it comes to scaling your website by adding more features and improving its functionality.
Top challenges of custom eCommerce systems
Let's have a look at some of the biggest challenges you may face with a custom eCommerce system.
- Implementing new features can be a slow process. It's difficult to have a proactive mindset when working with custom development since everything you add to your site needs to be built. There are no frameworks or other time-saving options that could help you accelerate your workflow.
- Not being able to integrate third-party platforms can be costly. Open-source solutions are a blessing when it comes to integrations. Whether it is a new payment system or a marketing tool, being able to quickly integrate third-party platforms is a must for any successful eCommerce website. When opting for custom development, the lack of underlying frameworks makes it harder, more expensive, and time-consuming to build any type of tool.
- Sacrificing the front-end experience. As custom development is created mainly by developers, the design and presentation of a website rarely come as a priority. Building code and building design are different things, and not many developers are skilled at both. Unfortunately, missing the point when it comes to good UX and design might seriously affect your business performance, as customers expect top-notch front-end experiences today.
- Not having a community. One of the best things about Drupal is its community. If your website is fully custom-made, everything you need, any issues you might run into can only be solved by your team of developers. All the community-made modules for extending your site's functionality are a great advantage offered by the Drupal community. With the custom eCommerce development approach, you don't get to leverage that benefit.
- Depending on an internal development team or agency. A company using custom development is tied to the original development team that has built its website. It's a real challenge to hire new developers when you don't have a predefined framework, and supporting them in learning how your eCommerce components were made can prove to be highly expensive.
Top benefits of Drupal Commerce
This Drupal-native eCommerce module is a popular choice among eCommerce businesses since 2011.
It is widely known for providing secure, scalable, SEO-friendly, and highly optimized Drupal frameworks that work for specific needs and business requirements.
Let's have a look at the key benefits that Drupal Commerce provides for online stores.
- More straightforward setup and development. Drupal Commerce has out-of-the-box modules that don't require too much hassle to install.
- Combines commerce and content. Being able to manage your content approach on your eCommerce platform easily is a must. With Drupal Commerce, you can handle complex content marketing strategies and build custom landing pages that keep your visitors engaged.
- Customization and scalability. Drupal eCommerce's architecture can be highly customized for specific business needs. However, all its extensions follow a general standard, making it easier for developers to handle the software more efficiently. Drupal eCommerce can also scale to meet the demands of all-sized businesses.
- Third-party integration. One great benefit of Drupal is that its modules were built with integration in mind. Interaction with third-party tools like payment gateways, analytics, or SEO is much easier and can be done quickly.
- Community support. With Drupal, you can take advantage of a multitude of modules made by users from the community. If you need advice on anything related to Drupal, you have a community of highly skilled developers to answer you.
All things considered, whether you choose a custom eCommerce system or you opt-in for Drupal Commerce, you need a strong and reliable team of experts to have your back at all times. That team can be Optasy, an agency formed by Drupal experts with 10+ years of experience building and maintaining successful Drupal projects. Have a look at our services, and let us provide proactive Drupal support in your Drupal journey!
Image credit: mohamed_hassan on Pixabay.
