10 Things to Consider Before Switching Ecommerce Platforms

If you’ve been selling online for any length of time, you’ve likely experienced frustrations with your e-commerce platform. Maybe sales have plateaued or customer experience issues keep cropping up. Or perhaps new features from competitors have you wondering if the grass truly is greener on the other side. It’s only natural in those situations to daydream about switching to something new.

Global online shopping revenues are projected to skyrocket to an enormous $8.1 trillion by 2026, surging up from $5.2 trillion in 2021. So, before you say goodbye to your existing setup with all its quirks, take the time to evaluate several important factors.

In this post, we’ll explore 10 key things you’ll want to weigh before taking the plunge into a different e-commerce solution.

What is Migration for E-commerce?

Migration, in the context of e-commerce, refers to the process of transferring your online store from one platform to another. This involves moving over all essential business and site components from your existing solution to a new one. At a minimum, a successful migration should port over products, categories, customer accounts and orders, payment profiles, and any other pertinent transactional or business data.

Beyond just relocating the backend data, migration aims to redirect your website traffic seamlessly. This usually involves setting up domain redirects so that any links or bookmarks pointing to your old domain will now route visitors to the equivalent pages on the new site. It’s also important for the destination site’s design, layout, and navigation to closely match the original for an effortless user experience during the transition period.

Why Ecommerce Migration is Important

When you are an eCommerce store proprietor, you should ensure it is optimized to run as efficiently as possible.

• As the platform that you launched may not fulfill your upcoming requirements, there may be a chance that you cannot continue with the same platform.
• While changing platforms can seem like a daunting task, making the switch to a new system offers several key benefits worth considering.
• Moving to a divergent e-commerce option will allow you to update the existing platform and explore unconventional features that can boost your business operations and customers’ experiences.

These features can include better stock control, better search and merchandise navigation tools, as well as a variety of payment methods, to name but a few.

10 Things to Consider Before Switching E-Commerce Platforms

1. Impact on Your Business

Transitioning to a new e-commerce platform is a major undertaking affecting many aspects of your operations. It’s important to carefully evaluate how the switch could influence key business areas like your supply chain, team workflows, and customer relationships. A well-planned migration process aims to minimize disruptions to these functions as much as possible.

Consider if your suppliers and vendors will need to integrate with any new systems or APIs. Also, assess if staff job responsibilities will change at all. New platforms may require training team members on different processes and tools. Look for solutions compatible with the skills already present in your organization.

2. Total Costs

When considering the total costs of an e-commerce platform, it’s important to look beyond just the platform and transaction fees. Those are certainly important to factor in, but the complete picture involves more hidden expenses that can significantly impact your bottom line over time. Don’t forget to account for plugins, apps, and integrations costs with other systems like shipping, accounting, and customer relationship management (CRM).

Setting up and maintaining integrations usually requires both a financial investment and technical resources. You’ll also want to budget for costs associated with moving your existing catalog and orders to a new system, as well as train yourself and your team on the latest workflows and processes.

3. Integrations With Future and Legacy Systems

One important consideration is how well a new e-commerce platform will integrate with your existing technology systems and those you may adopt in the future.

• Will it be compatible with your current shopping cart, customer relationship management (CRM) software, accounting tools, and other applications you rely on day-to-day?
• Can data like products, orders, and customer profiles transfer seamlessly from your legacy platform?
• Will the new platform play nicely with technologies you might use down the road, like a mobile app, inventory management system, or fulfillment tools?

Be sure to vet a platform’s application programming interfaces (APIs) and check if it can integrate with the specific applications you need, either out of the box or via custom development.

4. Skills and Ability of Your Team+

A key consideration when choosing an e-commerce platform is having a team with the right skills to set up, maintain, and optimize the store over time.

• Does your team have many years of experience building successful online businesses on a variety of platforms?
• Do they have deep expertise in areas like design, development, marketing, and analytics that will allow us to create a polished and high-converting online storefront?

In addition, your marketing team should have the skills to promote your new online store and drive traffic with strategies like paid search, email, social media, and affiliate programs.

5. Features and Capabilities

Does the new platform allow you to sell the types of products you need? Can it handle your typical order volumes and peak seasons? Evaluate whether it has the functionality your business requires both now and for future growth.

Also, consider the platform’s user experience, especially if you plan to make changes to your website yourself. Ensure the dashboard and admin areas are intuitive to navigate. Consider how customizable the design templates are and whether you can tweak the layout, colors, and images yourself. You’ll also want platforms that offer multi-channel capabilities, allowing you to sell through your website and marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, social media sites, and more.

6. Future Improvements and Needs

As your platform succeeds, the challenges, your demands, and your individual business needs will change along with it. Your goal changes, and you need to reconsider whether your platform choice is still relevant or not.

Technologies such as artificial intelligence and augmented reality will develop, allowing them to introduce newer platforms that can offer businesses more intricate capabilities that, sooner or later, may benefit their business operations. Staying alert about emerging innovations will give you chances to determine whether it is appropriate to jump onto a new, innovative device or platform you can use to maintain a competitive advantage.

7. Customer Service and Support

No matter how great a platform’s features are, if issues arise, you’ll want to know they can be resolved quickly and effectively.

• Look into what support options are offered—will you be able to call, chat, or email with representatives?
• Are responses typically received within an acceptable timeframe?
• It’s also good to research average wait times for issues on popular review sites to get a sense of typical support experiences.

Testing out the support channels yourself with sample questions can give valuable insight. You’ll also want to understand what hours representatives are available if you or customers need urgent after-hours assistance.

8. Best Time to Run the Migration

Migrating your store to a new e-commerce platform is no small feat, so it’s important to choose an optimal time to complete the move when it will minimize disruptions to your business. Some key considerations around timing include your sales cycles, any upcoming events, and your product inventory levels.

Ideally, you’ll want to avoid peak sales periods like holidays or seasonal events when customer demand is high. Launching a new site during these times of heavy traffic could lead to issues that negatively impact the shopping experience. It’s best to migrate before or after the busy periods when you have some buffer time.

9. Crawl Your Site Before Migration

Before you pack your bags and switch e-commerce platforms, take the time to crawl your existing site thoroughly. An in-depth site audit will uncover any issues lurking beneath the surface that could cause headaches during the transition. Use a crawler tool to map out your store’s pages, products, categories, and attributes.

This will serve as your master list and help ensure nothing gets left behind. Pay close attention to URLs and how they may need to be redirected to the new platform. Also, take note of any custom templates, code, or integrations that may require special treatment or rebuilding.

10. Transfer Only Up-to-Date Content

It’s important to carefully consider what content you will transfer over from your previous system.

• Only bringing current, relevant material will help you get the most value from your new platform.
• Be sure to leave outdated pages, products, and blog posts behind to avoid cluttering up your new storefront.
• Do an audit of all your existing web pages and online store catalogues.
• Remove any pages for seasonal items, past promotions, or products you no longer sell. Filter your blog only to include posts from the last 6–12 months.

Transferring outdated blog content that is years old is unnecessary and takes away valuable real estate from fresh, engaging material.

Final Words

Evaluating your business needs, goals, budget, and the functionality of different platforms should all factor into your important decision to switch e-commerce platforms. Be sure to consider ease of use for customers and staff and integration capabilities with other tools. Research platform fees thoroughly. And most importantly, make sure to test any new platform extensively before fully committing to it.

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