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<p>I'd take a good look at where you want to go with the site. There's a lot of platforms as you've seen, but beyond simple "some products and a checkout" what are you wanting the site to do?</p>
<p> Normally, I'm vehemently anti-platform, as it instills a culture of "sticking in X, crossing fingers and hoping for the best", rather than tailoring the experience to your specific user base & the business objectives.
For example, what do you see the big issue being in a years time? Keeping price competitive? Attracting new customers, or retaining existing ones? How important will brand be to you?
</p>
<p>Remember, a database is a database, and as long as your other systems aren't completely archaic, you'll be able to get feeds between them and whatever system you choose pretty easily. Be warned though - a lot of platforms have massively overzealous integration requirements ( well, those agencies have to pay the bills "somehow") - if you're a start up and can take some integration offline whilst you prove the business model, then you'll save yourself a lot of time and money.</p>
<p>I'd take a good look at where you want to go with the site. There's a lot of platforms as you've seen, but beyond simple "some products and a checkout" what are you wanting the site to do?</p>
<p> Normally, I'm vehemently anti-platform, as it instills a culture of "sticking in X, crossing fingers and hoping for the best", rather than tailoring the experience to your specific user base & the business objectives.
For example, what do you see the big issue being in a years time? Keeping price competitive? Attracting new customers, or retaining existing ones? How important will brand be to you?
</p>
<p>Remember, a database is a database, and as long as your other systems aren't completely archaic, you'll be able to get feeds between them and whatever system you choose pretty easily. Be warned though - a lot of platforms have massively overzealous integration requirements ( well, those agencies have to pay the bills "somehow") - if you're a start up and can take some integration offline whilst you prove the business model, then you'll save yourself a lot of time and money.</p>
2009-10-26T17:01:42+00:00
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2009-10-26T17:01:42+00:00
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