Online Merchants Increase Sales and Web Traffic With BigCommerce Ecommerce Shopping Cart Software

AUSTIN, Texas, March 8 /PRNewswire/ -- BigCommerce, the leading provider of ecommerce software for small business merchants, today announced growth of more than 100% per month since introducing its hosted ecommerce solution in August 2009.  More than 25% of the company's customers are companies that switched to BigCommerce after using solutions from Yahoo! and others, citing BigCommerce's enterprise feature set, affordability, easy customization and responsive customer support as key factors in their switch.  

In less than a year since its launch, BigCommerce has already gained significant industry and customer recognition for its innovative hosted ecommerce solution.  The company was just named a finalist for a "Best Software-as-a-Service" CODiE award, the prestigious annual award issued by the Software and Information Industry Association for excellence in software development, and was recently voted the #1 ecommerce platform by popular software review Website TopTenReviews, beating out Yahoo! Stores and many others.

BigCommerce gives small businesses everything they need to sell online: A robust ecommerce platform, the ability to modify the look-and-feel of a store without knowing HTML, advanced marketing capabilities, self-help and phone support, and more than fifty different ways to accept payments online.  BigCommerce also provides built-in integration with third-party services and tools to drive traffic to customers' online stores including one-click Google AdWords campaign creation and Google Products export.

BigCommerce is also more than just an ecommerce platform - the software was designed to help small businesses attract more customers to their stores with just a few simple clicks.  In particular, BigCommerce has invested heavily in search engine optimization functionality to help customers rank at the top of Google/Yahoo!/Bing, working with acclaimed SEO expert Aaron Wall of SEOBook.com to develop this proprietary infrastructure.  BigCommerce search engine capabilities include SEO-friendly links, per-product and per-Web page title and META data, proper use of H1 tags, tableless and W3C-valid templates, HTML/XML sitemaps as well as full control over image alt text.

The latest version of BigCommerce, released in January 2010, introduced advanced store marketing functionality for companies who want to take their site promotion to the next level.  Significant new features in this release include Google Website Optimizer support, which allows merchants to run storewide and item-specific tests to improve the conversion rate of their stores, and an Abandoned Order Report, which enables companies to understand who is abandoning shopping carts, when it is happening and more, so merchants can proactively work to win back the customer or improve their site.

Other popular marketing features include:

• One-click export Google AdWords campaign creation
• In-store promotional banners which can advertise discounts, etc.
• SuperZoom photo zoom and unlimited photos per product
• Built-in CRM with per-customer activity log
• Flexible coupon codes and gift certificates

"BigCommerce solves the most pressing problems for small merchants, allowing them to develop a rich online storefront without a Web designer, operate their store with incredible ease and attract new customers to their site," said Mitchell Harper, co-Founder and co-CEO of BigCommerce. "At least a quarter of our customers to date chose BigCommerce after trying other solutions, which shows that we're filling many unmet needs in the ecommerce space.  Ongoing innovation and listening to customer feedback are our top priorities as we continue to grow."

Making the Switch to BigCommerce

Thousands of established businesses across a wide variety of markets have already made the switch to BigCommerce.

For example, BabyandMeGifts.com, an online retailer of stylish gifts for babies and their mothers based in Indiana, originally built an online store using Digishop, but found it was limited in terms of shopping cart functionality and other user amenities.  They then switched to OS Commerce, but quickly grew fed up with trying to locate add-ons robust enough to showcase their products.  As a sole proprietor and a working mom, owner Jackie Myers was also frustrated by the lack of user support from these solutions.

Myers signed up for BigCommerce's free 15-day trial.  "We fell in love with BigCommerce immediately.  We signed up within three days – we didn't even finish the 15-day trial period.  BigCommerce had exactly everything that I was looking for."

Building the new storefront came quickly and easily.  After months of frustration with other providers, the revised BabyandMeGifts.com site was up and running within a week with BigCommerce.  The results were exceptional.

"Within a month of using BigCommerce, my sales had doubled because of the dramatic increase in site traffic," added Myers.  Since then, Myers has used BigCommerce's SEO optimization functionality and the company's Google Base interface to grow its unique visitors from 600 to over 12,000 per month.

When Myers has a question, she refers to the YouTube tutorials, enters her question on BigCommerce's GetSatisfaction customer forum or simply emails or tweets customer service for a timely reply.  Says Myers: "There are plenty of ways to get in touch with someone if you have a problem or question."

In fact, site operations, inventory management and order flow works so easily that Myers is now planning a sizeable expansion of her product selection.

Even ecommerce offerings from industry stalwart Yahoo! are coming up short against BigCommerce.  A rigorous side-by-side feature comparison reveals that BigCommerce is superior to Yahoo! Merchant Solutions on 25 key points, including cost, ease-of-use, customization, design options and implementation, SEO capabilities and business reporting:  http://www.bigcommerce.com/bigcommerce-vs-yahoo-stores.php

"We were not satisfied with Yahoo! Merchant Solutions' outdated Web hosting tools and had been looking for a reliable, cost-effective alternative for a while.  Thankfully, BigCommerce was the perfect provider, offering updated, easy-to-use tools at an affordable price," said Janice Cowart of Tazstar.com, a PC hardware and peripherals online retailer.  "Modern templates, quick and easy storefront set-up and excellent customer support proved we made the right choice.  Our customers love the new Web site and it is easy to maintain and update.  We look forward to attracting new customers and continued growth with BigCommerce."

For a detailed list of BigCommerce's offerings, please visit: http://www.bigcommerce.com/feature-list.php

ABOUT BIGCOMMERCE

BigCommerce is the leading provider of ecommerce software for small business merchants.  BigCommerce enables any small business to easily set up and operate a professional ecommerce site, combining advanced ecommerce functionality with simple, intuitive design and administration.  More than just an ecommerce platform, BigCommerce also helps small businesses attract more customers to their stores with just a few simple clicks, and offers more features than other ecommerce solutions.  BigCommerce is the latest offering from Interspire™, a leading provider of shopping cart software used by more than 40,000 organizations worldwide.  For more information, please visit www.bigcommerce.com.

SOURCE BigCommerce