Magento vs. Volusion: Why Magento Rocks (Part 1)

Let’s face it. We here at 121eCommerce love Magento and believe it’s the best platform out there for eCommerce websites. You may ask, why? What makes it so much better than the other options on the market? So we’ve decided to go into some depth with our answer. This blog will be Part 1 of why Magento rocks, this time comparing it to Volusion. Watch for more blogs to come in additional parts to this series.

Magento vs. Volusion

If you break down the comparison between Magento and Volusion, both offer many of the same benefits. In fact, both ecommerce platforms tend to help your business achieve the vital elements to success that you need. However, Magento moves ahead of Volusion in several different fronts. Although both platforms can provide a path to business success, Magento is able to do it at a more affordable price and slightly more power and functionality.

Working the Designs

Volusion has more free themes available for designing your site, its total available themes come out to less than 400. Magento, on the other hand, has 1900 themes available—11 of which are free. You can also adapt Magento complete themes with some HTML work. In the end, for more options and adaptability, Magento is the way to go.

Monitoring Your Stats

An integral part of successfully running an online business is monitoring the stats of your shop. Both Magento and Volusion offer dashboard features that provide you with updates regarding conversions, searches, and other vital business statistics. Volusion includes an analytics tools, but makes it harder to find by sticking it in the account area instead of in the Admin section. Where Magento outshines Volusion in this respect is the customizability and detail of the dashboard stats. In addition to overviewing your statistics, Magento allows you to export the information in a customizable report.

Extensibility

Future growth and adaptability is essential for online businesses, and at first glance, Volusion’s 40 add-ons might seem like the better choice. Magento may have only 20 or so, but here’s the kicker: Magento’s extensions are installed onto their server directly while Volusion’s are not. Essentially, Magento’s installation process is more developed and easier to understand, and the in-house storage of the extensions is extremely useful over turning to web apps.

Verdict

Volusion is not necessarily a bad way to go, it just doesn’t quite rank up to the power that is behind Magento. In many aspects, the two platforms are somewhat similar. Magento is clearly ahead thanks to its affordability, customizability of and ease of extensibility. While your shop might still see some success with Volusion, Magento will save you money and likely be the easier of the two to design and use.