Cost To Develop And Maintain An E-commerce Website

E-commerce website pricing is critical to consider. With more than 1.2 billion digital buyers worldwide, online shopping is a growing trend which no one can ignore. With that number growing 7.9% every year, e-commerce websites provide a great opportunity from an entrepreneurial perspective – be it selling products, online courses, handicraft jewelry, T-shirts, or tour packages.

How much does an e-commerce website cost to build and host? Your guess might vary with the variety of requirements. The pricing could range from $6000 to more than $60,000, depending on the platform and demands. Custom e-commerce functionality is usually the highest cost in a project but is often the most significant factor which makes your website easy for business. To narrow down the cost a bit based on your needs, read through the key areas that primarily influence the cost of developing and maintaining an e-commerce website.

1. Platform
2. Design
3. Development
4. Domain and Hosting

Some additional questions may arise as well, for example:

• Is it a new e-commerce website to be developed, or is it a redesign or redevelopment project?
• How many products?
• If any of the products have variations, will those be price-dependent?
• Do you have the domain name secured, or will you need assistance with domain registration?
• How do you want the payment via popular payment gateways like PayPal, Authorize.net, SecurePay or any other payment services?
• Do you want the site to be responsive?
• Do you need other special features like social media channels created or advanced SEO?

The costs may vary quite dramatically for similar functionality, based on how simple or complex the e-commerce web development platform is and including the licensing cost. The statistic shows that WooCommerce, Magento, Shopify, and OpenCart are the top 4 most frequently used platforms worldwide. Their respective shares are 24%, 15%, 9% and 8% among the top million websites. The prime factor for their popularity is that they provide the facility to develop unique solutions that best suit individual companies’ requirements.

WooCommerce – A free plugin for WordPress, it allows adding mainstream functionalities to WordPress websites. However, it allows significant customization by buying the needed extensions. Its unique combination of free and paid extensions makes WooCommerce popular among both start-ups and established companies.

Magento – This open-source e-commerce framework allows unlimited customizations and flexibility a website might want. The Enterprise Edition is a paid service and, hence Magento is a good fit for e-commerce sites of medium to high scale players like Nestle, Philips, and Olympus.

Shopify – A one-stop-shop platform, Shopify requires no professional knowledge to maintain its website. It has 4 licensed plans available. It makes it a good choice for small businesses, but big customers like Google, Wikipedia, and Tesla also enjoy the platform’s advantage.

Note: Development Prices may extremely vary from $20 to $140 per hour, depending on skills and regions.

1. E-Commerce Website Design – Web design is one of the most significant factors in e-commerce development budgeting. Most SaaS platforms include templates and themes to apply to an e-commerce project, which is usually customized to some degree to fit the individual site. These tools save time and money but still, carry costs. The costs could vary for basic themes and customizations depending on the requirement of the project.
2. E-Commerce User Experience (UX) Design – The user experience is arguably the most critical part of an online e-commerce store. The development cost of a creative web design should be put into the overall budget. Measuring the effectiveness of the UX design is a continuing process, well past development and initial launch.
3. Product Image and Graphic Design – The cost of visual elements of an e-commerce site could typically vary. Photography can be quite expensive, as can be custom photography and graphic Design work. A visually engaging website is far more likely to attract visitors and retain them long enough to turn into customers than one that is too plain. High-quality product images are equally essential for a successful online shop.

Prices for design vary as much as everything else from $1,600 to $30,000.

There could be a huge difference between a 100-hour e-commerce development project and a 300-hour e-commerce development project. Hence, the actual development time has to be quantified correctly. There are offshore developers and outsourcing companies and outsourcing companies who work on per hour basis or at a fixed cost. The hiring cost of developers varies based on the region. European companies offering e-commerce development services charge four times more than Asian web development companies. Hence, most businesses prefer developing their e-Commerce websites from companies situated in the sub-continent.

Prices for development of a complete e-Commerce platform can vary anything from $6,400 to $120,000.

Web hosting cost is one of the more predictable variables in e-commerce development budgeting and is not as expensive as the other modules. Most SaaS platforms offer some level of hosting, although it can be limited in the amount of storage, traffic, and even the number of orders, customers, and products. SaaS hosting can be a good option for small companies and startups. As the business grows, most owners move onto dedicated hosting. This typically costs between $10 and $250 per month. Hosting for larger-sized online shops could cost more. To add tight security, a top concern in today’s age of cybercrime, hosting could even cost up to $3,500 per month. There are multiple hosting providers including Bluehost, Hostgator, Godaddy, and more which offer varied plans, which clients can choose from.

Be it a typical SaaS solution or a custom e-commerce system, hosting can range from $10 to $4,000 a month.

Having analyzed the above-mentioned variables, there is no quick answer to the cost of developing an e-commerce site. For example, if the user wants to do $50,000 a year in sales, he can probably find an e-Commerce website for around the $8,000 range. As the website will probably need more features and functionality to build and to gain a market edge. Remember, starting an eCommerce website is like starting any real business, and it takes the capital, planning, and a solid team to be successful. The cost mainly depends on the CMS one selects i.e. WooCommerce, Magento, Shopify, and OpenCart. However, this chart will give an idea of the combined costs that might apply to your situation:

e-Commerce Website Cost

There are numerous consideration points before one can answer the question. Apart from the factors mentioned above, other ones that affect the final cost of development involve – search engine optimization, marketing, customer base, supporting applications, content, and more. Unfortunately, there is no exact answer as requirements vary from one business model to another. The e-commerce development company that you choose will affect pricing. As some companies will overseas.