It’s certain! You cannot survive highly competitive business environment if your website cannot survive on the web. If you are into ecommerce, then having a website with cutting edge content is a matter of life and death for you.
However, there are hoard of websites that are like a herd of sheep. One odd trendsetter leads and others follow. The time has come that demands to make one’s website different from the other. The responsibility lies on the shoulders of the ecommerce web designer to create something unique every time. Web content of ecommerce websites is also going to play the most crucial role as the whole gamut revolves around the contents. The search engines are scanning the content to rate the relevancy of the keywords. Keywords are going to live by their names and that makes the task of a web designer more challenging than ever.
Thankfully, Drupal ecommerce modules are a promising happening. Drupal is open source software for content management. It supports websites of all genres ranging from individual to entrepreneurs. Most content management systems can work on Drupal Core, a very basic version. This version provides for some fundamental facilities like search, caching, multilevel menu, RSS feed, etc. But these plain vanilla versions are not going to add flavor for an ecommerce website designer. Ecommerce website designer needs an extra embellishment that will exactly serve the purpose. As on 1st August 09, the Drupal website had over 4600 modules written and contributed by the Drupal community. Content Construction Kit, Views and Panels were some of the most dominant modules contributed by the communities.
Drupal & ecommerce: profitable combine
Ecommerce websites designed using Drupal are able to manage virtual economies. Ecommerce website designers can embed features like invoice generation, sales summaries, subscriptions, taxes and shopping carts. It allows ecommerce transaction through the likes of PayPal and eWay.
Other than these features, some characteristics of Drupal make it the best of the lot. These include:
- Search engine friendliness: your site can certainly get Google friendly with contributed modules like smart .htaccess and RL optimization.
- Ecommerce website designers can write secure codes and make their site as secure as required for ecommerce.
- Drupal caters for specific content requirements of an ecommerce sites.
Drupal modules for ecommerce
- Affiliate Drupal Shop: This module allows affiliate marketing of products on Drupal websites. This module lacks updates and does not rank very high on users’ charts.
- Alipay – ubercart: This is very famous Chinese gateway for payment.
- Adyen – ubercart payment: this module is capable of integrating payments through various sources like cash cards, bank transfers and even mobile phones.
- Amazon store: Amazon Product Advertising came up with this module. It allows instant installation and usage of Amazon Associate Stores.
- Authorise.net Advance Payment Gateway: Based on Customer Information Manager, this module allows storing customer information on authorize.net servers.
- Barcode: This module allows managing barcode directory into your Drupal module.
- CA Taxonomy: Along with ubercart 6.x-2.0 condition checks for nodes and their taxonomy terms can be set.
- Caixa Penedes: It enables payment gateway for the ecommerce package.
- Contenture: This module is for content publishers who use Drupal for micro-payments integration, via this revolutionary system.
- Other than these, various modules provide for Scandinavian, Chinese and Dutch direct payments.
Finally, an open source free content management system like Drupal is only paving way for future technologies that will change the face and formulas of the way we shop. Ecommerce website designers must equip themselves to get in line with this cutting edge technology that is only going to make our world much easier.
Regards, Cakes.
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