Your competitor has a new website with a modern, individual look and many useful functions. You have an open source 2 or 3 column standard layout that looks like any other shopping site available and offers only basis functions  Which website is a customer going to browse?

While osCommerce and ZenCart are not difficult to use or to understand how they work, are they rather dated and unable to do what customers require of a modern shopping website? I think its time to move on and I have chosen Magento.

It is a challenge. Magento works very differently and offers many more functions  with more ways to customise than either ZenCart or osCommerce could hope to offer. The downside? It’s complicated.

Rather than go live, I have installed it at home on my own server in order to test and understand how to manage the front and admin side.

My aim: to run 3 websites using one installation of Magento with one database, offering a selection of products through sites that look and feel different.

I am starting with the free 1.4.1 version and I’ll keep you updated on how i get on. Hopefully if you are a Magento beginner like me it will help you too.

In addition, the importance of SEO cannot be emphasised enough for any website. As well as marketing and promoting your online store, your cart software has to have great SEO compatibility and I think Magento is over and above ZenCart and OsCommerce.