Newbie - should I be delving into Magento

[frenchie]

Hi,

I have heard great things about Magento, so would like to use this for a simple online shop - selling 10-20 products. So will need a store front and cart - thats about it.   Should I be goign down the Magento route?

I am ready to install Magento onto a host.  Would it be easier just to go for Wordpress, CSCart, Prestashop or Joomla for instance?  Or even take a step back and just go for Shopify?

I would like to learn more about ecommerce, web design and I like to have control over everything so magento seemed like a good choice.

Thanks for your help and input!

[chiefair]

Magento is massive overkill for 10-20 products.

[frenchie]

Thanks Chiefair,  is it over complicated for such a basic site?

Couple of site examples: 

http://biancachandon.com/  

http://bobbyabley.co.uk/shop/ 

Is there a little brother alternative?  What would other people use for small shops?  I already have hosting and domain, somthing like Wordpress.org?

[robfico]

I wouldn't say Magento is overkill for any size store. It all depends on if the features it offers meet with your needs, how much you like working with the software, and whether the hosting option you choose will work well with the software.

We have a number of small merchants running Magento with a handful of products. They like Magento, make use of features and extensions they need, and it works well without being too much for them.

The key with Magento is being comfortable with the software, knowing who to contact or how to troubleshoot issues that may arise with an open source project, and choosing a web host that can help you out when you get stuck or errors crop up.

It's true Magento requires more resources hosting wise, and can be somewhat complicated to set everything up, but it works for stores with a few products and for stores with thousands of products equally well. With small stores and good hosting, Magento is quite fast with just basic caching that is built into the software.

[JLHC]

I agree with @robfico that Magento should work just fine with small stores. 

You will be able to learn a lot about all aspects of eCommerce with Magento's powerful features and you have control over everything. Magento is a much better fit for people like you than those who just want to set it and forget it. 

[frenchie]

Thanks all for the comments both for and against.

Really helpful posts @robficoRobfico and @JLHC - very impressed with this forum!!

Im going to get strted with Magento, I have basic hosting with Sitegorund so looking forward to reading posts/guides on installing Magento an jumping into this!

Thanks again!

[JLHC]

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@frenchie wrote:

Thanks all for the comments both for and against.

Really helpful posts @robfico@robfico and @JLHC - very impressed with this forum!!

Im going to get strted with Magento, I have basic hosting with Sitegorund so looking forward to reading posts/guides on installing Magento an jumping into this!

Thanks again!

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You're welcome! 

Here's the official installation guide for Magento:-

http://devdocs.magento.com/guides/m1x/install/installing_install.html#install-magento

Some hosting provider will have auto installer for Magento as well which you can use to easily install Magento in your hosting account. 

[MirandaB]

I think Magento is a great choice, especially for a simple online store. You can check out this informative blog post "Ecommerce CMS Showdown: an In-Depth Comparison of Shopify, Magento and PrestaShop" and decide for yourself!

Miranda B. | Marketing and Research | Shoppimon

[frenchie]

Thanks james,  I have setup hosting with Siteground, which has the Magento Auto installer.  They even provided me witha  temporary server URL to setup and test the site without using my domain name.

I've installed Magento and also used SSH to install the patches.  Now I need to get stuck in and start playing with my Magento site, the fun begins!!

Thanks for the link Miranda, i will have a read through the post.  

I guess the next step is to customis a template to create my site?  What software do eople use, photoshop, dreamwaever, etc?

[JLHC]

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@frenchie wrote:

Thanks james,  I have setup hosting with Siteground, which has the Magento Auto installer.  They even provided me witha  temporary server URL to setup and test the site without using my domain name.

I've installed Magento and also used SSH to install the patches.  Now I need to get stuck in and start playing with my Magento site, the fun begins!!

Thanks for the link Miranda, i will have a read through the post.  

I guess the next step is to customis a template to create my site?  What software do eople use, photoshop, dreamwaever, etc?

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Most will use Photshop but it depends on what you need. There are quite a lot of third-party themes for Magento that you can use as a base to start customizing according to your needs.