A Magento or Zen Cart webshop?

Are you considering starting your own webshop or migrating your existing webshop? However, do you lack the time, motivation and coding knowledge to do this yourself and/or do you have the opinion "if I do something I want to do it right", then choose a professional webshop builder.

If you choose the benefits of open source software, there are a number of so-called platforms from which to choose. In this consideration you will always include two popular open source platforms: Magento and WooCommerce, in addition there are still many organizations that use Zen Cart. In this blog a comparison between Zen Cart and Magento platforms. With the advice to switch as soon as possible!

Zen Cart

More than 10 years ago, Zen Cart appeared on the market as a derivative of osCommerce. As a PHP/MySQL platform, Zen Cart is very popular. This is mainly due to its consistent performance, activity on forums and easy implementation process.

Terrain Loss Zen Cart

In recent years Zen Cart has lost considerable ground to other e-commerce platforms of which Magento is one of the most popular. A major reason for this is that the PHP coding framework is very outdated and therefore can no longer easily meet changing customer requirements. But the lack of marketing budget is also to blame.

Emergence of Magento

Magento coding is easier to customize to the customer's needs. Also, Magento comes with more functionalities by default and features beautiful design. The customer can choose from a wide variety of beautiful templates. The active community also ensures that new modules and plug-ins are continuously developed and there is a lively growth in Magento webshops. Since 2008, Magento has been used by 28% of the market.

Target comparison Magento Zen Cart

Magento is particularly aimed at and suitable for medium-sized and larger companies (5-200 people) that have the manpower to start and maintain a web store. Zen Cart has historically been used more often by smaller companies.
If you want to start a Magento webshop do not do it yourself. Hire a professional party. Where Zen Cart's coding is relatively easy and simple and you may still decide to build such a webshop yourself, Magento calls for real 'developer skills'.

Comparison Magento Zen Cart

Price

Both Magento and Zen Cart are Open Source platforms. Downloading this software is therefore free. But when you consider the budget you will spend on the construction of your webshop, its promotion and introduction, don't forget the costs for hosting, the (design) template, security, payment module and probably a designer and developer. For a Magento webshop you will probably be slightly more expensive than a webshop with Zen Cart, but you can also benefit from more functionality and a nicer graphical layout. For a basic webshop the spending pattern is more or less the same.

Conclusion

There's not really a price difference between Zen Cart and Magento

Simplicity and convenience

For both Zen Cart and Magento, having the necessary technical knowledge and at least average coding skills for installation and customization is a requirement. If this is not available within your own organization find a developer who can train your staff on adding inventory, customer management, registering and filling orders etc.

ZenCart not intuitive, but fast
Zen Cart has many dropdowns and is therefore not an intuitive system. Zen Cart is an easy system because everything is very standard. However, the number of templates available is limited. If you want to provide customization to the customer then it is necessary to modify the PHP code. A Zen Cart shop, however, is very straightforward. It is therefore easy to quickly turn options/modules on and / or off.

The coding within Zen Cart is a conventional, largely still flat code and has been called sloppy by some developers.

However, Zen Cart's PHP code does allow you to build a web store faster compared to Magento.

Magento more complex coding
Magento has a more modern, object oriented, but more complex coding compared to Zen Cart. Lack of support tools makes it necessary to work with a professional. The Magento backend is more complex with more extensive system settings and administrator pages that often look different than many expected. It is, however, a nice challenge to master the maintenance of your webshop and stock by following Magento training courses and reading many tutorials.

Conclusion

Zen Cart generally scores better than Magento in terms of simplicity and convenience.

Product functionalities / attributes

Magento, compared to Zen Cart, offers a much broader, more robust and better developed set of functionalities that are crucial for setting up a successful webshop. For example, templates for Magento webshops are optimized for smart phones and tablets. This is a must to reduce the number of 'abonded carts' (people who do not complete the online sales process but leave their products in the shopping cart for example). Magento also has better and stronger SEO tools.

An additional advantage is that multiple Magento webshops can be supported from the same administrator account. This functionality is rarely found in competing web shop software packages. Zen Cart requires an additional, relatively complex module to be added.

Conclusion

The product comparison option, the coupon system (Zen Cart only offers a 'light' version of this) the shopping list and the very important one page check out are just a few examples of the fact that Magento houses much more functionality and attributes than Zen Cart.

Graphic design/styling

If you want a functional webshop as well as one that looks graphically beautiful and modern, Magento is by far the best option. The graphical possibilities and the number of templates available for Zen Cart are minimal, also due to the outdated styling. Of course, you can hire a designer to work for you and create a Zen Cart webshop with your desired, distinctive design. Templates for Magento shops, on the other hand, all feature an elegant, modern and distinctive design.

Conclusion

Magento scores much better than Zen Cart in terms of graphic design and styling. Although in Zen Cart the templates are usually easier to customize.

Integrations and Add-ons

Do you want to integrate your shop with other programs or do you want to expand your store with extra functionalities? Then you need additional modules (add-ons) and / or integrations. Magento offers these very many useful plugins and add-ons. For Magento 1 users these can be found on Magento Connect and for Magento 2 on the Marketplace. All these additional plugins and add-ons are sorted by rating, relevance and price. Moreover, they are all available in the Magento app Store.

Zen Cart also offers plug-ins. Zen Cart offers shop owners a database of over 1500 integrations such as language packs, social media and additional marketing materials. But beware: Zen Cart users claim that these plug-ins are not always compatible with latest Zen Cart versions. To install a Zen Cart plug-in does require technical knowledge. For many Magento plug-ins, a standard installation procedure is often sufficient. However, this can sometimes lead to surprises. If the module conflicts with another module, a technician is sometimes required.

Conclusion

Magento offers many plug-ins through Magento Marketplace, Magento Connect and the Magento App Store. These plug-ins can be perceived as stable and reliable by the potential users even before purchase / installation. The reason for this is the reviews on the Magento app by users of the various plug-ins.

The Zen Cart plug-ins are often severely outdated, less or incompatible with the latest versions of Zen Cart, and can be less customized for users. The Magento plug-ins are perceived as clean, reliable and useful.

So a clear plus for Magento when it comes to the quantity, quality, stability, reliability and usefulness of the plug-ins and integrations. With Magento 2, the plug-ins are tested and rated. This allows you, as a user, to be more confident of a good outcome when installing them.

Check-out procedure

It is very important for a customer that he/she can quickly and easily, but above all safely, pay for his/her shopping or order in the webshop. Efficiency and safety in the checkout process is therefore required. With Magento, this is perfectly regulated. Magento can be linked to many payment systems and payment solutions such as PayPal (standard) and Payment Service Providers such as Multisafepay, Ingenico, Buckaroo, Sisow and Docdata.

Conclusion

Magento features a one page checkout. Although Zen Cart offers more plugins for the checkout, the Magento checkout is faster. So, a plus for Magento.

Support

In case of problems you want to be able to count on support. Both on a technical level for realizing the desired links, preventing problems during updates, but also for answering simple customer questions and for promoting your webshop. Step by step, organizations want to continue to grow with their webshop.

Magento users can count on the very lively and active Magento Community. This community consists of more than 2 million users and is still growing by the day. They are active on various forums and are often the first point of contact for Magento users. The lively community develops and shares new plug-ins, makes various tutorials available and is also active on social media.

Conclusion

The Zen Cart Community theoretically offers the same service and technical support as the Magento communmunity. However, due to the emergence of several other e-commerce platforms, the number of Zen Cart users has dropped significantly in recent years.
This has ensured that the support is at a lower level than Magento. Plus for Magento in the area of support.

Table 1: Magento and Zen Cart compared with each other

Advice: Magento or ZenCart

We compared Magento and Zen Cart on six points. On only one point, simplicity and ease of use, Zen Cart is still the clear winner. If you want a basic webshop without too much fuss that is easy to maintain, Zen Cart is still justifiable from this point of view.

Do you want a webshop with which you can distinguish yourself from your competitors both graphically and in terms of functionalities? One that is at the forefront of developments and allows your customers to pay quickly and easily with the one-step checkout? And which is also accessible via all conceivable mobile devices. Then choose a Magento webshop.

Need help with your Magento webshop?

Vicus eBusiness Solutions helps you realize your Magento webshop. As the very first Magento webshop builder in the Netherlands and with hundreds of completed webshops for very different companies we have become Magento expert since 2007. Our specialists are happy to answer all your questions. We are also at your service if, after reading this blog, you would like a further explanation of the pros and cons of both webshops.

Learn more

Vicus gladly advises and helps organizations with the optimization of marketing, sales and customer service process by designing / building a professional webshop (possibly linked with CRM systems and / or financial administration packages).

It is precisely by thinking along with your company's wishes and future plans that Vicus helps you achieve stable growth.

Would you like to know more? Feel free to contact us on telnr 033 461 1196 or by e-mail at sales@vicus.nl. Also take a look at our website www.vicus.eu or read the Step-by-step guide to growing your own affordable Magento webshop.