Website.com Offers Free eCommerce Website with No Transaction Fees
Website builder Website.com introduces new eCommerce feature with not transaction and subscription fees. Founded in 2005, to date, Website.com has mostly served blogs, personal and business pages.
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This new solution is designed for small merchants who wish to break into eCommerce without burdening them with long-term commitments and subscription fees.
New users can set up a shop with the simple to use drag-and-drop interface to create a customized look for their site and be up and running in no time.
“Our ultimate goal is not to offer false promises of success to entrepreneurs, but to lower the cost of entry and business sustainability. It’s unrealistic for new business owners to expect instant profits. Unlike other eCommerce service providers, our free platform allows owners to start selling online, on their own time without added pressure.”
Stuart Williams, director of marketing at Website.com
By offering a free eCommerce platform, small merchants are not pressured to realize sales immediately while they learn how to best market and promote their products.
This approach by Website.com is especially beneficial for micro-businesses where the owner/operator often works on small margins and does all the work themselves.
The company also offers domain name registration at $15 per year, which is a fairly standard price these days.
“We’re seeing that the financial burden for new business owners looking to sell online is just too high. The startup cost can often force a new business owner to drop out of the race before they even have a chance to see any growth. Unlike other major eCommerce providers, Website.com’s platform provides a solution that is suitable even for individuals to see if selling online is for them – with no commitment.”
Stuart Williams, director of marketing at Website.com
Free Has Limitations and Comes with Ads
Of course, anything offered for free has some limitations. This is also Website.com’s first real foray into eCommerce, so the platform is not at the same level as Volusion, Shopify, or BigCommerce.
The free option is limited to 10 pages, 1GB of bandwidth, and will show Website.com ads on the pages. Additional plans with unlimited pages and no ads start at $9 per month.
Overall, the idea to offer a free tier even for eCommerce is a pretty interesting step for micro businesses. The company already serves over 1 million pages and offers over 400 in-house designed templates.
As a drag-and-drop website provider with a large number of ready to go templates, the service can really make it easy to get started in eCommerce.
Even the paid tiers should suffice for many small eCommerce stores with limited inventory.
Website.com does lack many integrations and features found at other SaaS eCommerce platforms, But for some owners they may not be necessary and the paid tier pricing is very attractive.
The new free Website.com eCommerce platform is now available in select countries.
What do you think about Website.com’s approach to bring micro businesses into eCommerce? Drop us a line in the comments sections below.
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Richard Meldner
Richard is co-founder of eSeller365. He has over 17 years of experience on eBay which includes tens of thousands of sales to buyers in over 100 countries and even has experience with eBay’s VeRO program enforcing intellectual property rights for a former employer. And for about two years Richard sold products on Amazon using Amazon FBA in the US.
To “relax” from the daily business grind, for a few weekends a year, he also works for IMSA as a professional race official.