Windo v/s WooCommerce
Before the internet took over, businesses never contemplated an online store. Thus, it is difficult to create and design an online store. But what’s tougher is choosing the right eCommerce platform to create an online store.
Windo and WooCommerce are two top eCommerce platforms with their own pros and cons. In this article, we will break the comparison of their features and help you choose the right platform that fits your business needs.
Overview
What is Windo?
Windo is a simple and effective eCommerce platform helping businesses to create a beautiful online store in just a few minutes. It’s a Shopify alternative that lets businesses like yours sell their products and services from a single place through a hassle-free process.
Its advanced features and flexibility can turn any website into a fully-functional eCommerce store.
What is WooCommerce?
WooCommerce is an open-source eCommerce plugin that is built on WordPress. It is a customizable and effective eCommerce solution that commonly helps brands to create an eCommerce store. It allows you to add extensions easily and customize your online store as per your needs.
Windo vs WooCommerce: A Detailed Comparison
While both Windo and WooCommerce offer the best eCommerce solutions to create an online store, it is still interesting to compare them on various fronts.
Pricing
Pricing is the basic and prominent factor to consider when choosing an eCommerce platform. An eCommerce platform may be providing the best possible solutions but may not be the right fit for your budget.
Windo has two pricing plans: The Sprout Plan and The Blossom Plan.
Their Sprout Plan is forever-free. It costs nothing but offers important eCommerce features like unlimited orders, unlimited products, seamless online payments, and excellent customer support.
Whereas the Blossom Plan costs $12 per month. It has all the features of the Sprout Plan along with a custom domain, 0% transaction fee, and priority customer support.
WooCommerce doesn’t cost anything to businesses to get started; however, you will be liable to pay for a domain name, web hosting, and SSL certificate that starts from $9 per month.
For beginner plans, the cost for plugins, security, themes, and website designs will be free. But as you pursue higher plans to leverage more features, it will increase your expense. Because to scale your business, you need to shift to paid themes and plugins for better results.
Verdict: Windo is clearly the winner in terms of pricing.
Themes
Windo allows users to choose their preferable themes from six different options and customize the store layout and colors as per the brand personality and colors. Their themes are unique and eye-catching which can help you give a unique identity to your business, representing your brand colors, logo, and style.
Along with it, you can also choose to add or remove any sections like shipping information, marketing banners, and more, that you don’t want to showcase on your online store.
WooCommerce has thousands of themes available for its users. You can choose the most suitable theme for your business and customize the elements based on your preferences. Whether you are an established business or a startup, WooCommerce is desirable for all your professional needs.
However, if you want high-quality store design for your business, you should opt for the paid themes. You can choose to pay for more personalized themes and scale your business. The templates range from $39 - $129, which is more expensive than the entire pricing plan of both WooCommerce and Windo.
Verdict: Windo is a wise option for many businesses, considering its various theme options at an affordable rate as compared to WooCommerce.
No doubt, the WooCommerce themes look great. But, spending hundreds of dollars on paid themes isn’t a feasible option for small businesses and bootstrapped entrepreneurs. This is where Windo’s easy-on-pocket and equally appealing themes can fill in the gap.
Payment Integration
Windo allows businesses to add either online or manual payment methods by connecting various payment gateways that are available in different countries. A simple and seamless payment process like this makes it easier for sellers to sell products or services in different countries.
Windo has got two major payment plugins: PayPal and Stripe. These payment methods are available in all countries. Besides those, it also offers payment options like Paystack, Flutterwave, Midtrans, and Paytm. Windo even lets businesses add custom payment methods available in the seller’s country for smooth local payments.
Like Windo, WooCommerce offers PayPal and Stripe as their default payment options. After all, these payment methods are available in all countries. Along with it, the platform has also introduced a WooCommerce payments solution powered by Stripe.
It allows sellers to add local payment methods by creating add-ons for WooCommerce. In simple terms, this platform supports regional payment services and has even other popular payment integrations like Amazon Pay, Square, Alipay, and more.
WooCommerce never charges any additional fees unless you are using different payment gateways or services for your business payments.
Verdict: There is no clear winner here because both Windo and WooCommerce are offering the same payment integrations.
While WooCommerce does have the big guns in the form of Amazon Pay and Alipay, it’s Windo that offers more convenience to its customers via one-click payment method integrations.
Live Chat Integration
Through Windo’s Live Chat Integration, you can easily customize the chat widget and choose the part of the screen that should be made visible to the users. The chat widget is highly customizable in terms of design and its position on the website. A higher level of personalization helps you in building brand credibility and gaining customer trust.
To use this feature, you can simply go to the live chat option in the settings and choose from chat widget designs and placement options. The icon color will be according to your brand color. This way you won’t lose the originality of the brand.
WooCommerce’s Live Chat Integration allows you to speak with your customers directly from the WooCommerce website; however, unlike Windo, it’s not free. You will be given a 14-day free trial to test their service. It starts from $16.99 per agent. So, you can test it for 14 days and check if it is a fit for your business or not.
Verdict: Although WooCommerce’s Live Chat option is effective, it looks costly when compared to Windo’s live chat integration which is free. Moreover, the latter runs with the same effectiveness and efficiency, making it an ideal option for several businesses.
Ease of Use
Windo has a user-friendly interface that is simple and easy to use. Users can navigate through the entire website seamlessly. Its seamless process and powerful functionality let you create your online store in just a few clicks.
You can sign up easily on Windo, choose from their various themes, and customize your online store as per your needs. It lets you easily add products to your store and sell them to customers easily. Managing your online store is convenient with Windo and you highly improve your customer experience.
WooCommerce is super flexible in terms of customization but it isn’t a self-hosted platform. It means you will need to install several plugins to improve the effectiveness of your store. There are plenty of free and paid plugins available to manage your store through WooCommerce. But, in the end, it may increase your expense because, like Windo, they do not offer everything under their basic pricing plan.
Verdict: Windo is undeniably a winner here in terms of simplicity and user-friendliness.
Windo or WooCommerce — Which is Better?
Windo and WooCommerce are two top platforms in the eCommerce market. But Windo is easier and more convenient to use. It is a self-hosted platform and doesn’t require installing additional plugins or extensions. You can get started quickly and design your eCommerce shop in a few minutes. Furthermore, setting up payments and customizing your store is a bit easier compared to WooCommerce.
The prime advantage of Windo is that it is affordable and offers all the prominent features of WooCommerce. You can upgrade your pricing plan, leverage the additional features, and manage your store effectively.
And the major disadvantage of WooCommerce is that it comes with a learning curve and requires businesses to invest some time to master the website. Whereas, Windo neither comes with a learning curve nor requires you to have any prior coding knowledge to get started with your eCommerce store.
If you are looking for a budget-friendly option along with advanced features and a user-friendly interface, Windo is the best option for you. It is hassle-free and can help you boost your business growth seamlessly.
All you need to do is sign up and get started!
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How to convert my store website to App?You can request for APK generation in your seller app/dashboard from settings. You'll receive an Android APK file from our team within a week.
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How to add the discount coupons?In the Settings, you can go to “Discount Coupons” to create coupons for your customers.
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How do I get customers?Windo helps you in creating your online shop & configuring payments & logistics. We are not directly promoting the shops of any business owner. However, you can utilize the benefits we are giving like- Adding coupons, Integration of Google analytics & Facebook pixel, which will help you to understand your customer's behavior & strategize your way of marketing.
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How can I add my customer’s testimonials?In the settings, you can go to “Customer Testimonial” to add testimonials received from your customers and it will start reflecting on your shop for other customers.
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How can I share my store scan code?In the Dashboard, there is an option of Share your shop, you can either Download it or email the scan code to yourself and share it with your potential customers.
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When can I connect with customer support?You can mail us at team@mywindo.shop. Or text us by clicking on the Support icon at any time of the day.
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How can I request a new feature?In settings, you can go to “Feature Requests”, to send requests for premium features.
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To whom should I connect for customer support?You can connect Windo team by clicking on the Support icon or mail us at team@mywindo.shop. We’ll reach out to you on the same Business day (Monday to Friday) and during weekends we will respond to you within 12 hours (Saturday & Sunday)
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Where can I see the blogs & tutorials?In settings, under Support, you can refer to Blogs. You can see the tutorials on Dashboard or you can visit our YouTube channels to watch tutorials.
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Why should I choose WINDO?If you are starting your business or you just want to scale your business without taking too much effort, then Windo is your answer. Here you get unlimited benefits & features for free.
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Why should I upgrade my free plan to paid plan?In the free plan, you certainly can create a decent shop, but to get more customers and orders, you need to put in a little extra effort & time. This is possible only if you upgrade your free plan to paid plan. Here are some benefits of the paid plan: See your customer’s abandoned cart, Use SEO benefits for your shop’s higher ranking, create discount coupons for your customers & much more.
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What is WINDO?Windo is a tool for any small/medium-scale business owner to create an online shop in minutes without paying anything. One can handle orders end-to-end orders with any mode of payment & delivery.
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How can I request a new feature?First, you need to go to “Settings” and then click on “Feature Requests” to send requests for premium features.
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How can I customize my shop website?You can go to “Settings,” click on “Shop Website,” and there you’ll find all options to customize your shop.
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How can I add the payment options?payment
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What are the payment options customers will get to pay for orders?payment
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Are your payment methods safe?payment
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Do you take any commission on transactions?payment
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What are the payment options customers will get to pay for orders?payment
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How does the shipping process work on Windo?shipping
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What shipping options are available on Windo?shipping
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Does buyers pay for shipping on Windo?shipping
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How do I manage shipping on Windo?shipping
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How can I connect my Domain name to my store?In Settings, go to “Shop Website,” where you will see the option of “Custom Domain”, click on it and fill in the required details and lastly, click on Connect to connect your Domain.
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How long does it take for my domain to propagate?It may take up to 48-72 hours for your domain’s records to propagate and for your site to appear worldwide.
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How can I disconnect my domain?If you want to disconnect your domain anytime from your WINDO Shop anytime, you can remove or reset your A or CNAME records back to your previous record mapping.
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How many times can I change my domain?Not more than 3 times a week.
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Can my post caption also be synced?No, you can only sync the images.
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How much time is required to sync my Instagram products?You can sync your Instagram products within a few minutes.
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How many products I can sync?You can sync unlimited products.
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After connecting my Instagram to the Windo shop then my latest product will be synced?Your Instagram will be synced every 24 hours.
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How many themes are currently available?You can select from 5 theme options available on our app or you can go ahead and build your own theme.
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How to do the layout customization?In Settings, go to “Shop Website,” where you’ll see the option of “Themes” click on it, and you’ll see two options, themes & Layout customization. On click of “Layout customization,” you will see all the options where you can enable or disable a particular section to customize the layout of your store.
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Can I change the color of my store?To customize the color of a selected theme, you can go to themes in settings and click on details. Click on “Pick color” to choose primary and secondary colors for your store.
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How can I change themes?Go to Settings, You’ll see the “Shop website” heading; below that, click on Themes, where you can see multiple themes. You can select a theme for a single product or multiple products per your requirements.
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How can I connect with my buyers?In Settings, go to “Shop Website,” where you’ll see the option of “Live Chat Settings” click on it to enable the Live chat option and connect with your customers.
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Can I disable the live chat widget?Yes, you can do so by disabling the toggle switch present in live chat settings.
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Can my buyers connect with me via WhatsApp?Yes, they can. You need to customize your live chat feature and select WhatsApp as your widget.
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Can I place the chat widget anywhere on the screen?No, you can place the chat widget on the top right corner or bottom right corner of the screen.
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What is Facebook pixel & how will it be helpful for my business?Facebook pixel can be used to track conversion from Facebook ads. You can also retarget people who have already taken some kind of action on your website.
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How can I understand my user behavior & what actions they take on my website?By configuring Google analytics and Facebook pixels.
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What is Google Analytics & how will it help my business?Google Analytics can be used to measure your shop’s data that will provide insights into your business and you can strategize accordingly.