CS-Cart.com offers over 500 different features, meaning it can meet the needs of many diverse types of businesses, all at an affordable price. It allows you to set up and maintain your online store, and gives you lots of options; one of the best features of CS-Cart.com is the fact that you can purchase the downloadable software and have no additional ongoing charges. Read our CS-Cart review below.
OverviewCS-Cart is an impressive platform for users to any level of eCommerce experience.With loads of features at a great price, CS-Cart is a great shopping cart solution that will quickly enable your online store to do business.
CS-Cart is recommended for any business that needs a shopping cart solution that is easy to setup and budget-friendly, especially the small to mid-sized business. Unlike most software of this type, CS-Cart allows you to pay a single up-front charge and download the software so that you can move forward without monthly fees.
You will quickly notice that CS-Cart offers multiple options for setup, including comparison product abilities, individual or multiple-vendor stores, and even enables you to create multiple storefronts. All of this might sound a little complex, but even so, the admin panel is very user-friendly and does not require programming skills for the initial setup or ongoing management. Unless you want to use HTML or CSS, it is not necessary at all with this software.
CS-Cart was built specifically to be easy-to-use and intuitive for those without development skills, but it is also scalable by choosing the right version of the software from the beginning. The choices range from CS-Cart to Multi-Vendor. Another advantage to CS-Cart is the support that you will receive from the website and the ease of finding developers familiar with the software if you choose to customize it further.
CS-Cart offers a full money-back guarantee for the purchase of the software. It also gives you a 30-day trial period for CS-Cart or Multi-Vendor. Additionally, there are money-back guarantees for Facebook store installations, eBay synchronizations, and other elements, as noted on their refund and money-back guarantee policies.
CS-Cart enjoys a high reputation in the online community. Sites like RepDigger show it has an 89% favorable, or excellent, reputation. SiteAdvisor and Google have tested the website and found it to be safe, and internet safety site, WOT, rates it a 94 out of 100, by checking testimonials and reviews on the site and the site security itself.
Overall, the testimonials that we had access to show that people are very happy with their choice of CS-Cart for their shopping cart solutions. They specify how user-friendly it is, how quickly they can get up and running, and how the platform will grow with their business over time. If you need an easy to use solution to get your storefront setup and generating cash flow, CS-Cart is an excellent choice.
Key FeaturesExpert reviews fall in line closely with what consumers have to say. While the reviews aren’t exactly glowing, critics are also hesitant to dismiss the program entirely. If anything, they make a point to clarify exactly who will benefit from the CS-Cart the most. Perhaps the shopping cart’s biggest flaw is marketing itself as a great all-around option when it is really best suited to a small segment of businesses.
For medium to large businesses who have ready access to an experienced developer, critics maintain that CS-Cart can be an excellent choice. The main problem is that you will need someone with enough technical knowledge to handle any bugs and get the most out of all the available features.
Small businesses and beginners won’t find CS-Cart worth the time and trouble and experts are much more apt to recommend one of the most recognizable names in eCommerce. There is plenty of potential there, but CS-Cart simply hasn’t evolved into a stable enough platform to surpass more dependable competitors.
The good news is that all the potential is there. Critics agree that if developers focus more on quality than quantity when it comes to features, then CS-Cart could be a major contender.
In general, CS-Cart receives slightly above average reviews. Users tend to rate it at about 3.5 to four stars out of five. It doesn’t don’t have an overwhelmingly impressive reputation, but it is a solid choice.Here are some of the features that satisfied customers find especially attractive:
For some users, these benefits far outweigh any problems with CS-Cart and make it worth investing in the software.
The good news about CS-Cart is they are always working to roll out new features. The downside of this quick turn out is that the add-ons have been known to cause a lot of bugs. This can create a somewhat unreliable program that is riddled with problems. For business owners, downtime is a worst-case scenario and CS-Cart has yet to solve these glaring problems
Users on the community forum report spending more time reporting and tracking bug reports than actually managing their site. This is also problematic because users pay for the software upfront. Many who gave up after experiencing too many problems had already passed the 30-day money back guarantee period and had to choose between losing out on a few hundred dollars or sticking with a troublesome program.
Finally, be aware that the community forum main has posts from authorized resellers and should be taken with a grain of salt.
Design & CustomizationDesigning and customizing your CS-Cart solution is easy; you simply choose the themes and colors that you desire and customize them further if you feel it necessary. You can change the way your storefront looks by picking a different theme in your admin panel. The interface is similar to popular CMS platforms (think WordPress) so it easy to see the changes you are making as you do them.
It is easy to customize the themes and modify backgrounds, fonts, colors and favicons in real time with the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editing abilities. You can also save any modifications you make to your themes as presets so that you can reuse them for other themes as well. Default CS-Cart Themes offer three sets of presets to choose from and modify as you see fit for your needs.
CS-Cart comes with a single, customizable template, and hundreds of themes. Changing themes and templates is simple. Because CS-Cart is well-known and well-loved, you will find lots of these available to download or purchase on the Internet, and lots of tutorials exist to make installing them a breeze. Additionally, the layouts in CS-Cart can be arranged via block placement with drag and drop functionality.
Page Style Customization As mentioned earlier, changing templates and themes is a relatively simple process. The layout for individual pages can be changed easily with the drag and drop block style using a simple grid system and then text and images can be added. CS-Cart allows you a lot of creativity with more than 200 storefront themes available, lots of great SEO tools, simple visual editor, widget mode, layout manager and built-in content management available. You can even edit HTML and CSS in the browser if you are technically savvy, or know someone who is.
Content Management with CS-Cart will be familiar to anyone who has used a website or blog. It includes a full CMS (content management system), which means you can design SEO-friendly pages, and you can control navigation and page placement. Photos and Galleries are added to CS-Cart through the use of third-party applications.
Mobile Store Site Building is accomplished by adding Twigmo to make your CS-cart storefront mobile-friendly.
Social Sharing Integration is easy and free by using a third-party application like Add This. Additionally, social login is available by adding the JanRain module on the CS-Cart website.
Custom Design Services are available from many developers on the CS-Cart Marketplace and many other places as well. The platform is extremely popular, and many developers are well-versed in how it works.
Features & Tools CS-Cart licenses include installation services and technical support for its software and its add-ons that are available to use with it. While we already mentioned the differing software levels available, we should also mention that it is possible to setup a Facebook store or eBay synchronization with the software as well, to beef up your storefront to earn added revenue.
CS-Cart allows third-party eCommerce plug-ins to be added; you can find many plug-ins that offer enhanced features and functionality on the CS-Cart Marketplace.
Custom domains are compatible with CS-Cart by setting up alias domains. CS-Cart integrates easily with other websites, payment services and shipping methods. In fact, there are more than 80 payment and shipping services that CS-Cart integrates with easily and quickly.
| Feature | Overview |
|---|---|
| Mobile Commerce | Mobile commerce can be added to your CS-Cart storefront by integrating Twigmo, which makes your online store mobile-friendly for iOS, Windows 8 and Android devices. The software determines when a visitor is using a mobile device and serves up the mobile storefront to them in place of the regular one. This allows mobile users to browse your store, search for products and make purchases. |
| Adding Products | Adding products is seemingly simple with CS-Cart; the organization of the admin panel is great, and will be very familiar to those with inventory management knowledge. You can add products one at a time or bulk add them, as well as clone a product. |
| Product Display | Product display options with CS-Cart: Every product entry in your catalog has these attributes, and you choose which, or all, you want to use. An image, name, price, list price from the manufacturer, quantity in stock, status as active or hidden (depending on availability.) All of these product options can be changed easily as needed. |
| Cart Functionality | Shopping cart functionality is one of the biggest positive attributes of CS-Cart. The functionality is super easy to use, with lots of filters to help customers search for products and quickly find what they are looking for. Once they narrow down their selections, they can view lots of details about each product, including images, reviews, options and any popups that you have added. Everything flows smoothly and response times are quick. |
| Apps Integration | Apps integration is available with many third-party applications, from shipping apps to mail apps. Here is a list of just a few of the apps that can be integrated: PayPal, MailChimp, API2Cart, Product Stickers, AfterShip, Live Search, Facebook, Stripe CartSpan, Shipway, Sendy, Ship Rush, Magic 360, and Live2Support. |
| Integration with eBay & Amazon | You can quickly use the Export to eBay link with CS-Cart; eBay synchronization must be setup to do so. Currently, CS-Cart works with Amazon checkout, but a third-party application is necessary to sync your products. (Koongo is one of those applications that supports the API needed to make this integration work. |
| Content Management | Content management is extremely easy to do with CS-Cart. It is simple to upload files or individuals images, texts, and products. CS-Cart includes a full CMS (content management system, which means you can design SEO-friendly pages, and you can control navigation and page placement. |
| Language Support | Language support is enabled by going to translate.cs-cart.com, clicking the desired language and downloading it. Save the file and then add it via the Manage Languages button in your admin panel. That language is now available to your customers. |
| Hosting & Security | CS-Cart can be setup independently as a shopping cart and catalog; you can also add a CS-Cart widget to your website or websites for multiple sales channels. Security is dependent upon the server which you choose, and CS-Cart cautions to be sure that the server meets certain requirements. Additionally, it also recommends a Unix-based system due to their enhanced security capabilities, better scalability, and greater performance. |
| Backups and Site Exporting | You can backup your CS-Cart site by going to the admin panel and the database. Create a name for your backup file and click Backup button. With this backup file, you can copy it to your computer and then restore it on a new server. |
| Payment Processing | With dozens of options for payment methods, it is easy for your customers to checkout on your storefront site. Whether they want to use authorize.net, Google Checkout, or PayPal, their credit card or multiple methods, you can set up your site to handle that. |
| Shopping Cart Plugins and AddOns | Lots of plugins and add-ons are available to make your customer’s shopping experience seamless and efficient, as well as capture the greatest amount of sales for your store. |
| Order Management | can be done in some ways. For smaller storefronts, an email can be sent to the site administrator for each new order. When you grow your business to the size where that is not practical, running order reports for fulfillment will work better in the long term. |
| Inventory Management | can be handled relatively automatically by setting up status order adjustments so that it decreases the inventory whenever a product is purchased. |
| Abandoned Carts | You can setup newsletters to go out to customers with abandoned carts by using the onsite Newsletter feature under the Marketing tab. |
| Mobile eCommerce | is accomplished via the integration of Twigmo and appears seamless to your customers. |
| Payment Card Industry (PCI) Certification | CS-Cart meets PCI compliance standards, and they recommend that all online stores meet that level of compliance as well. |
| Tax & Shipping Calculators | CS-Cart allows you to setup real-time shipping calculators for all of the largest shipping carriers– UPS, FedEx, USPS, Canada Post, etc., so that any changes will be reflected immediately. Tax calculators are setup in the administration panel. Go to the Shipping & Taxes area and set up the taxes to be charged on your products by selecting the Rates Depend On the field and add either the shipping or billing address. |
| Shipment Tracking | is enabled when you initially setup the new shipper in your CS-Cart administration panel. |
| POS Capabilities | We could not find any mention of specific POS capabilities though we certainly can see how the platform could be used on a mobile device in this regard. |
| CRM Features & Reports | The platform enables sales reports and orders so that you can see at a glance what you have sold, what is shipping when, and what is remaining in inventory. |
| SEO | The SEO add-on can make the site easier for search engines to find and categorize. It is easy to enable this addon in the admin panel by just changing its status to active, then specifying your desired settings in the window that opens. |
| Social Sharing Integration | is accomplished via third-party applications like AddThis, which can make social sharing of your website, or any of your products as easy as clicking a button. |
| Blogging | There is a blog setup that is simple to use and very much like a standard WordPress blog. |
| Newsletters | integrate easily with MailChimp and other email marketing platforms for tracking purposes and ease of use. |
| Built-in Promotion Options | are available on all but the free plan. The paid programs enable promotions and sales. |
| Gift Certificates, Deals or Coupons | The admin panel will allow you to add a block anywhere you want to on the Homepage for special deals, and you can pick the products you want to add, as well as your title for your special deals. To enable gift certificate sales, simply make sure that the gift certificates add-on has an active status in the admin panel. |
| Site Statistics & Analytics | are enabled by setting up the Google Analytics Google Analytics add-on is created to allow the administrator to see the statistics for CS-Cart on his Google account. This add-on is based on Universal Analytics.would like to track your CS-Cart orders, enable the Track e-commerce transactions option. Then you should select Yes in the E-commerce website option on the profile page of your site in your Universal Analytics account. You will be able to view reports under the E-commerce section of your Universal Analytics account. |
Plans & Pricing One of the best things about this platform is the cost, at least initially. CS-Cart offers a free trial period, as well as free online demos of its product and even after that is over. For larger storefronts, or adding applications and add-ons, there will be additional charges. Additionally, there is a 30-day money-back-guarantee.
CS-Cart lifetime – For $385, this solution adds a lot of functionality, like loyalty programs, return handling, multiple languages and currencies, branding, and more technical support. You can also purchase a single year license for $195 per year.
Multi-Vendor – This plan is $1450 for a lifetime or $590 per year and allows you to have separate admin panels for each of your vendors, vendor-specific shipping, and lots more tech support credits.
Adding additional storefronts are $245 or $125 each depending on the plan.
Note that eBay synchronization, Mobile Commerce, Facebook stores, and Cloud search are optional add-ons available for an additional charge for each subscription level.
Customer Support CS-Cart support includes an extensive documentation area, with a reference guide, lengthy and searchable knowledge base, and even developer documentation available at your fingertips. Additionally, there is customer support available via telephone and email ticketing, and training and tutorials as well. CS-Cart information seems relatively easy to find both on the website and further on the general Internet as well, and many forums exist to ask additional questions as needed. Customer support agents for CS-Cart seem to have excellent knowledge of the product and great people skills as well. Indeed, the exceptional customer support was noted in many of the testimonials we reviewed online.
The CS-Cart professionals help users setup their site configuration, troubleshoot issues and help them understand functions and features as part of the installation service. Each license of the software comes with free support credits to be used as needed, and they do not expire; you can also purchase additional credits for more extensive use or help with design and customization.
Technical support is provided via the website’s Help Desk system around the clock, so if there is an issue anytime, you can ask for assistance. The Help Desk is currently staffed during the daytime hours at GMT+4, but they will respond timely if it is after hours when you submit your query. More immediate answers can sometimes be found on the community forums, where many experienced users help one another through any glitches or modifications.
Ease of Use Store Setup is quick and easy to the simple user interface and drag and drop functionality that is available. You only make your choices for themes, templates and layouts, and can see how it will all look before it goes live. Site navigation is simple, and making changes to any of the elements is easy to do with just a few simple clicks. For more extensive changes, access to HTML and CSS code is available, along with extensive developer documentation. Finding someone well-versed in CS-Cart is relatively easy as well; the site offers a catalog of experienced developers where you can get assistance.
Conclusion Overall, CS-Cart is a very powerful eCommerce platform. Even in the crowded and growing online shopping cart market, CS-Cart stands out as one of the best with an excellent combination of user-friendliness, affordable pricing, scalability and extensive functionality. Few shopping carts offer all that CS-Cart does, and it seems that development is high on their list to keep the platform future proof.
On the flip side, CS-Cart sometimes is slow to handle new bugs, meaning that you might have to spend some time (or money, if you hire help) to tidy things up on your own. Seemingly, they are busy cranking out new futures at the expense of perfecting others. Being aware of that is probably a key to having a good experience with the platform. It does everything that you could probably want in a shopping cart solution though it might be a little glitchy at times.
If you are okay with a few glitches here and there for a platform that offers full customization control, real-time editing, a user-friendly interface, multiple storefronts, multiple payment and shipping options, SEO, and tracking abilities, and a great price point, then this is the right shopping cart for you.
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