e-Commerce with Integrated Blog (e-Blogging) - Part I

Lately I’ve been exploring different e-Commerece web applications and e-Commerce plugins for Wordpress. Since this blog mainly focuses on how to create profit from an Internet business, the first thing is to choose which web application is suitable for your Internet business. There’s not a one size fits all because each Internet business has different needs and requirements. Though, the foundation (system) can be the same across the board, whether you choose to use Wordpress as a customer management system (C.M.S) or an e-Commerce solution such as Magento, OsCommerce or Zencart. All of these systems work very well and they are constantly being updated and developed for users.

I Am Still Not Convinced With Using Wordpress e-Commerce Plugins

I wrote a post comparing Using A Blog Vs. Using A E-commerce Website?, which discusses the differences between a blog and an e-commerce system. Then over the last few weeks I’ve been writing reviews looking at the different e-Commerce plugins available for Wordpress. If you want to see the various reviews, read the articles section under eBlog Reviews. What I am exploring today are the different options available to integrate a blog into an existing e-Commerce system. If you have read all of my reviews about the different e-Commerce plugins for Wordpress, you will see that I am still not completely convinced. Wordpress for blogging is a fantastic system and is more than capable of handling large volumes of data. Though, once you add on an e-Commerce plugin it does not have the same functionality in comparison to an e-Commerce system, which are more robust to handle large consumer transactions. Now, the big challenge is, most e-Commerce systems do not have a blog interface built-in,which raises the question ofhow to integrate an e-commerce system with a blog?

Why Have An e-Commerce System Integrated With A Wordpress Blog?

Over the years, web users have found blogs to be more compelling to look at than just shopping sites. Most blogs have written reviews and information relating to a product or service, allowing any web user to do their research before making a purchase. Imagine that you were looking to buy the latest iPhone and you wanted to look at some reviews and read other people’s opinions before spending your money. If you typed “iPhone review” in Google, the first site that appears is usually a review site such as Cnet or Smart Company, which all run a blogging application such as Wordpress. These review sites usually only provide a review and opinions, but don’t have a link saying where to buy. This is where having an e-Commerce system integrated with a Wordpress blog can benefit your Internet business. Instead of the customer going to other websites to read reviews and opinions about the product (by that time they may have forgotten your website), you can have your own reviews and comments linked to your products. This encourages the customer to stay on your website and helps them save time looking for other places for reviews and opinions.