The Definitive Guide to Custom eCommerce Development 


Introduction: Custom Development vs. Out-of-the-Box Solutions

For businesses that rely on online sales either as their primary or secondary income stream, there will inevitably come a time where they have to make the critical decision of choosing between custom eCommerce development and out-of-the-box eCommerce solutions.

Each approach has its unique set of advantages and disadvantages that must be carefully evaluated to determine the best fit for a business's specific needs.

To help with the decision making process the creative and digital teams here at Toru Digital teams put their heads together to create this guide as a way of navigating through the process. Let’s start with the advantages (and disadvantages) of custom eCommerce development:

Advantages of Custom Development

1. Faster Iteration Cycles: Custom development allows for quicker updates across the stack, from A/B testing to design tweaks to database optimisations. This flexibility enables businesses to innovate continuously, respond to insights rapidly, and achieve higher conversion rates.
2. Strategic Progression: With custom solutions, progress is driven by your vision and strategy, rather than being limited by the constraints of third-party technology. This fosters more innovation and optimisation, helping you stand out in the competitive market.
3. Enhanced Integration: Custom development offers superior integration capabilities with your existing business systems, ensuring seamless operation and data flow.
4. Scalability and Future-Proofing: Custom-built platforms are designed to evolve with your business, providing the adaptability needed to meet future requirements and market demands.
5. Handling Greater Complexity: Custom builds enable you to deliver greater complexity, whether it be in products, pricing, or operations. Over the years, we've encountered clients, particularly in the jewellery industry, who needed custom builds because their product and pricing structures were too complex for off-the-shelf platforms to handle.

Examples of Work:

Disadvantages of Custom Development

1. Higher Capital Expenditure: Custom development generally requires a higher initial investment and ongoing support costs compared to out-of-the-box solutions but can pay huge dividends in the medium to long term (see points above).
2. Resource Intensive: Developing a custom solution demands more time and expertise, necessitating a skilled design and development team to manage and maintain the system

When Custom Development is Recommended

1. Unique Requirements: When your business needs unique functionalities or operates at a scale that off-the-shelf solutions can't support.
2. Data and Code Control: If controlling your data and code is crucial for your operations.
3. Long-Term Vision: Businesses aiming for significant market differentiation and those with a long-term vision should consider custom development.
4. Complex Integrations: For the best possible integration with other business systems, custom development is often the most effective approach.
5. Complex Product and Pricing Structures: Custom development is particularly recommended for industries with complex product and pricing structures. This can often be an essential requirement due to the unique intricacies of their product offering, which out-of-the-box platforms struggle to accommodate.

Evaluating the Need for Custom Development

Before committing to custom development, businesses should assess their specific needs through a thorough discovery session, including a functional requirements document (FRD), technical specifications, design mockups, and cost estimates. Consulting with experts can provide valuable insights into the potential benefits and feasibility of custom solutions.

eCommerce Web Design Considerations

Importance of User Experience (UX) and Design

Good UX is paramount in eCommerce, significantly impacting conversion rates. Custom development allows for more control over UX, enabling rapid iterations and data-driven design decisions that adapt to changing trends and user behaviour.

Custom development enables you to use all the tools at your disposal from traditional market research to the latest AI analytics platforms and bespoke AI integrations. 

Best Practices for eCommerce Website Design

1. Navigation: Intuitive navigation structures help users find products quickly and efficiently.
2. Product Pages: Detailed product information, high-quality images, and user reviews enhance the shopping experience.
3. Checkout Process: A streamlined, user-friendly checkout process reduces cart abandonment and increases sales.

Responsive Design and Mobile Optimisation

With an increasing number of users shopping on mobile devices, responsive design is essential. Custom eCommerce sites can be optimised for mobile use, ensuring a seamless experience across all devices.

Payment Processing and Security

Overview of Payment Processing Options

Custom eCommerce sites can integrate various payment gateways and processors, such as SagePay and Stripe. Building your own checkout process provides better UX and lower costs and can simplify compliance and security management.

Importance of Secure Transactions and PCI Compliance

Ensuring secure transactions and PCI compliance is crucial to protect customer data and build trust. Custom solutions offer the flexibility to implement robust security measures tailored to your specific needs that go above and beyond standard out-of-the-box solutions.

Fraud Prevention and Risk Management

Custom development allows for advanced fraud prevention and risk management strategies, reducing vulnerabilities and enhancing the overall security of the eCommerce platform. We always recommend regular audits and pen tests (penetration tests) to find and address any potential security risks before they have any business impact. 

Integrations and Add-Ons

An eCommerce platform can live or die on how well it works with your existing IT infrastructure.

A key advantage of a custom eCommerce development compared to an out-of-the-box eCommerce solution is that you can work with existing IT systems rather than having to adapt or change them to suit an out-of-the-box solution. The time and cost savings of this approach are clear and, when you add the ability to create custom automations, custom reporting and other custom enhancements, integrations can often be the deciding factor in choosing the right eCommerce solution for your business. 

Common eCommerce Integrations

1. CRM Systems: Custom builds facilitate seamless integration with CRM systems, enhancing customer relationship management.
2. ERP Systems: Tight integration with ERP systems improves operational efficiency and data accuracy.
3. Marketing Automation: Custom solutions can incorporate advanced marketing automation tools to boost customer engagement and retention.

Evaluating and Selecting Add-Ons

While off-the-shelf platforms often rely on third-party extensions, custom eCommerce sites can incorporate necessary functionalities directly into the build, ensuring optimal performance and compatibility.

Managing and Maintaining Integrations

Effective management and maintenance of integrations are crucial for long-term success. Custom solutions provide the flexibility to evolve with your business needs, ensuring continuous improvement and efficiency.

Scalability and Future Growth

Designing for Scalability

Our custom eCommerce platforms are designed with scalability in mind, utilising cloud infrastructure like AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud to handle increasing traffic and data loads efficiently.

This approach is exactly what the market leading infrastructure platforms were built for and the code, data and cloud infrastructure become so closely aligned that they can be considered part of the same system making scaling much, much easier and cost effective than out-of-the-box solutions. Expanding Product Lines and Markets

Custom solutions offer the flexibility to quickly adapt to new product lines, markets, and sales channels, supporting business growth and expansion.

Expanding Product Lines and Markets

Custom solutions offer the flexibility to quickly adapt to new product lines, markets, and sales channels, supporting business growth and expansion.

Preparing for Peak Traffic and Seasonal Demands

Custom development allows for tailored configurations that can handle peak traffic and seasonal demands, ensuring optimal performance and customer satisfaction.

Ecommerce Marketing and Advertising

Accumulating data, analysing it, and making enhancements to improve the data (conversions, drop-off rates, product views, etc) is a vital cycle for all successful eCommerce sites.

Whilst out-of-the-box solutions also offer the ability to manage this marketing cycle, they can often be limited by the improvements that you can make, potentially restricting growth. This isn’t the case with custom builds, where anything is possible.

Importance of Ad Copy and Product Descriptions

Effective ad copy and detailed product descriptions are essential for attracting and converting customers. Custom platforms can integrate these elements seamlessly, enhancing marketing efforts.

Integrating eCommerce with Marketing and Advertising Efforts

Custom eCommerce solutions enable advanced integration with marketing tools and platforms, facilitating targeted campaigns and data-driven optimisations.

Leveraging Data and Analytics for Optimisation

Custom builds allow for sophisticated analytics and reporting, providing valuable insights to drive continuous optimisation and improved conversion rates.

Ongoing Maintenance and Support

Unless you are building the site yourself, you will always need some level of support for your eCommerce solution. Whilst the out-of-the-box solutions such as Shopify and Magento do offer the support, it is often time limited and it is rare that you are able to build a relationship with the development support team and rarer still that they fully understand your unique business needs.

As a development partner we make it our business to know your business inside out, and be fully aligned with your KPIs, goals and vision. As part of our support we make sure that the development plans fit with your strategy as well as actively helping you to define it. 

Importance of Regular Updates and Maintenance

Regular updates and maintenance are crucial for security, performance, and functionality. Custom solutions often require dedicated support to manage these tasks effectively.

Managed Services and Support Options

Choosing a development partner that offers comprehensive support services, including regular audits and proactive maintenance, ensures the longevity and success of your eCommerce platform.

Planning for Future Enhancements

A well-designed custom eCommerce solution should include a roadmap for future enhancements, ensuring the platform evolves with your business and market trends.

Emerging Trends and Technologies

Having the ability to quickly experiment and integrate with emerging new technologies can often be the difference between a market-leading eCommerce solution and a BAU solution. 

As a current example, Amazon Personalize is a fully managed machine learning service that uses your data to generate item recommendations for your customers. We’re integrating this AI functionality (the same AI recommendation functionality that is used on Amazon.com) into our custom eCommerce solutions. This, along with the integration of AWS Bedrock to add a layer of industry LLM intelligence, is providing our clients with next-level AI for their eCommerce. 

As an independent development agency, we are able to be so agile because we do not have the limitations of third-party software as a barrier. At Toru Digital, we have a can-do innovative culture designed to help our clients stay ahead of the competition.

Conclusion: Making the Right Choice for Your Business

Deciding between custom eCommerce development and out-of-the-box solutions requires careful consideration of your business needs, goals, and resources. This evaluation is particularly crucial for businesses with complex product and pricing structures, which often necessitate custom solutions.

Custom development offers unparalleled flexibility, scalability, and control, making it an ideal choice for businesses with unique requirements and long-term visions. However, it demands a higher investment and a commitment to ongoing maintenance and support.

By partnering with an experienced development partner like Toru Digital, businesses can navigate the complexities of custom eCommerce development and achieve a tailored solution that drives growth and success. Our expertise in creating bespoke eCommerce platforms ensures that your business can thrive in the competitive online marketplace.

Get In Touch

For ambitious brands seeking a powerful and tailored e-commerce solution, Toru offers comprehensive consultation and development services.

Contact Toru Digital today to discuss your project and discover how we can help you create a powerful, scalable, and future-proof eCommerce platform.