Volusion Review 2019

What is Volusion?

Volusion is an online platform that allows you to create and manage an ecommerce website. Like other ecommerce website builders, the focus is on the details of selling products rather than creating the best-looking site in cyberspace.

One of the most important aspects of ecommerce builders is that they are able to tie up multiple sales channels, from Amazon and eBay to social media sites and even real-life point of sale transactions. The best ecommerce platforms allow you to manage these different avenues effortlessly, as well as run a good-looking website.

Volusion doesn’t have the brand recognition of Shopify or BigCommerce, but it still claims to have helped over 180,000 businesses sell more than $28 billion worth of products.

Volusion: The Good

Being an ecommerce platform, it’s hardly surprising that Volusion gets its core function of helping you manage sales right – but that’s not all it does well.

Product Management

You’ll find from the outset that Volusion’s product management is among the best in its class. You can add loads of detail to each product to make it more enticing to customers, and to help you keep track of how many you’re selling and how many you’ve got left in stock.

No Transaction Fees

Unlike some ecommerce builders – we’re looking at you, Shopify – Volusion won’t charge you a penny for making a sale. All the money you make from your site, you get to keep.

There is, however, a cap on the value of the sales you can make in a single month. We’ll discuss it more in the pricing section below, but even on the most expensive plan, you’ll be limited to $500k.

Reporting tools

Volusion has a great selection of reporting tools to help you keep track of your sales performance.

You’ll be able to see handy snippets of reporting in the Dashboard section (value of orders over time, top five products etc.). As you’d expect, you can go into more depth in the dedicated Reporting section. You’ll be able to see data on everything from orders in a specified timeframe to the number of authorized product returns.

Themes

Volusion offers 45 themes, which might seem like a paltry amount – especially when only 11 are free to use. However, they’re all mobile responsive and look great.

You can also adjust the color palette of each theme, which can help you make your website stand out even more.

Introduction

When you create your online store, you’ll be given a whirlwind tour of the software. This is much appreciated because, as we’ll explain below, Volusion’s software can be slightly confusing.

Volusion’s support staff will also give you a call almost as soon as you set up your site, offering to advise you on the initial setup of your site and the current state of your business. This support is a nice touch from Volusion and instantly makes you feel more connected to the software.

Volusion: The Not-So-Good

It’s not all good news for Volusion, though, as we found that it was typically harder to use than some of its rivals.

Confusing menu structure

During our testing of Volusion, we found its menu structure to be slightly confusing. For example, while some elements of our site’s design were to be found in the Storefront menu, others were left in the Design menu. In fact, there were also occasions where functionality was accessible through both menus – changing the theme, for example.

There were also submenus that we found overly taxing to use. For example, the Site Content submenu contained a list of pages that were accessible from the navigation on the live version of our site, but couldn’t be accessed through the Storefront menu. For example, crucial pages – such as the shopping cart – were reduced to a text editor view, not the what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) editors available from some of its competitors.

Sales channels

Volusion could integrate more sales channels into its platform. Its main competitors, Shopify and BigCommerce, both allow for more sales channel integration as standard and through their app stores.

To be clear, the sales channels that Volusion does offer are integrated into the platform seamlessly, but the lack of certain channels isn’t great. Some sales channels – Amazon and eBay, for example – are restricted to the higher pricing tiers as well.

Errors

One concerning aspect of our time with Volusion was that we received two HTTP errors while navigating the menus. We received an HTTP 500 error, which is due to a server-side error and was rectified quickly. However, we also received an HTTP 404 error, which could be due to the page being removed, having its URL changed without the link being updated or removed.

If we were a client relying on the software to run our business, we’d be a bit annoyed to say the least.

Volusion Pricing

Volusion offers five pricing plans, three of which have fixed prices. It also offers a 14-day free trial. All of these plans offer unlimited bandwidth, and as we mentioned above, you won’t have to pay any transaction fees. You’re also able to change your payment plan from month-to-month, which is handy for growing businesses.

Volusion Personal

The cheapest plan on offer, Personal costs $26 per month and has some limitations which only make it feasible for businesses in the earliest stages of their development. For example, you only have access to online support, and will be limited to 100 products and up to $50k sales per year.

Volusion Professional

For $71 per month, you’ll receive phone support and be able to stock up to 5,000 products. The sales cap is doubled to $100k per year, and you get access to features such as product reviews, newsletters and abandoned cart recoveries.

It’s a much better option than the Personal plan, but you still don’t get Amazon or eBay integration.

Volusion Startup

As Volusion's most popular package, Startup lands smack dab in the middle of all the best features without going too high on price. You'll get the third party app integrations, the unlimited products guarantee, and the $250k in online sales per year. You will take a hit on support, with only online and phone options, but it saves you a lot per month if you're eying the upgrade.

Volusion Business

A big jump to $269 per month, the Business plan is Volusion’s priciest fixed-cost plan. There’s a big bump in the number of features available to you, which now include access to Volusion’s API, advanced report builder tools, and access to the ‘Dedicated Success Team’, who can advise you on business decisions rather than offering support.

Volusion Prime

This is the custom plan designed for the largest businesses using Volusion. There’s not much we can say about this package, because it is tailored to each business individually.

Volusion: The Verdict

If you’re looking for an ecommerce platform to manage your online business, you could do a lot worse than Volusion. You’ll get a good-looking website and a sales platform which will let you integrate a good range of different sales channels.

However, it’s not the easiest software to use, with confusing menus and an occasional doubling-up of functionality. Volusion’s support staff will likely be more-than-willing to show you round the software, but it shouldn’t be this hard.