Ubercart is built on Backdrop CMS and fully integrated with Backdrop's core systems. Some folks may be wondering, though... why use Backdrop for an e-commerce website at all? Since we made the decision to port Ubercart to Backdrop CMS for all our future e-commerce sites, let me give you a little bit of our rationale:
- Backdrop CMS is very search engine friendly. URL optimization, smart .htaccess, and a host of contributed modules to make your site more friendly and noticeable to Google and all major search engines make Backdrop CMS the ideal platform for an e-commerce website. After all, if customers never find your site, they probably won't be buying your product!
- Backdrop CMS is a secure application framework. Developers who are much more security savvy than us have worked hard to eliminate security risks and make it easy for developers to write secure code. This ensures your store's and your customer's information is kept securely and safely out of the reach of hackers and prying eyes.
- Backdrop CMS is a powerful and versatile content management system. An e-commerce site needs to do more than take orders. Customers are growing accustomed to full community sites built around products or product markets. Blogs, forums, product reviews, and articles are becoming essential to attracting and keeping customers in your store. These features are all easy to add and administer on your e-commerce site when it's integrated with a system like Backdrop CMS out of the box.
- Backdrop CMS and the Ubercart project have an ever-growing community of developers. This means anyone looking to start up an e-commerce site using Backdrop CMS who needs custom code done will be able to find help. There is a growing market for such work, and companies are even beginning to offer specific Ubercart services to clients.
- Backdrop CMS has a growing list of themes available for download and consultants offering theming services. Whether you have a design on hand that needs to be converted to a store theme or need one made from scratch, you will be able to find the help you need. Furthermore, there is a large list of themes ready-made and available for download from backdropcms.org.
So, why use Backdrop for e-commerce? Your customers will find your site more often, have a secure shopping experience, and hopefully hang around your site longer, browsing the content and other customer retention sections of your site. As a store owner, you can be sure that if someone hasn't already developed a module to do what you want on your site, there will be someone around with the knowledge to get it done.