E-commerce and marketplaces
Opening a marketplace is not one more channel, it is a second trade. Catalogue, prices, stock and logistics follow rules that are not yours, and the penalty for a mistake is not a drop in traffic, it is being delisted.
Choosing the platform: PrestaShop, WooCommerce, Shopify or Shopware, on four questions
Technical connection of a marketplace: catalogue, orders, shipments, returns
Mapping the catalogue and its attributes, size by size and colour by colour
Prices per country, VAT included and in local currency, never a net price by mistake
Stock shared between your site and your marketplaces, without overselling
Listing compliance: product information, safety, price reduction announcements
Feeds to the ERP, the logistics provider and accounting
A marketplace is not plugged in, it is integrated. The catalogue has to be remapped attribute by attribute, prices recalculated per country with the right VAT and the right currency, stock shared without ever overselling, and orders brought back into your back office with their own delivery constraints.
And the penalty for a mistake is not the same as on your own site. A net price sent into a field expecting a tax-inclusive one, a listing missing a mandatory statement, a stockout not reported: the platform suspends, then delists. You do not win back a lost position by fixing it the next day.
The four workstreams, in the order they hurt
| Workstream | What breaks in practice | What it costs |
|---|---|---|
| Catalogue and attributes | The marketplace imposes its own taxonomy. Sizes, colours, materials and categories never match yours | Listings rejected on import, or worse, published with the wrong attribute |
| Prices per country | Tax inclusive, VAT of the delivery country, local currency. One field filled wrongly and you sell at a loss | Your margin, on every order, until somebody notices |
| Shared stock | The same item sold at the same moment on your site and on two marketplaces | Cancellations, which weigh directly on your seller rating |
| Listing compliance | Mandatory product information, safety, price reduction announcements. Platforms now check before publishing | Suspension, then delisting. The most expensive of the four |
The four platforms, what they do well and what they impose
None is better in the absolute. Each makes a different bet on what you agree to manage yourself, and that bet is paid for elsewhere. Here is how we present them when the question of the platform comes up.
PrestaShop
Open source, installed on your own hosting, with a considerable module ecosystem and a strong footprint in France. Its real strength is native multistore and multilingual support: one installation serves several countries, currencies and catalogues with no extra layer. No commission on sales.
Its specificity lies in its internal mechanics. Hooks let a module graft on cleanly, overrides let you rewrite the core, and that is where debt accumulates: a forgotten override blocks a version upgrade years later. Moving from 1.7 to 8 and then 9 is planned for, not endured. Hosting, security and backups stay your responsibility.
WooCommerce
An extension of WordPress, so content and shop live in the same tool. It is the only platform where the blog article, the landing page and the product page sit in one place, with the same editorial chain and the same search optimisation. For a brand whose acquisition runs on content, the advantage is decisive.
Its specificity is the flip side of its flexibility: performance depends entirely on your hosting and on how many plugins are installed. A shop stacking twenty plugins slows down, and nobody knows which one is at fault. Order storage has also changed model with HPOS: an older shop has to migrate, and not every plugin follows.
Shopify
Hosted and managed, nothing to administer. Its strength is the checkout, continuously optimised on a volume nobody else observes, and a launch measured in days. Payment, security and version upgrades stop being your concern.
Its specificity is the price of that peace. You pay a subscription and, outside their own payment gateway, a commission per transaction. The checkout is only marginally customisable outside the top tiers. Templates are written in Liquid, and above all you do not own the platform: whatever it decides to change applies to you. It is an excellent base as long as your model fits inside theirs.
Shopware 6
Open source, German in origin, with a commercial edition. A deliberately API-first architecture, and a rule engine that expresses complex commercial conditions without development. It is the strongest base for B2B: prices per customer group, quotes, recurring orders, differentiated catalogues.
Its specificity is human before it is technical. The ecosystem is smaller outside Germany, skills are rarer, and the initial integration cost is higher. In exchange, the architecture ages better than average.
| Platform | What it does best | What it imposes on you | When we recommend it |
|---|---|---|---|
| PrestaShop | Native multistore and multilingual, no commission, deep catalogues | Hosting and security on you, override debt to watch | Several countries or brands, wide catalogue, a wish to control everything |
| WooCommerce | Content and commerce in one tool, editorial search performance | Performance dependent on hosting and plugin count | Acquisition driven by content, moderate catalogue |
| Shopify | Checkout, speed to launch, zero infrastructure | Subscription, plus transaction fees if you do not use Shopify Payments; checkout barely customisable, platform not owned | Fast launch, standard model, small technical team |
| Shopware 6 | B2B, rule engine, API-first architecture | Narrower ecosystem outside Germany, costlier initial integration | Selling to professionals, complex commercial rules |
What should actually decide it Not the fashionable platform, but four questions. How many references and how many variants. Do you sell to professionals. How many countries, with which VAT rates and which currencies. And who, in your company, will run the shop day to day. A platform too powerful for the team carrying it costs more than a platform that is slightly tight.
The modules we deploy to equip these platforms come from Datafirefly Limited, the sister company of our agency, which publishes for PrestaShop, WooCommerce and Shopware. The method comes before the tool: the platform is chosen on the four questions above, not on the module catalogue available.
Our approach
- Framing before connecting. Which share of the catalogue goes to the marketplace, at what price, with what delivery promise. A technical integration laid down without that decision produces a channel costing more than it returns.
- Catalogue mapping. Attributes, sizes, categories, images in the required formats. It is the most thankless work and the one that decides everything else.
- Prices and stock. Rules per country, arbitrage between your site and the platform, safety thresholds so you do not oversell.
- Order flows. Orders, shipments, tracking numbers, returns and refunds, through to the ERP and the logistics provider.
- Monitoring. A marketplace integration degrades in silence: a feed failing overnight warns nobody. We put reconciliation in place before we leave.
The mistake that costs most Treating the marketplace as a catalogue export. It is not an outbound feed, it is a sales channel with its own rules on price, stock, lead time and compliance. A company that pushes its whole catalogue without deciding what belongs there often finds it is selling its best references at the thinnest margin.
What you get
- A written framing: which references, at what price, on which marketplaces, with what delivery promise.
- The technical integration, catalogue and orders, with the mapping documented.
- Explicit price and stock rules, verifiable line by line.
- Daily reconciliation between what the platform displays and what your back office actually delivered.
Who is it for?
For brands wanting to open a marketplace without losing their margin, for those who already have one but live with cancellations and suspensions, and for those running three channels by hand in a spreadsheet.
Frequently asked questions
Should we open several marketplaces at once?
No. One, well run, teaches more than three skimmed over. Catalogue and logistics constraints differ from one platform to the next, and it is the first one that shows you what your organisation can actually carry.
How long does a first integration take?
The technical connection is counted in days, the catalogue mapping in weeks. It is almost always the catalogue that sets the timetable, not the connection.
What happens if a feed fails overnight?
Nothing visible, and that is precisely the problem. Frozen stock, stale prices, orders not brought down: the platform, meanwhile, keeps selling. Monitoring is not optional on this channel, it is what avoids suspension.
Is listing compliance really a risk?
It has become the leading reason for blocking. Platforms check mandatory statements before publication, and a shortfall means the offer is suspended, not merely flagged.