Drupal-based websites come in all shapes and sizes. Over the last few years, e-commerce website developers have accepted Drupal as their go-to website builder en masse. While other builders and CMS like WordPress and Joomla do provide e-commerce modules and core features, Drupal has managed to establish a league of its own. The most basic of all Commerce modules from this builder includes features that enable product management, order management, payment security and tax calculations. Just like any great e-commerce module, the ones from Drupal make promoting products, offers and discounts incredibly easy. Coupons, PayPal integration, Amazon and eBay integration and physical store locator elements make it an attractive choice for all e-commerce site developers.
Why do we need a list of the most necessary modules for Drupal?
Right now, if you were to search Drupal.org for e-commerce modules, you would find 330-odd hits. Several of these modules offer highly specific functions including affiliate marketing and barcode generation. Your website might need one or more of these modules depending on the functions you want to impart. Nonetheless, choosing just one or a few from the 300+ list can become a tad bit confounding for developers old and new. A successful attempt at ecommerce web development requires a thorough knowledge of modules, their salient features, and their compatibilities to a great extent. So, here is a list of the seven leading e-commerce modules from Drupal that will help your e-commerce site climb its way to the top of the SERP.
Commerce recommender and Ubercart recommender
Businesses grow and evolve with the demands of the market. With each passing day, a business needs to mature and adopt techniques that enable growth of revenue. Upselling and cross-selling are two of the most effective techniques that the Commerce recommender and Ubercart recommender modules enable. They generate personalized recommendations for your website visitors. You must always use them in tandem, since in the event of a new user with no purchase history; the cross-selling module will analyze the purchase history from other users with similar buying interests and recommend products accordingly. You can choose either one of these modules depending on your selling priorities or install them together to leverage their combined actions.
SEO checklist
This one is not specific for e-commerce sites, but it is indispensable. The SEO checklist module from Drupal can turn your website into a sales-generating platform. Keyword monitoring, traffic analysis, product optimization, URL optimization are all part of the necessary SEO module for your e-commerce site. Optimizing for a search engine is much work, and this Checklist module helps you keep a tab on all your optimization efforts, SEO factors and site activities. It is a superbly streamlined module that supports automatic updates of the ranking factors and SEO parameters as they change your e-commerce website. The SEO Checklist module can warn you about unwarranted changes and missed updates too. Monitoring your site optimization progress was never easier before the SEO Checklist module for Drupal commerce came along.
Drupal Commerce or Ubercart
Contrary to what most might like to believe, e-commerce is not a core feature of Drupal modules. You need to add these functionalities by choosing the right modules like Ubercart or Drupal Commerce. These are the basic framework that can add the complete e-commerce features to your site. For small businesses, Ubercart is a great choice. Larger businesses should consider Drupal Commerce since it can satisfy complicated demands of buying, selling, and recommendations.
Commerce Upsell or UC Upsell
Upselling is a distinct practice. It is not the same as cross-selling. While cross-selling entails convincing the customers to buy more products based on their current choices, upselling involves enticing the customer to opt for an upgrade. Upgrades often bring along better profit margins for the seller. The ideal way to suggest an upgrade is by recommending products during customer checkout. Both Commerce Upsell and UC Upsell are effective upselling modules for Drupal users. You can install them on Drupal Commerce and Ubercart Platforms respectively.
Commerce Shipping
Do you know who your target customers are? Are you selling to a small locality within your state or are you selling across the country? Drupal supports several international seller sites that need international shipping support. Now, shipping across the world can be a complicated process since it involves different parameters of cost. Based on the quantity, type, and weight of products, the shipping charges can vary. Almost all international customers want to know shipping charges before the buy. Commerce Shipping is one such pervasive module for Drupal e-commerce that supports the integration of FedEx, UPS, and USPS.
MailChimp e-commerce
Working in the e-commerce domain brings people face to face with some email marketing services. MailChimp is one of the leading email marketing service providers across the global marketing domain. The MailChimp e-commerce module helps to establish mailing lists based on customer demographics. This is a unique module that supports email sending via third-party service providers. Email marketing campaigns, marketing analysis and sending personalized emails to clients become a lot easier when you have a module like this one working with your e-commerce site.
Currency
International websites need to think beyond shipping problems. While you will be optimizing your website for an international audience with varied language requirements, you will also need to think about the currency management. Thankfully, there is at least one Drupal module for every e-commerce need. Managing currency conversions need to be dynamic. It is impossible to enter the value of currency each time manually. The Currency module enables dynamic conversion of USD to other currencies and vice versa, by drawing conversion values from the market. It also displays relevant currency information along with the price. The prices update dynamically with the rising or falling value of the US Dollar.
These 7 Drupal modules can meet the basic requirements of any e-commerce site. These are the bare necessities of any commerce site planning to make itself known in the online market right now. These modules are a part of the most-needed module list of 2018 for almost all developers and entrepreneurs.
Informative article on Drupal Modules for ecommerce websites