3dcart In 2018: How Would 3dcart Clients Review Them?

3dcart Introduction

3dcart is a full-featured hosted ecommerce solution. With 3dcart everything you need to design your site, list products, publish it to the internet, accept orders, and process payments is integrated into one ecommerce website plan.

3dcart is based out of Tamarac, FL, and was launched in 2001 by Gonzalo Gil. As an experienced ecommerce website developer, Gonzalo believed he could take the most popular features his customers requested, and build them into an ecommerce package that anyone could afford. Having seen what ecommerce could do for large and medium-sized business, Gonzalo wanted to extend the ecommerce opportunity to small businesses that couldn’t afford a custom-built website.

In addition to hosted ecommerce websites, 3dcart also offers professional website design services, SEO marketing packages, professional site setup services, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate, and add on applications.

Services & Specializations

3dcart’s product mix includes seven different categories:

• Shopping Cart Software
• Ecommerce Website Design
• Ecommerce Website Marketing
• Website Hosting
• Professional Website Setup Services
• Private Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Certificates
• App Store

The 3dcart shopping cart software is much more than just a simple shopping cart. It’s a complete web store platform. More than fifty free website templates are included, and more than a hundred premium templates are also available. Compatibility with mobile devices, including checkout functionality is built-in, and a mobile-optimized admin panel is included so you can manage your store from your smartphone.

If you want a blog, that’s no problem. Also, social media integration includes a Facebook Like button, support for Facebook Stores, and easy installation of the multi-platform AddThis social sharing button. Accepting payment is always a serious consideration for any ecommerce website, and 3dcart offers integration with more than 100 payment providers.

Multi-media support within the shopping cart software is strong. Aviary image editor is included, and can you link YouTube videos to product listings as well. A built-in search function makes it easy for customers to find what they’re looking for.

If you want a completely custom ecommerce website 3dcart offers several website design packages. All packages include a responsive design, a static home page, a product page frame, and a drop-down menu. There are lots of additional options included in the higher priced packages, such as 404 Error Pages, Checkout Pages, View Cart Pages, Contact Pages, and more. You can also contact the 3dcart team for a custom design quote.

Several website marketing packages are offered. All of the marketing packages are built on a combination of search engine optimization and integration of analytics tools. Each package is invoiced on a monthly basis, and includes reports to present the results of marketing efforts.

Website hosting is included with every plan and includes a domain name, access to a shared SSL certificate, FTP, and automatic daily data backups. Security for your website is enabled by IP blocking capabilities, flexible user profiles with customizable access permissions, and level 1 PCI compliance. All 3dcart accounts include generous bandwidth, unlimited disk space, and unlimited email accounts. To ensure your site is always accessible, 3dcart also offers a 99.9% uptime guarantee.

Website setup services are also available. Professional site setup is offered along with data migration services from several competing ecommerce solutions including ProStores, Yahoo!, and Volusion. Other setup services include store copying, for merchants who want to sell similar product lines at more than one domain, and domain name change services.

While all 3dcart packages include access to a shared SSL certificate (located at yourdomain.3dcartstores.com) you can also add on a third-party private SSL certificate for personalized branding, or an upgraded certificate for improved security. Third-party SSL certificate providers include RapidSSL, GeoTrust, and Norton Secured (Symantec).

If there is some additional functionality we haven’t covered that you know you’ll want in your store there’s a good chance that there’s an app for that. 3dcart offers an app store full of paid add ons that can be integrated into your 3dcart store. App categories include Accounting, Advanced Search, Advertising, Drop Shipping, Email Marketing, Mobile, Order Management, Shipping, Social Media, Tax, and more.

Infrastructure

3dcart does not maintain their own data centers. Instead, their data centers are on servers hosted by other providers such as RackSpace, SoftLayer, ThePlanet, Peer1, and LiquidWeb. The benefit to this approach is that the data centers are geographically distributed in such a way that they can guarantee 99.9% uptime. It also means that 3dcart, made up of ecommerce experts, outsources server management to companies who are server experts.

Support and Customer Service

3dcart boasts excellent customer service as one of their top priorities. The support team is 100% in-house, and operates out of the company headquarters in south Florida. Support is available 24/7/365 from a support ticket system, live chat, and over the phone.

3dcart offers extensive documentation that includes a Knowledge Base with many tutorials and answers to common questions, an HTML design guide, and a well designed virtual user’s manual. 3dcart also offers introductory ecommerce and 3dcart training through a YouTube channel, and eCommerce University to help you make the most of the platform. Further, a 3dcart user forum allows users of the platform to interact and provide each other with assistance. Lastly, a Personal Guru Session with a 3dcart ecommerce expert is included with every plan to help you get your site up and running quickly.

Billing & Payment Policies

You can try 3dcart free for 15 days. Following that initial trial period you’ll have to sign up for one of the paid plans. No contract is required, and you choose to be a 3dcart customer on a month-to-month basis. If you do think you’ll be a long-term customer you can earn a discount by paying for an entire year’s service at once. You’ll want to be certain that you’ll stick with 3dcart before paying for a full year since 3dcart does not offer refunds.

Summary / Conclusion

3dcart offers a serviceable shopping cart that mirrors the features offered by many of the competitors in the hosted ecommerce segment. However, there are a few things that make 3dcart stand out from the crowd:

• Customer support is extensive: 24/7 tech support, extensive documentation, user forums, several training sources, a Personal Guru Session, and more.
• 3dcart pricing is competitive with the industry, and the free 15 day trial and open-ended no-contract arrangement makes trying 3dcart a low-risk move.
• Guaranteed uptime is important, and 99.9% guaranteed uptime is impressive.

If you’re in the market for a hosted ecommerce solution 3dcart is definitely worth taking a look at.