5 Facebook Shopping Cart Apps That’ll Boost Your E-commerce Business

They say the best things in life are free. And it’s true. There are plenty of things that have enriched our lives. But when we think of promoting an e-commerce business, the word “free” doesn’t really seem believable. But Facebook has made it believable. Facebook offers you a way to engage your customers for free - not just on the social network, but also in your online store.

Facebook has quite a few well-integrated shopping cart apps that could bring the ease of use and high customization that you look for. Here are some of them that experts recommend.

PageLever

PageLever social e-commerce app offers Facebook page owners a simple way to create landing page. If you have a business page on Facebook (which is likely), you can have it set up. To set it up, all you need is a branded image. The “weight” of the page largely depends on the quality of the image. It’s free but the upgraded version of PageLever is available at an annual fee of $20.

Ecwid

With almost 500,000 active users all over the world, Ecwid is one of the most used e-commerce app for merchant on Facebook. There are two primary reasons why it’s so popular - it’s free and it’s incredibly easy to use. It has a drag and drop functionality and extensive customization features that would help you design a shopping cart with spectacular ease. Not only that, it also lets you replicate your Facebook shopping cart with all the other Ecwid carts owned by you on other sites and vice versa. Also, the app has a cart management page, which lets you view and manage all your Ecwid carts at the same time.

StoreYa

StoreYa surely knows how to make shop application for a social network. Offers seamless integration with Magento, WordPress, Amazon, eBay and even Etsy. It even gives you a host of ecommerce marketing tools that you can use. Importing your online store to Facebook via StoreYa is a walk in the park. But that’s not really all that it gives you. It gives you a whole lot of social shopping features including a coupon pop-up that people get when they browse your store on Facebook.

VendorShop

Another e-commerce app for merchant worth mentioning here is VendorShop. It processes payments through PayPal, lets you manage multiple stores from one single dashboard and saves time. It’s free and it lets you create a shop on your Facebook page, that too with a shopping cart. You need a PayPal account to use VendorShop.

Storefront Social

Like StoreYa, Storefront Social is a Facebook e-commerce app that integrates with many ecommerce platforms. It also works with a lot of popular shopping cart solutions like OS Commerce, X-Cart, 3D Cart etc. Storefronts that are created with the app can be smoothly connected to Twitter, Pinterest and Google+. The app even works with different currencies and languages. It supports interfaces with Yahoo Commerce Central, Google Base Feed and CSV imports.

That’s all folks. These were some of the most popular facebook shopping cart apps. Each of these platforms has their own sets of pros and cons. There’s no single e-commerce app for merchant that can be termed as the “best”. It all depends on your business goals, requirements and convenience.

Over To You

Have you used any of these? How was your experience with the e-commerce app? Share with us. Are you wondering whether selling on Facebook is a good idea? If you need help with choosing the right ecommerce shopping cart app for Facebook, or wondering how to make shop application for Facebook, we can help. Send us a mail at: business@theappchicks.com or better yet, come by our Sacramento office for a one-on-one consultation.

4 Little Known Aviation Apps to Explore

Aviation apps have come a long way. They have been improved with each new software update. Apps like Garmin Pilot, WingX Pro 7 and ForeFlight Mobile are more than just mobile applications. They can do so much more. They have innovated. They have gone beyond displaying just inflight charts and maps.

The debate goes on about whether student pilots should learn using paper charts or use the top aviation apps to learn, but almost everyone can agree on the fact that a tablet with apps for aviation running comes in handy.

1: LogTen Pro X

Available on: iPad, iPhone, Mac

If you are looking for an advanced flight log app, this is the app for you. It’s completely self-contained. Meaning, it doesn’t need to be synced to a computer. The app completely revolutionizes the way pilots log their flights with a new feature called Fly Now. All they have to do is tap a button to start and stop their flight log. It will automatically determine the departure time and destination airports based on the device’s GPS data. What’s more, it even calculates the total duration of the trip and uploads it onto iCloud so that pilots can access it from all their devices. LogTen Pro X is praised by pilots for its amazing ease of use, which is far better than many leading apps for aviation.

2: MyRadar Pro

Available on: iPhone, iPad and Google Play

MyRadar Pro is probably the go-to weather software for pre-flight planning. It offers swift access to storm information along with automatic updates of scrolling graphic NEXRAD radar imagery. It works so fast that the imagery starts to appear from the moment the app is opened. Pilot-friendly features like AIR/SIGMET overlays and TFR display make it a must-have in the aviation industry. The flight planning software currently shows weather images within the United States, including places like Hawaii, Alaska, and even Puerto Rico. The images are easy to zoom in on, so pilots have no problem whatsoever checking the weather.

3: CloudAhoy

Available on: iPhone

Especially designed for pilots, CloudAhoy provides a comprehensive debriefing during flight. It uses GPS to capture flight path, letting pilots to review it after landing. Pilots can even overlay their flight paths on a Google satellite or a terrain map from the app itself. The app also allows them to display their flight path over aviation charts. Even student pilots and instrument pilots can use this app as a flight log app -  to record the flight maneuvers and instrument approaches.

4: FBO Connect

Available on: iOS

FBO Connect is another one of the top aviation apps that helps pilots easily request services like fueling, hangaring, tie-down and parking, aircraft rental, aircraft maintenance, flight instruction, etc. whenever they need it. With integrated features that help the pilot send service requests to their nearest FBO or service provider, the app simplifies things. It makes all the nearby FBOs visible to pilots, makes the request-processing easy and syncs all the data onto iCloud so that it can be accessed easily.

These 4 are some of the top aviation apps for pilots. Can you think of any other aviation flight planning apps? Then go ahead and add to this list. Let us know at business@theappchicks.com

If you have come up with an idea of a flight planning software, let us help turn it into a reality. We are always available on email or Skype. Better yet, let’s have a whiteboarding session at our Sacramento office.