Introduction to Magento Community Edition

Introduction

Magento is a powerful and full-featured e-commerce platform built on open-source technology. It enables you to quickly create a professional and functional e-commerce site, including one or more stores, that empowers you to customize and control virtually every aspect of the customer experience.

From sales to marketing, product management to customer interaction, Magento comes complete with everything you need to manage and execute a wide variety of business models and store types. All of this is made available for free to the community. It is a dramatic cut from the typical e-commerce startup costs associated with operating a direct sale site in the past.

Magento is clean, intuitive, and full scalable.

There are two primary editions of Magento available to the public. The first is Magento Community Edition. This is the edition our extensions and themes support. It is free to download and install under the open source OSL 3.0 license, and comes with no monetary commitments or subscription costs.

The second edition presently available is Magento Enterprise Edition. This solution comes at an annual subscription fee and includes several additional features that are useful to larger online retailers. This edition is not presently supported by RocketTheme as its third-party support is limited.

Features

Magento Community Edition comes complete with a rich set of integrated features, many of which can be further enhanced with third-party extensions and/or themes to add additional functionality and/or improve the user experience.

Below is a short list of features included with Magento Community Edition. You can find a complete list on the official site.

SEO

• SEO Optimized
• Google Site Map
• SEO Friendly URLs
• URL Rewriting
• Meta Content for Products, Categories, and Content Pages
• Automatically Generated Site Map
• Automatically Generated Popular Search Terms Page
• Google Content API for Shopping

Site Administration

• Permissions and Roles System
• Templates Allow 100% Customization
• Batch Import/Export of Catalog and Customer Information
• Multiple Website Control and Management from One Admin Panel
• CMS Available for Content Pages (Home, Informational)
• Regional Tax Rate Support
• Customer Type Tax Rate Support (wholesale, retailer, non-profit, etc.)
• CAPTCHA Functionality
• Multilingual Support

Catalog Management

• Virtual Products (Downloads, etc.)
• Sample Support
• Unlimited Product Attributes (Features, Specs, etc.)
• Product Bundling and Grouping Support
• RSS Feed for Low Inventory Alerts
• Moderated Product Tags and Reviews
• Advanced Pricing Rules
• Batch Product Updates
• Backordered Items, Miminum and Maximum Quantities

Marketing and Promotions

• Related Products
• Promotional Pricing Support (Including Store, Category, and Product Restrictions)
• Coupon Support
• Unique Coupon Code Generation for Media
• Multi-tier Pricing for Quantity Discounts
• Customer Groups
• Product Bundles
• Persistent Shopping Cart
• Wish List Support (Including Email)
• Polls
• Free Shipping Options
• Minimum Advertised Price

User Experience

• Layered Navigation for Filtering Products in Categories in Search Results
• Static Block Tool
• Recently Viewed Products
• Product Listing in Grid or List Format
• Product Comparisons with History
• Powerful Search Tool
• Multiple Images Per Product
• Product Image Zoom-in
• Related Products
• Stock Availability
• Wish List
• Facebook Share
• Send to Friend via Email
• Grouped Products View

Checkout

• One-page Checkout
• Guest Checkout and Checkout with Account
• Ship to Multiple Addresses
• Account Creation Option at Checkout
• Saved Shopping Cart
• Payment Options
  • Amazon Payments
  • Multiple PayPal Gateways
  • Authorize.net
  • Google Checkout (Level 2)
  • Checks and Money Orders
  • Purchase Orders
• Shipping Integration with Label Printing (All Major Carriers)
• Real-Time Shipping Rates (UPS, FedEx, USPS, DHL)
• Set Specified Destination Countries
• Flat Rate Per Order or Item
• Free Shipping
• Table Rates (Weight, Sub-Total, Destination, Item Numbers)
• Order Tracking from Customer Accounts (On-site)

Order Management

• View, Edit, and Fulfill Orders from Admin Panel
• Split Fulfillment Support
• Print Invoices, Packing Slips, and Shipping Labels
• Phone (Manual) Order Creation
• Assisted Shopping
• Customized Order Status
• Email Notifications
• RSS Feed of New Orders
• Re-order Support from Admin Panel

Customer Accounts

• Account Dashboard
• Order Status and History
• Product Reviews
• Re-orders
• Default Billing and Shipping Addresses
• Email or Send RSS Feed of Wish List
• Digital Product Downloads
• Address Book

Customer Service

• Contact Us Form
• Create and Edit Orders from Admin Panel
• Order History / Status Updates
• Order and Account Updates via Email
• Order Tracking
• Password Reset

Magento has hundreds of features available in the Community Edition, including International support, mobile commerce, and an extensive set of analytics and reporting features.

The goal behind the creation of Magento was to build an e-commerce platform that accomplishes all the tasks commonly associated with solutions that run thousands, or tens of thousands of dollars to operate.