E-commerce development

E-commerce development takes more than a catalog and a cart: you need a platform that suits your products, pages Google can understand, secure payments, invoicing and stock connected to the store, and a shop everyone can use. We help you choose between WooCommerce, Shopify and custom development, and we build the store so that it can be found and can sell.

We are an Italian agency and we work online, with clients across Italy and abroad. If you are a foreign brand that wants to sell to Italian customers, we build categories and product pages around Italian searches; if you sell in more than one country, we plan the structure for each market from the start.

On this page: how to choose the platform, e-commerce SEO, accessibility, cookies and privacy, integration with your management software, timelines and how we get to a quote.

Who it is for, and who it is not for

It is a good fit if:

• you want to open an online store and do not know which platform to choose;
• you already have a store that is slow, hard to manage or invisible on Google;
• you need to connect the store to your warehouse, management software or invoicing;
• you want one point of contact for development, SEO, content and campaigns.

It is not for you if you only want a theme installed and then left as it is: an online store lives on up-to-date catalogs, customer service and maintenance. According to ISTAT, the Italian national statistics institute (SDGs Report 2026), in 2025 15.3% of Italian businesses with at least 10 employees sold online to consumers: e-commerce is a common route, but it is not right for every business and should be assessed on the numbers of your case.

WooCommerce, Shopify or custom development

There is no best platform in absolute terms. There is the one that fits your catalog, your running budget and the people who will use it every day. These are the criteria we work through with you.

• WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin. It has a large ecosystem of extensions, leaves you in control of hosting, data and code, and integrates well with an existing WordPress site. It needs updates, backups and well-configured hosting, because security is your responsibility.
• Shopify is a subscription platform, ready to use and managed by the provider. You get started quickly and you are free from server maintenance. In exchange you accept the platform's limits and depend on its pricing: check the official site for costs, fees and payment provider charges, because they change over time.
• Custom development makes sense when you have pricing rules, customer-specific price lists, configurators, order flows or integrations that standard platforms do not handle well. It costs more to design and maintain, but the store adapts to your process rather than the other way round.

Questions we ask before recommending anything: how many products and variants you have, who updates the catalog, which systems the store has to talk to, how much control over your data matters and who will handle maintenance. If the honest answer is that a standard solution is enough, we tell you.

E-commerce SEO: categories, product pages and filters

A store that cannot be found on Google depends entirely on advertising and word of mouth. SEO is set up in the structure from the start; for a store that is already online, the work is described on our e-commerce SEO page.

1. Categories. These are the pages that answer the broadest searches. We build them on what customers actually search for, with useful copy and a clean URL. What you get: the category tree with the searches for each one.
2. Product pages. Title, a description written for the product rather than copied from the supplier, optimized images, availability and reviews if you have them. What you get: a product page template and the rules for writing the others.
3. Filters and faceted navigation. Color, size, price and sort order can generate thousands of near-identical URLs that waste Google's crawling. We decide which combinations deserve an indexable page and which do not, using canonical tags, noindex or targeted blocking. What you get: the rule for each type of filter.
4. Product structured data. Product markup with name, image, price, availability and, where available, ratings, following Google Search Central documentation. It helps Google understand the page and can make results richer, but it does not guarantee a ranking.
5. Out-of-stock and discontinued products. We decide case by case whether to keep the page, 301-redirect to an alternative or return the correct error.

Speed and Core Web Vitals

A slow store loses customers before they see the product. According to web.dev, a good experience means LCP within 2.5 seconds, INP within 200 milliseconds and CLS within 0.1, measured at the 75th percentile of visits. We work on images, script loading, caching and server-side rendering where the platform allows it, and we measure before launch. What slows a store down is often the plugins and third-party scripts added over time, so we assess them one by one.

A store everyone can use

A store that is easy for everyone to use sells more. We build in adequate contrast, alt text for images, forms with clear labels, a correct heading order and keyboard navigation, including in the cart and checkout, where any obstacle costs a sale.

Cookies, privacy and secure payments

• Cookies. The banner has to ask for real consent: a pre-ticked box does not count. We configure the banner and tracking so that nothing starts before consent.
• Privacy. Customer data protected, a clear privacy notice and a list of the providers that process data on your behalf. The wording is validated by your privacy advisor.
• Payments. We do not handle or store card data: we rely on specialized payment gateways and networks, with the payment page over HTTPS.
• Security. An isolated user for each application, least privilege, secrets never in the code or the repository, a firewall, automatic security updates, verified backups and incremental, reversible deployments. For web vulnerabilities our reference is the OWASP Top 10:2025. Ongoing website security and maintenance is also available as a separate service.

Stock, management software and invoicing

If orders are re-entered by hand into your management software, sooner or later someone makes a mistake. Connecting the store to your stock prevents you from selling products you do not have and updates inventory automatically. The connection goes through an API, scheduled exports or a purpose-built module, depending on what your software offers. If your management software is not up to it, we can look at custom software with you, or at API integrations between the systems you already use.

On invoicing, the goal is for an order to become an invoice without typing anything twice: the store passes the data to the e-invoicing software you already use, or produces it in a format your accountant can import. Which route is best depends on the tools you have.

How we work

1. Free analysis. Catalog, volumes, existing systems, shipping and goals.
2. Choosing the platform. We present the options with their pros and cons, and the reason for our recommendation.
3. SEO structure. Categories, URLs, filters, and redirects if you are moving from an existing site.
4. Development and integrations. Store, payments, shipping, connection to management and invoicing software.
5. Testing. Test orders, speed measurements, usability and consent checks.
6. Launch and monitoring. We check indexing, errors and orders in the first few weeks.

Maintenance after launch

An online store needs ongoing care: platform and plugin updates, backups, payment checks, fixing errors in Search Console, new categories and pages. We agree with you what is included and what is not, so you know who steps in if something breaks.

How long it takes

It depends on the platform, the number of products, the integrations and how quickly product details, photos and approvals come in. A store on a hosted platform with few products gets going faster than one with management software, custom price lists and an existing catalog to migrate. The quote sets out the timeline, phase by phase.

How much it costs

An online store starts at €5,000 + VAT: this is an indicative figure, and the final quote comes after a free analysis of the project. The cost depends on the platform, the number of products and variants, the features (shipping, discounts, B2B), integrations with management and invoicing software, migration of an existing catalog, copy to write and the level of maintenance. Recurring costs such as subscriptions, hosting and domain are separate.

What we do not do

• We do not recommend the most expensive platform by default.
• We do not tie you to us. Code, domain, access and data stay yours, and we hand over the documentation.
• We do not promise sales or rankings. The store is the foundation; after that you need competitive products, content and consistency.
• We do not give legal or tax advice. We tell you what to check with your own advisor.

Who looks after your project

Your point of contact is Eugenio Tommasi, who has been doing SEO since 2009 and builds websites and software. He has worked in Milan, in Prague and in Spain, and with Dutch clients in Rome; he studied in Florence. We work online with clients across Italy and abroad. If you need a brochure website first, see website development; the full picture is on the web development page.

The first step

Already have a store and want to understand why it does not sell or cannot be found? Tell us about it. For a new online store, get in touch for a quote. You can write to us in Italian, English, Spanish, German or Portuguese.

Sources

• ISTAT, SDGs Report 2026, Goal 9 (in Italian)
• web.dev, Web Vitals
• OWASP Top 10:2025
• Google, SEO Starter Guide