Do I really need a multistore webshop configuration?

[loginname]

PS 1..6

 

my business parter wants our shop to be multistore because:

• unique webshop targeting each country
• cheaper to send goods, as we are located in Scandinavia and wants to target both Scandinavia and USA, it would be good to have a myshop.com and a myshop.no/myshop.se websites for the different shops

some issues are unclear at the moment:

• if each product should have unique label for each country (meaning for example lavel is translated to the local language)
• We may want to offer different payment solutions based on what country user is in

these items are clear at the moment

• if user register at lets say the .com version of the shop he cannot order from the .no webshop

 

problems (as I see them):

• if using multi store and want to open a new webshop for each country as we go, we might run into problem that some dude in that country as already taken our domain and we must use a different domain - hurting our brand
• It would mean much more effort maintaining it

 

Based on this I hope you guys can give me some suggestion if multi store solution is correct, or if we are better off with a single shop (myshop.com), which is customized to target each country -> it checks from where the user is living and automatically shows a version of the site unique for his country. Example, USA customers see site in Engish, Swedish customer see shop in Swedish

[loginname]

would be great if someone could take some take and share his view on this topic

[El Patron]

yes, your partner is corrrect in having ccTLD for specific country and .com for US.

 

Learn more here:

https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1347922?hl=en

https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/182192?hl=en

 

and native PS will create sitemap for each domain used.

[Naldinho]

I don't know if you need multistore. I think you could accomplish what you want just using the IP of the customer to geo-locate the customer but I could be wrong as I'm not absolutely clear on what you are hoping to do. 

[El Patron]

so anyway, as time is precious and I did respond with 'some' information

 

ps with multishop is pretty slick when it comes to multiplexing same content across multiple domains, the key is to have 1+(ccTLD) and 1(gTLD) to avoid duplicate content.

 

So build main domain shop, add shipping languges etc that will work on all domains.

 

Then add another domain that shares everything, then you can cofigure this new shops defaults, language, name, contact, currency anayitics etc.

 

Once you have the 2nd domain generated then run site-map.

 

Because domain name age is factored into seo, the sooner the better.  Don't worry about redirecting us visitor to us site (and not recommended).

 

The key is having a decent theme that works in multishop, i.e. menu category sliders etc...if the theme works then you can really roll out as many ccTLD's as you want with very little maintenance.

 

http://etiendas.co/

http://etiendas.com.co/

http://etiendas.co.uk/

 

because of this strategy I wrote (back in the day) module for PrestaShop 1.4 to allow same content multiple domains.  Now 1.5+ supports this and works well.

http://etiendas.co/en/prestashop-module/27-multishop-multidomain-pro-14.html

 

Here is ps explanation of 'do you need multishop' (note it does not include, do you want to multiplex same content across multiple domains question and if yes use multishop)

http://doc.prestashop.com/display/PS16/Managing+Multiple+Shops

 

sorry can't do more, watching grandkids today.