From my journey as a core PHP developer to an e-commerce specialist, one thing that has driven me is the need to learn. I started my career as a core PHP developer. While working on the programming language, I studied about the default functions from which I created custom functions. I was able to build and provide assistance on various types of projects. It is at this time that I advanced my career from maxtreme pharma core PHP to MVC architecture and further expanded it to HMVC. While working on this architecture and its programming, my attention became focused on e-commerce. Amazed by its possibilities in various industrial needs such as sales, rent, wholesale/retail, etc. This led me to learn more about e-commerce and how it functions in various categories. This, in turn, led me to learn about Opencart.

This is where I got into building e-commerce software systems for companies and as projects. Integration and customization was a part of it. The more I learned about e-commerce and its functions, the better I became. Around this point, I advanced my career to Magento specialist where I was programming custom modules, API and other functionalities. The point is to never stop learning and never be afraid of aiming high.

Becoming an e-commerce specialist was a platform for me where I could learn more deeply and use my acquired skills to develop successful projects, however, there were challenges that I faced during my work times. Instead of seeing them as a pain, I see these challenges as various motivating factors that further drove me to learn more about e-commerce technologies. Some of the challenges I faced was dealing with API transactions, recurring payments which involved repetitive tasks. Most of the challenges were involved in the server-side. Changes in the server-side made us make frequent changes. Overcoming challenges helped me to update my knowledge as an e-commerce specialist. This also allowed me to serve the customers better. When low-level companies visit us for a consultation on starting an e-commerce website, based on my experience in dealing with these challenges, I am able to point them out and explain clearly along with the solutions. This makes them choose us for implementing the e-commerce software. This is helpful for both customers and us.

E-commerce is an evolving platform that results in newer changes occurring. The idea is to know about the current trends by identifying and analysing them to see if such an update is beneficial for the organization. What I normally do is that when I come to know about any trending ecommerce update or solution, I test it myself. The testing involves ensuring if the latest trending concept will be feasible for smoother workflow in the organisation. If found suitable, only then I will brief my team about it. Sometimes the team members come up with ideas on improving the e-commerce system. This also results in checking and finding out if it has the potential for business growth.

What I don’t prefer is leaving one for the other. Being both an e-commerce specialist & a team leader, I am able to find a balance on both sides. The thing about e-commerce projects is that for almost every project, the base is the same. This makes dealing with e-commerce projects one step easier whereas when handling other project types, they will have different architecture and functions. Since they are different and require different logic, a certain amount of time is needed in order to learn and build the logic especially if its a project that I don’t know about. Without the proper knowledge base, handling the projects is not at all recommended.

When I receive projects, based on the project type, I assign the respective parts to my teammates and bring them together on board. The benefit of this approach is that each member gets a part of the project that they are well experienced at and it promotes faster development of the project. As an e-commerce specialist and a team leader, I have an overall idea about both platforms. This is what makes me able to handle projects without compromising one over the other.

Mobile applications are gaining popularity in recent years. Smartphones are gaining dominance in the online world for accomplishing a wide variety of tasks equivalent to the ones performed on a typical desktop. This includes e-commerce. Since the majority of people are using smartphones for shopping, an e-commerce app can definitely increase business sales. What an e-commerce app does is promotes publicity about products and drives customers to the app or website. When we build an e-commerce mobile app, what we try to aim for is providing a faster and fluid shopping experience to the users. When designing the app for smartphone, it involves the use of caching and API’s which are compressed so as to provide a faster loading time. The purpose of an e-commerce app is to lead the customer from browsing to sales point within the shortest time. This means presenting an interface that houses all the important parameters needed for promoting a sale.