E-commerce website creation
An e-commerce website is a shop that never closes, accessible from any phone or computer, at any hour of the day or night. Having a custom e-commerce site built costs between CHF 5,000 and CHF 20,000 depending on the number of products, the level of customisation, and the payment integrations you need, with a timeline of ten to sixteen weeks from the first conversation to the first sale. On this page, you'll find real market pricing in Swiss francs, a clear breakdown of the features your online store needs to actually convert visitors into buyers, an honest comparison between off-the-shelf platforms and custom-built sites, and the concrete steps of the project through to your first order.
How much does a custom e-commerce website cost
The price of a custom e-commerce website depends on the number of products you're selling, the level of customisation in the buying journey, and the payment and shipping systems that need to be integrated. For a store with fewer than fifty products, a polished design, a working shopping cart, one or two payment methods, and shipping rate management, the budget sits between CHF 5,000 and CHF 10,000 with an independent professional. That's the range for a clean site that lets you sell from day one, with SEO fundamentals in place and an admin panel to manage your orders yourself. At this level, the design is tailored to your brand and products, the checkout flow is built to convert, and the site is delivered ready to rank on Google from the first day it goes live.
When the catalogue goes beyond a hundred references and you need advanced search filters, product variations like size or colour, multiple currencies, or features like promotional codes, customer reviews, or real-time stock management, the budget moves to a CHF 10,000 to CHF 20,000 range. This type of site suits businesses that are already selling and need a tool built around their operations, not a compromise imposed by a platform's limitations.
Above CHF 20,000, we're talking about projects that combine a catalogue of several thousand references, automatic synchronisation with management software or an ERP, complex shipping rules across countries, a loyalty programme, or a marketplace that lets other sellers offer their products on your platform. These projects exist and make sense when order volume makes manual operations impossible, but they don't apply to most businesses launching their online sales.
On top of the build cost, you should budget for recurring expenses specific to e-commerce, which are higher than for a showcase website. Hosting runs between CHF 30 and CHF 100 per month because the site needs to handle traffic spikes and secure transactions. Security certificates, backups, and updates add between CHF 80 and CHF 200 per month if you entrust them to the provider. And every payment transaction takes a commission of 1.5 to 3 percent depending on the method used, a cost many people forget when calculating their margins.
When you're comparing offers, the question isn't just the number at the bottom of the quote but what that number actually includes. A CHF 3,000 project based on a pre-configured theme, with no product copywriting, no SEO work, and no training on catalogue management, will cost you more in the long run than a CHF 12,000 project that covers the entire journey from product photography to the first live order. For an overview of web creation costs in general, see the article on how much a website costs or request a quote.
What your online store needs to actually sell
The product page is the most important page on your e-commerce site, and it's where most stores lose their customers. Each product page should show the item from multiple angles with professional-quality photos, describe exactly what the customer will receive by answering the questions they have before buying, display a clear price with no surprises, and let them add to cart in one click. A poorly presented catalogue with vague descriptions and a single photo per product doesn't convert, even if the product itself is excellent.
The checkout flow, from cart to payment confirmation, needs to be as short and clear as possible. Every extra step, every unnecessary form field, and every slow-loading page loses buyers along the way. The average cart abandonment rate across e-commerce sits around 70 percent, and a large share of that comes from a checkout that asks too many questions or reveals costs too late. The best sites reduce the process to three steps at most, offer at least two common payment methods, and show shipping costs before the final page so customers know exactly what they're paying before they commit.
More than half of all online purchases happen on a phone in 2026, and your store needs to be designed for that reality from the first sketch, not adapted after the fact. That means buttons large enough for a thumb, images that load quickly on a mobile connection, a checkout flow that works without zooming, and a loading time under two seconds, because every additional second reduces your conversion rate measurably.
An e-commerce site needs more SEO work than a showcase website, because you need to rank not only your general pages but also every individual product page and category page in Google's results. That means unique titles and descriptions for each product, a category structure that search engines understand, clean URLs, and technical markup that lets Google display your prices and stock availability directly in the search results. The article on ranking your website on Google covers the SEO fundamentals for any type of website.
Without tracking sales and visitor behaviour, you're running your store in the dark. You need to know which products sell best, at which point in the journey visitors abandon their cart, how long they spend on your product pages, and which channel brings you the most profitable buyers. This data is the foundation for every improvement, whether it's redesigning a page that doesn't convert or choosing which products to feature on the homepage.
Off-the-shelf platform or custom-built site
Platforms like Shopify or WooCommerce are solid options for testing an online sales project quickly and without a large upfront investment. Shopify offers built-in hosting, a ready-to-use dashboard, and hundreds of pre-made themes, with a monthly subscription starting around CHF 30. WooCommerce is free to install on your own hosting if you already have a WordPress site, which makes it attractive for small catalogues. If your priority is validating demand before investing in a custom tool, these solutions get the job done.
The limits show up when your store grows. Themes shared by thousands of sites make it hard to stand out visually from your competitors, and your store ends up looking like every other shop built on the same platform. Performance degrades as the catalogue expands because the platform loads code for features you don't use, which slows down page loads and hurts your Google rankings. Commissions on every sale stack on top of the subscription cost and gradually eat into your margins. And if you need a feature the platform doesn't offer natively, you depend on third-party plugins that add costs, compatibility risks, and technical complexity you don't control.
A custom-built e-commerce site is designed exclusively around your catalogue, your buying journey, and your operational constraints. The design is unique and built to convert your visitors into buyers, not to suit the broadest possible audience. Loading speed is maximised because every element on the site serves your store and nothing else. There are zero sales commissions beyond the payment processor's fees. And as your business evolves, the site adapts to your needs without being constrained by a third-party platform's technical choices. The page on custom website creation covers pricing and the full process of a custom project.
The right choice depends on your specific situation. If you're launching a first catalogue of twenty products to test the market, a platform does the job without major financial risk. If your online store is the core of your business, if you need a buying journey tailored to your industry, if sales commissions are eating into your margins, or if you want your site's experience to match the quality of your products, custom development makes complete sense. If you don't need online sales, the page on showcase website creation covers your options for a presentation website.
How your online store gets built, step by step
Building an e-commerce website follows five phases that take ten to sixteen weeks in total, a longer timeline than a showcase site because the catalogue, checkout flow, and payment integrations require significantly more development and testing work. Every phase has its reason, and skipping one always leads to costly fixes after launch. This timeline might seem long for a site that sells products, but getting the payment flow, stock management, and shipping rules right before the first customer order saves weeks of emergency patches and lost sales down the line.
The first phase is a detailed conversation to understand your products, your customers, your logistics, and your sales goals. This leads to a project brief listing the site's pages, the number of products to include at launch, the payment methods to connect, the shipping rules by geographic zone, and every feature you need to manage orders day to day. This phase takes one to three weeks and sets the quality bar for everything that follows. The article on starting an online store walks through the options for getting started step by step.
Next comes the visual design of the store, with mockups showing the homepage, category pages, product pages, cart, and checkout flow on both desktop and mobile. You see exactly what your store will look like before a single line of code is written, and adjustments happen at this stage, when they're simple and inexpensive.
Development turns the mockups into a real, working store, connected to your payment provider, configured with your shipping rules, and populated with your catalogue. It's the longest phase of the project, running four to eight weeks, and it includes product page integration, tax configuration, order and confirmation email setup, and all the technical SEO groundwork.
Before the first sale, a testing phase checks every step of the buying journey across major browsers and devices, confirms that payments land in your account, that confirmation emails go out at the right moment, and that stock levels update correctly. A few test orders are placed under real conditions to verify everything works end to end. Once the final corrections are in, the store goes live and you receive a full training session to manage your catalogue, process your orders, and understand your sales analytics.
Selling online in Switzerland and France
Selling in Switzerland means accepting the payment methods your customers actually use, and in this country that means Twint first and foremost. More than five million people use Twint to pay in Switzerland, and offering only credit cards costs you a significant share of potential sales. PostFinance is another method to integrate if you're targeting a broad audience, alongside Visa and Mastercard which remain the international standard.
Your store must comply with Switzerland's Federal Act on Data Protection, the nFADP, which came into force in September 2023 and sets specific obligations around the collection and processing of your customers' personal data. If you also sell in France or the European Union, the GDPR adds its own requirements. An e-commerce site that doesn't follow these rules faces penalties, but more importantly it loses the trust of buyers who increasingly check whether their data is protected before handing over their card details. The article on website maintenance breaks down what a maintenance contract covers.
Shipping logistics between Switzerland and the European Union come with specifics that many online stores discover too late, notably customs duties and import VAT that can surprise your customers if they aren't clearly stated before checkout. Your site needs to display prices including VAT for Switzerland and handle different VAT rates if you sell in multiple countries, with separate shipping rules by geographic zone so your customers know exactly what they'll pay.
If your customer base spans French-speaking Switzerland, German-speaking Switzerland, and France, your store needs to work in multiple languages with a translated catalogue and currencies adapted to each market. This isn't just about customer comfort, it's a direct conversion lever, because a buyer who can't read a product description in their language or who sees a price in a foreign currency hesitates more before placing an order.
Frequently asked questions about e-commerce websites
How long does it take to build a custom e-commerce site?
Between ten and sixteen weeks for a complete store, counting the project brief, design, development, catalogue integration, and payment testing. A simpler site with a smaller catalogue can be ready in eight weeks, but the feature set will be more limited.
What commissions are taken on each sale?
With a custom-built site, no commission goes to the site developer. Only the payment processor takes its cut, typically between 1.5 and 3 percent per transaction depending on the method used. Platforms like Shopify add their own commission on top of the payment fee if you don't use their built-in system.
Can I manage the catalogue and orders myself?
Yes, the site comes with an admin interface that lets you add products, change prices, track orders, and manage stock without any technical intervention. You receive full training at delivery so you're autonomous from day one.
Will my e-commerce site show up on Google?
Technical SEO work is built in from the design phase, with optimised product pages, markup that lets Google show your prices in search results, and a page structure search engines understand. Reaching the top positions for competitive searches typically takes three to six months of steady work.
Which payment methods can be integrated?
All common methods are possible: Visa and Mastercard, Twint for the Swiss market, PostFinance, PayPal, and bank transfer. The choice depends on your customer base and target markets. Each additional payment method slightly increases integration time but improves your conversion rate.
What if I already have a store on Shopify or WooCommerce?
Migration is possible: the product catalogue, customer data, and order history can be transferred to the new site. Old URLs are redirected to preserve the search rankings you've built. The migration work adds to the creation project and takes between one and three weeks depending on the volume of data.
Is the site compliant with the nFADP and GDPR?
Data protection compliance is built into the site from the design phase: consent banner, privacy policy, secure payment data handling, and the right to have personal data deleted. If you sell in both Switzerland and the European Union, both legal frameworks are covered.
What's the difference between an e-commerce site and a marketplace?
An e-commerce site sells your own products to your customers. A marketplace lets multiple sellers offer their products on your platform, with commissions on each sale. A marketplace is a significantly more complex and expensive project that makes sense when you want to become the intermediary between sellers and buyers in your sector.
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