The comparison between WC Marketplace vs Dokan, to show you which is the Best Multi Vendor Plugin for WooCommerce?
Both Dokan and Multivendor are multi seller eCommerce marketplace solutions on WordPress and based on WooCommerce. In this article we’ll cover the detail comparison between Dokan Multivendor and WC Marketplace plugins. If you’re thinking to start or want to manage an online business, checkout this comparison to see which solution is more suitable for you and meets your requirement.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Full Feature Comparison List
Features WC Marketplace Dokan
General Important Points
1. Demo ✓ ✓
- single site demo for all features & extensions X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
2. Detailed Documentation ✓ ✓
Scores 1 out of 1 1 out of 1
3. Support ✓ ✓
- Live chat X ✓
- Ticket & emails X ✓
- Contact forms ✓ ✓
- Forums ✓ X
- Facebook group X ✓
Scores 4 out of 7 6 out of 7
4. Built-in Multilingual support X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
5. Multiple widgets & custom theme X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
6. Pricing bundles X ✓
- Price $320 $499
- Sites 3 5
- Extensions 9 24
Total Scores in this category 6 out of 12 11 out of 12
Admin Dashboard
7. Admin dashboard overview with meaningful marketplace data & insights X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
8. Withdrawals ✓ ✓
- Allow vendors to request for withdrawals by default X ✓
- Automatic disbursement of commissions with schedule ✓ X
- Free withdrawals and let vendors pay withdrawal charge ✓ X
- Withdrawal threshold and minimum number of days to pass before disbursement ✓ ✓
- Withdraw threshold ✓ ✓
- Minimum withdraw limit ✓ ✓
- Order status for withdraw X ✓
Scores 6 out of 8 6 out of 8
9. Restrict vendors from accessing admin backend Paid Free
10. Built-in Refund Management X ✓
- Built-in system in front-end for vendors to request for customer order refunds X ✓
- Built-in system in backend for admins to review refund reasons, amount, approve, reject and manage in other ways X ✓
Scores 0 out of 3 3 out of 3
11. Admin reports ✓ ✓
-Displays logs of all orders X ✓
- Graphical display of store stats by vendor X ✓
- Shows number of products created, withdrawals, net earnings, sales, signups by month, year and custom range X ✓
Scores 1 out of 4 4 out of 4
12. Extensions ✓ ✓
- Modules system with easy toggle on and off and lower prices X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
13. Handy tools X ✓
- Automatically create pages X ✓
- Scan for duplicate orders X ✓
- Re-builds order sync table X ✓
Scores 0 out of 4 4 out of 4
14. Upgrade license from back-end X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
15. Built-in customizable vendor registration form ✓ X
- Email verification during registration X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 1 out of 2
16. Commissions ✓ ✓
- More than 2 types of commission ✓ X
- Vendors can select payment methods from frontend ✓ X
- Admins can share coupon discount with vendors ✓ X
- Admins can transfer payment gateway charge, shipping and tax charges to vendor ✓ ✓
Scores 5 out of 5 2 out of 5
17. Welcome Wizard for New Vendors X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
18. Disable vendors from accessing admin back-end by default X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
19. Enable terms & conditions field in registration forms & vendor stores X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
20. Default email notification on product submission X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
21. Define the store banner width & height X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
22. Store policy X ✓
- Show privacy policy in separate page ✓ ✓
- Enable privacy policy in contact forms ✓ ✓
Scores 2 out of 3 3 out of 3
23. Search items using product GTIN ✓ X
Scores 1 out of 1 0 out of 1
24. Store layouts and templates 3 4
25. Built-in customizable email notification templates for different premium features & extensions X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
Total Scores in this category 17 out of 40 33 out of 40
Vendor Dashboard
26. Product Categories ✓ ✓
- Vendors can add multiple categories X ✓
- Vendors can create categories from back-end ✓ X
Scores 2 out of 3 2 out of 3
27. Product Tags ✓ ✓
- Vendors can create their own tags from front-end X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
28. Product inquiry form on store page ✓ ✓
- Define privacy policy for visitors X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
29. Low stock and out of stock alerts for vendors ✓ X
Scores 1 out of 1 0 out of 1
30. Zone-wise shipping ✓ ✓
- Vendors can add their own shipping methods ✓ ✓
- Separate back-end settings for admin ✓ ✓
- Vendors can define processing times, shipping & refund policy from front-end X ✓
Scores 3 out of 4 4 out of 4
31. Vendor-Admin Contact Form X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
32. Vendor can define store slug ✓ ✓
- Vendor can change store slug ✓ X
Scores 2 out of 2 1 out of 2
33. Vendor overview ✓ ✓
- Store insights: total sales, earnings, no. Of orders ✓ ✓
- Store traffic & visitors’ map ✓ ✓
- Product sales report & product stats ✓ ✓
- Announcements, reviews and status-wise orders X ✓
Scores 4 out of 5 5 out of 5
34. Store SEO ✓ ✓
- Built-in SEO Add-on Premium Feature
- Facebook & Twitter pages X ✓
- Front-end capability X ✓
Scores 1 out of 3 3 out of 3
35. Product SEO from front-end ✓ ✓
- Built-in SEO Add-on Premium Feature
- Back-end product SEO for admins X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
36. Coupon management ✓ ✓
- Built-in feature X ✓
- Vendors can grant store-wide discount X ✓
- Restrict by emails and categories ✓ ✓
- Limit usage by user and number of items ✓ X
Scores 3 out of 5 4 out of 5
37. Upload different product types ✓ ✓
- Simple ✓ ✓
- Variable ✓ ✓
- Grouped/Bundles ✓ ✓
- External ✓ X
- Affiliate ✓ X
- Accommodation ✓ X
- Simple & Variable Subscription ✓ X
Scores 8 out of 8 4 out of 8
38. Vendor reports ✓ ✓
- Top selling and top earning X ✓
- Statement X ✓
- No. of items purchased, worth of coupons used & spent on shipping charges X ✓
Scores 1 out of 4 4 out of 4
Total Points Earned for the Best WooCommerce Vendor Dashboard 27 out of 40 32 out of 40
Advanced Features to customize & create different types of marketplaces
39. Vendor dashboard Color Scheme Customizer X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
40. Store Support ✓ ✓
- Manage user queries from front-end in ticket system X ✓
- Admins can view and reply to queries ✓ X
- Exchange replies from front-end like versation ✓ ✓
- Close & reopen tickets X ✓
- Vendors can choose email templates, exclude products from inquiry, modify buttons ✓ X
- Smooth & easily understandable dashboard to store & keep track of customer queries X ✓
Scores 4 out of 7 5 out of 7
41. Vendor Subscriptions ✓ ✓
- Create unlimited membership packages using custom attributes ✓ ✓
- Configure various types of emails ✓ X
- Admins can select the methods of payment to allow for vendors to purchase ✓ X
- Admins can define access privileges, billing, message, capabilities, limitations, upgrade ✓ X
- Add trial functionality in subscription packages X ✓
Scores 5 out of 6 3 out of 6
42. Vendor Bookings ✓ ✓
- Create bookings and send notifications ✓ X
Scores 2 out of 2 1 out of 2
43. Vendor Auctions ✓ ✓
- Admin controls X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
44. PDF Invoices ✓ ✓
- Packing slips and vendor invoice ✓ ✓
- Select template, what to show, send via email, add terms & conditions by vendors & admins ✓ X
Scores 3 out of 3 2 out of 3
45. Vendor Vacation ✓ ✓
- Vendors can pre-select multiple dates for vacation ✓ X
- Set notification threshold ✓ X
Scores 3 out of 3 1 out of 3
46. Store opening & closing time ✓ ✓
- Set hours of operation for every day of the week ✓ ✓
- Set opening and closing notice X ✓
Scores 2 out of 3 3 out of 3
47. Vendor Verification ✓ ✓
- SMS verification X ✓
- Social profiles ✓ ✓
- Photo ID and address ✓ ✓
- Separate verification requests page in backend X ✓
Scores 3 out of 5 5 out of 5
48. Importer & Exporter ✓ ✓
- Upload and download products in csv format directly from front-end dashboard X ✓
Scores 1 out of 2 2 out of 2
49. Staff Manager ✓ ✓
- Detailed privacy settings for individual staff members X ✓
- Comprehensive range of permission controls X ✓
- Frees admins of extra work X ✓
Scores 1 out of 4 4 out of 4
50. Stripe & Paypal ✓ ✓
- Paypal masspay gateway & paypal payout ✓ X
- Automatic refunds via stripe X ✓
Scores 2 out of 3 2 out of 3
51. MOIP X ✓
- Automatic payments X ✓
- Direct checkout using credit card and bank transfer X ✓
Scores 0 out of 3 3 out of 3
52. Product Duplicator for vendors X ✓
Scores 0 out of 1 1 out of 1
53. Single Product Multi Vendor (SPMV) ✓ ✓
- Admins can set the layout and text of the buttons X ✓
- Admins can set the criteria for displaying spmv products ✓ X
Scores 2 out of 3 2 out of 3
54. Ajax live search X ✓
- Instant results while typing X ✓
Scores 0 out of 2 2 out of 2
55. Live chat X ✓
- Real time chatting from anywhere around the marketplace X ✓
- Mail notifications of conversations and offline messages X ✓
- Store and track all live chat messages in vendor dashboard X ✓
Scores 0 out of 4 4 out of 4
56. Follow Store X ✓
- Stay updated about favourite stores via email X ✓
Scores 0 out of 2 2 out of 2
57. Return & Warranty Request X ✓
- Return, exchange, get partial or full refunds and refund as store credit X ✓
- Add warranty for global and specific products X ✓
- Vendors add return policy and reasons for return X ✓
Scores 0 out of 4 4 out of 4
58. Wholesale X ✓
- Add wholesale price and quantity front-end X ✓
- Allow customers to apply as wholesale customers X ✓
Scores 0 out of 3 3 out of 3
59. Geolocation X ✓
- Customers can search for products and vendors in a specific area or radius X ✓
Scores 0 out of 2 2 out of 2
60. Vendor reviews ✓ ✓
- Vendors can manage reviews from front-end X ✓
- Shows aggregate number of reviews and rank on storefront X ✓
Scores 1 out of 3 3 out of 3
61. ShipStation X ✓
- Vendors can import WC shipping orders, manage, generate labels and manage it all without a hassle from a single place X ✓
Scores 0 out of 2 2 out of 2
Total Scores for WooCommerce Multi Vendor Advanced Features 30 out of 70 59 out of 70
The Best Multi Vendor WordPress Plugin → WC Marketplace
82 out of 162 Dokan
135 out of 162
Best Admin dashboard features: WC Marketplace vs Dokan
In a multi-vendor eCommerce marketplace, the owners and/or administrators has the full control of Dashboard. Therefore, it’s very important for a multi-vendor eCommerce WordPress plugin to accept the right settings and features to the admins of a multi seller marketplace.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Admin Overview
The Admin Overview page is the vital element in multi-vendor marketplace websites. It provides an easy and at-a-glance summary of the marketplace that helps admins make important decisions and take instant actions.
A marketplace plugin without an Overview page is a smartphone without notifications.
Dokan
Dokan provides a nice, clean and interactive admin overview page where admins can view a summary of their marketplace at a glance. It also shows important stats for the admins to get quick insights and take immediate actions.
The admin dashboard shows everything in details like net sales, number of products created, number of signups, pending vendors, commission earned and pending withdrawals for the month. It also provides a line chart to compare total sales, number of orders and commission for each day of a month. The Dokan overview also displays latest blogs and a subscription widget so users can subscribe to the newsletter directly from admin dashboard.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace doesn’t have a dashboard for admin. The near about is a “Todo list” which shows the number of pending products and the number of pending withdrawals for approval.
Insight: Dokan Admin Overview page is an important element in the backend of Dokan Multi Vendor Plugin. Since the owners of multi seller marketplace have to control a lot of tasks, the Overview page is his most handy tool to stay up to date, to make quick conclusions. The visually attractive Dokan Marketplace Overview page is, thus, imperative for admins to understand the daily status of their marketplace and how well its performing. This facility is not available in WC Marketplace.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Withdrawals
When you run a multi seller eCommerce business, you need to manage the payments. As the administrator of the multi seller marketplace, you require having a easy-to-use dashboard that allows you to view and manage all payments in a go. And nothing can be better if you can handle all these from one place!
Dokan
Dokan Multivendor Withdrawal options are very simple to use. With simple settings like withdraw threshold, withdraw limits, withdraw methods, and order status it gets hassle free for admins to setup global vendor payments. Dokan plugin also provides a withdrawal dashboard from where admins can approve, cancel and manage withdrawal requests.
The plugin uses WooCommerce settings for its email so that admins can set up email notifications to send the approval or cancellation of withdrawals to vendors. Dokan Multi vendor admins can also set up the email. When any new withdrawal request is made they will receive a notification.
WC Marketplace
With WC Marketplace the withdrawal options can be difficult to understand for most marketplace owners. Most owners want some or all control over their multi seller marketplace, especially for payments.
WC Marketplace allows admins to turn off that option for vendors to request withdrawals. So that payments can be disbursed automatically based on a withdrawal threshold or a minimum waiting period. Admins can also set withdrawal schedules and charge vendors for withdrawals. This plugin also allows admins to receive the payment gateway charge from vendors.
Insight: With so many aspects of our lives becoming digital, it only makes sense to ease the burden of remembering when to pay a bill and doing it manually. In the case of a multi-vendor eCommerce marketplace, where prices, number of vendors and vendor situations are constantly changing, you would need to think twice before you really start taking advantage of auto payments.
There are some factors to consider:
What if some vendors accidentally withdraw any payment twice?
The vendor has changed his prices significantly so much so that the commissions you originally set doesn’t make sense anymore?
Moreover, you may also face some unusual circumstances for which you may need to change the type and amount of commission you pay. Such problems can happen when you’re starting off your marketplace and redressing them takes time and effort.
While WC Marketplace has got more options for disbursement of commissions, the solution tends to provide a lot of power to admins at the cost of upsetting vendors. Dokan Multivendor, on the other hand, can manage commissions more practical for the admins and provides a lot more control to vendors to request withdrawals by default. Thus when you try for withdrawals you allow a balance of control between the powers of the admin and the vendors. This will help the admins to review an order and a withdrawal request before disbursing the vendor commission. Dokan Plugin has this option by default because this is an essential feature that allows balance to be maintained between the admins and vendors, and ensures accurate disbursement of commissions.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Vendor Management in a Multi-Vendor eCommerce website:
Your muti vendors eCommerce runs for your sellers. The backend’s vendor station is the heart of every multi-vendor marketplace. Where admins and site owners can view all WooCommerce vendors who have registered. It’s acts like the headquarters from where admins can manage vendors, approve them or deny and directly view their status and profiles.
Dokan
The Dokan multi-vendor plugin station is a core feature that smoothly filters all approved and pending vendors and displays important seller information at a glance. The admins of Dokan multi-vendor get to view vendor details in a beautiful and cleanly organized colorful layout.
The page wonderfully lays out in a pre-defined template with all seller information like vendor address, number of products he/she is selling, revenue earned, total items sold, current balance, and other details all in a single page. It also shows the email, phone, registration date and status among others. The Vendor Manager also shows the social profiles of the vendor and allows the admin to send an email right from the dashboard. Admins has the power to edit basic vendor profile details from WordPress Users feature.
WC Marketplace
The vendor manager for admins features in WCMp is relatively less visually appealing and not user friendly. On top of that, the WCMp vendor manager for admins carelessly grants a lot of control to admins to even change the store slug and store name of a vendor. It also lets admins to do things that can already be done from the default WP Users page. There is a benefit to add a separate commission method and percentage for individual vendors but it’s a hassle that most admins would rather not take.
Insight: Dokan Multi-vendor Marketplace Vendor Manager for Admins feature is simple and easy to understand for any type of user. This core feature smoothly helps admins to view and manage their vendors without granting them too much control to change individual store information. It is void of unnecessary details and has just the right number of features for admins to flawlessly take care of his vendors.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Announcements
As a marketplace owner, sometimes you need to broadcast reminders, messages, and notifications to the seller in your multi shop marketplace. For this purpose you need an announcement feature which is a logical, basic and central element of a WordPress WooCommerce Marketplace.
Dokan
Dokan Multivendor lets admins to create announcements for selected or all vendors. Meanwhile, WCMp only allows announcements for all vendors. Imagine a situation where you have to notify only vendors selling auctionable items or physical items with a change of shipping taxes. Vendors can view these type of announcements from their dashboard.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace plugin only allows admins to create announcements for all vendors. Admins cannot create announcements for selected vendors.
Insight: Dokan Announcements feature is more rich than WC Marketplace as it allows admins to select vendors.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Refunds
An integral part of a WooCommerce Multi-Vendor Marketplace is the ability to handle refunds and returns in a simple and smart way. Repayments are unavoidable in an eCommerce multi store and vendors need to be well-equipped to handle these situations smoothly. A flexible refund mechanism also acquires customer satisfaction and ensures the reliability of vendors.
Dokan
With Dokan Multivendor admins can directly manage refund requests and approve or cancel them from the backend. Vendors just need to request for refunds manually from the frontend and have it passed through their admins panel. Admins can review the refund reasons and take an action accordingly. With this procedure, the Dokan Multivendor solution ensures transactions meet the highest level of standards.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace plugin doesn’t have an in-built refund dashboard for vendors and admins. They also can’t show refunded amounts in reports.
Insight: Dokan in-built refunds system allows both admins and vendors to keep a close track of orders that have been refunded. Both parties thus have a system that lets them calculate earnings at any time accurately.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Admin Reports
Reports are an integral part of managing a multivendor eCommerce website. They show history and trends. Admins can spot best performing stores. They let the site owners have an increased understanding of risks and opportunities.
Reports also highlight the link between number of products sold, total orders, and revenue earned. As a consequence, they help admins create long term business strategy, policy, and goals.
Dokan
In Dokan, admin reports show stats by day, year, custom range, and by vendor. Admins can see the number of orders placed, order total and the total earnings or commission. Admins can also view all the logs for each vendor and which product of theirs has been purchased along with status and vendor earning.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace, admin reports also show sales and earnings data by year, month, week and custom range. It also shows vendor wise gross sales and earnings product. The reports help admins to compare sales against earnings for individual products and vendors.
Insight: While WC Marketplace reports are displayed in the WooCommerce menu along with WooCommerce reports, possibly for easier navigation, Dokan reports show admins just the right amount of data to be able to take appropriate decisions, such as total earnings and logs of all orders. From WooCommerce Reports, Admins can view top products and how much they earned directly, and in Dikan reports other data can be found.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Modules vs Add ons
Sometimes you might need some extra features to further
customize your WooCommerce multi-vendor marketplace. Like, to create
auction-able and rental products, to create wholesale products, to offer
warranty, or to enable a help desk ticket system for registered users. To do
this, you have to obtain ”extensions” in WordPress.
Dokan uses the modules system to offer extra features to your Multi-vendor
site. While WC Marketplace uses add-ons.
Dokan
With Dokan plugin Module system users can handle all their extensions from a single page. It’s easier than the default way of managing WordPress plugins because it’s terrifically easy to activate and deactivate the extensions simply using the help of a toggle button. Admins get the benefit to turn on and off features as they require. The Dokan Multi-vendor modules page also provides an easy way to remember what the modules work for with brief easy to read captions. And a quick way to search a module is also provided with the search bar. It keeps all your marketplace extensions in one place and separate from other plugins that you will be using to operate your WordPress WooCommerce Marketplace.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace Add-ons, on the other hand, don’t do that additionally you have to purchase them separately.Insight: When you’re using a number of extensions to run your WooCommerce Multi-vendor Marketplace, the default WordPress Plugins repository becomes a disorganized page to keep track of all your WooCommerce Multistore extensions among all the other plugins that you will be using in your WordPress site. With the Dokan Multivendor Modules system, you not only get an organized system of all your multi seller marketplace extensions, but also save more by buying the bundles.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Email configuration
Dokan
Dokan allows admins to configure and set up a emails host for the different modules and several core feature and premium features using templates and WooCommerce settings. These templates and settings allow admins to quickly set up the recipients, subject and message they want to send to vendors, customers, or themselves when different set of actions are triggered.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace does not have its own in-built email templates and notifications features. This means if WC Marketplace users want to send customized emails that’s not included in the default WooCommerce emails, they will need to develop it.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Tools
Dokan
Dokan Multivendor Tools section is a very handy feature. It lets admins to set up all required pages for their WooCommerce Multi Store Marketplace automatically in a single click. This section also checks for duplicate orders and re-builds order sync table.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace doesn’t have any such tools option.
Insight: When a user is setting up his eCommerce marketplace, he needs to create a number of required pages in order to get started. And he can save a lot of time on this task if it can be done automatically. Useful convenient features make it easier for admins to keep their backend and the overall marketplace clean, organized and manageable. From time to time admins will also need to check for duplicate orders and this type of feature of Dokan easily scans the entire system within seconds and filters out the duplicate orders.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Updates
Dokan
Dokan updates and license are easily accessible from this section. It allows users to keep getting the support and updates relating to the plugin.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace doesn’t have a pro version but a handful of add-ons. They don’t have a separate section within the plugin for users to upgrade license directly for paid add-ons.
Insight: Another handy tool for users to remain informed about their expiring licenses and have it upgraded from the dashboard, and not have to login to their account.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Help
Dokan
The help section of Dokan includes important get started guides, tutorials, and detailed instructions on usage of features and modules.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace has a knowledge base section within the plugin for admins to upload any instructions or guides on their own for their marketplace.Insight: both solutions have a knowledge house with detailed documentations in the site for their marketplace.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Settings
Dokan
Dokan plugin has a number of settings like vendor capabilities, selling options, withdrawal options, page settings, appearance and email.
In Dokan, admins can allow or resist vendor entry to dashboard by default. In WC Marketplace admins are required to purchase an add-on in order to restrict vendor access to WordPress dashboard.
Dokan allows admins to controls if vendors can add store opening and closing times, which WC Marketplace doesn’t. The plugin also lets admins control if vendors can have a Google map widget in their store page, alter the banner image dimensions, enable terms and conditions, and let vendors manage reviews from the frontend. These important features are not available in WC Marketplace. Dokan also allows admins to disable guest product inquiry, allow vendors to create product tags, allow vendors to select multiple categories for products, control new product status, allow vendors to add discount on products or orders and more. Vendors has the option to change order status and duplicate their own products.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace has settings on general, vendor, payment, capabilities. The plugin has a built-in vendor registration form that’s customizable.
Dokan appearance settings has 4 layouts whereas WCMP has 3 layouts for vendor shops.
Dokan also has an option to add email verification during vendor registration to avoid spams, fake emails, and to add security.
Insight: Dokan settings are more detailed and the different categories allows easy management.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Commissions
Dokan
There are 2 types of commissions available in Dokan. Admins has the option to set the minimum withdraw limit, order status and withdraw threshold. In Dokan, vendors can request for withdrawals by default. If the marketplace are using Stripe or MOIP modules, admins can allow automatic payments also.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace has 4 types of commissions options. Which include % + Fixed per transaction and % + Fixed per unit. The plugin also allows admins to share coupon discount with vendors, set the tax and shipping charges on vendor and set the disbursement threshold and withdrawal locking period.
Admins also have a commissions page in the backend where they can view history and details.
Insight: WC Marketplace plugin offers more commissions options to admins.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Support
The best solutions haven’t great features but also have great customer support service as well. Support should be easily accessible, prompt, caring, responsive, and skilled enough to solve the problems technically.
Dokan
Dokan Multivendor customer service has a high ranking in WordPress.org forums, Trust Pilot, and in several sites who have reviewed the plugin. They offers 24hr live chat, email, FAQ, and contact form for users and visitors to easily get in touch. Premium customers with valid licenses also get priority support and responses within 24 hours or less.
Apart from this the Dokan Multi-vendor has a rich documentation house wherein a host of resources, tutorials, guides, and videos are stored. Users get detailed instructions from installation to configuration to usage of each and every feature and module of Dokan Multivendor Plugin.
WC Marketplace
While the support of WC Marketplace is highly appreciated, the team mainly provides direct support through their forums only. As they mentioned in their site “Any support request raised through email, twitter and contact form will be simply be redirected to the support forums!” The team can be contacted through forms, but that’s not encouraged. The team prefers questions be posted in the support forums so that issues remain open to public search and users can find solutions quicker.
WC Marketplace also has a very well-written documentations, which they call the ”Knowledge Base”.
Best Vendor Dashboard Features: WC Marketplace vs Dokan
The WooCommerce Frontend for Vendors allows sellers to create items, products and manage their stores smoothly without getting into the admin backend.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Store Setup & Vendor Dashboard UI
Dokan
The WooCommerce Vendor Dashboard of Dokan Multi-vendor plugin has an advanced UI/UX with enriched capabilities that ensure a smooth and simple experience for vendors. The Dokan Frontend hosts the vendor dashboard in a visually attractive platform in the store frontend.
In Dokan plugin, vendors also get a Store Setup Widget when they register. This simple widget allows them to enter store slug, description, and payment details quickly and get some important stuffs out of the way, which save time and energy.
Dokan Vendor Dashboard can manage all products, orders, coupons, withdrawals, return requests, reviews, booking and auction-able products. Vendors can also add their social profiles to their store, enter payment information from dashboard, manage shipping, returns and warranty and SEO.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace, there are no separate store setup widget for vendors. They offer an attractive vendor dashboard wherein the menu, options, and settings are laid out in a very unsophisticated way so that it’s easy to search and navigate for users. In WC Marketplace the UI of the overall vendor frontend is easy to understand.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Vendor overview dashboard
The overview dashboard page is an important feature of a plugin. For vendors, this page is a summary of the state of their store. So, it’s essential that it contains a good amount of important data.
Dokan
In Dokan, the vendor overview dashboard consists of a visual chart showing the sales and number of orders in the current month. It also lays out the number of orders and products according to their status.
The overview page also displays announcements from the admins and a simple stat showing earning, pageviews, orders, and total sales.
All of these are clickable and redirects the vendors to the relevant page.
WC Marketplace
The WC Marketplace vendor overview is richer and tells vendors the KPI and store insights for the last 7 and 30 days. Vendors can compare store traffic, number of orders, sales, earnings, and withdrawals. Vendors are also able to see a map of all visitors around the world and the geo-location where the visitors came from. The overview dashboard also shows withdrawable balances for a number of days, a simple product-wise sales report, reviews, pending customer queries, and a bar chart illustrating the status of the products in store.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Categories & Tags
Product categories and tags benefit both admins and vendors in terms of SEO and Google page Indexing. Moreover, it makes customer searches easy on search engines and within the marketplace. Maintaining a categorical hierarchy is also important to allow a product get more exposure on search SEOs for the right keywords.
Dokan
Dokan vendors forcibly need to assign a product to a category. This plugin encourages better product search for the customers on both search engines as well as on your website. Dokan allows vendors to choose multiple product categories and create their own tags from the frontend.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace only recently made adding a category compulsory for vendors. Though multiple product categories cannot be added, vendors can create categories if they’ve access to the backend.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Product SEO & Store SEO
The SEO tool is very important for any growing online marketplace as it helps to rank your store and products in search engines and exposes you to your audience. Both Dokan and WC Marketplace allow vendors to set the preferred meta data for their shop page as well as individual product pages.
Dokan
Dokan provide the facilities to vendors to add SEO title and
description separately for their store, Facebook page, and Twitter page from
the frontend. Dokan Vendors can also do Product-specific SEO from the
individual Edit Product page of each item.
On top of that, Dokan releases admins from this duty and keeps it optional for
admins to add Product SEO from the backend.
WC Marketplace
While in Dokan PRO, Product SEO and Store SEO are a built-in feature, in WC Marketplace these features are available as a premium add-on. In WC Marketplace, vendors have to do Store SEO from the backend setting panel. Switching back and forth between backend and frontend is a hassle that takes up time.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Coupons
Dokan
Dokan has a built-in coupons feature. Vendors can create, manage, and edit coupons, set expiry dates, and many more.
It also lets vendors to grant storewide discount for all products, define the min order amount and the percentage.
Dokan has a pleasanter and more attractive interface and the options for coupons are just right for any seller.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace this Coupons feature is available with Advanced Frontend Manager add-on which has a starting price of $100. It comes with extra options like minimum and maximum spend, email restrictions, individual use, limit usage on number of items and per user, and a more improved discount type feature.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Vendor reports
Vendor reports let sellers to identify problem areas and opportunities, streamline processes, reduce costs and improve efficiency. Sellers can view trends and spot best performing products. It also emphasize the link between financial and non-financial performance.
Dokan
Dokan vendor reports show monthly data such as total sales, number of products sold, coupons used, shipping charges, and also sales by day or custom range, top earning product, top selling product, and statement for a custom range.
WC Marketplace
The vendor reports feature of WC Marketplace shows similar data but not in an illustrated graph like that of Dokan.
The advanced report option of WC Marketplace also show sales by product, stock and transactions data for any range of dates.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Advanced features
In WooCommerce Multivendor Marketplace you can avail advanced
features by going for various extensions.
This section will be associating Dokan Multivendor Modules with WC Marketplace
Add-Ons.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Single Product Multivendor
The Single Product Multi-Vendor advanced feature lets vendors sell products of other vendors and show it side-by-side to shoppers in the marketplace.
Dokan
In Dokan, admins can change the button text that allows vendors to sell products of another vendor. Admins can also change the title of available vendors list section and also the position of the available vendor section.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace, admins can only display single product multivendor items. There are not a lot of other options available for this feature.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Color scheme customizer
Dokan
Dokan lets the admins to customize vendor dashboard color
settings. In cases when admins are using third party themes, this useful
feature lets them quickly adjust the color of the frontend dashboard to match with
the theme.
Dokan color customizer allows a plenty number of options for admins, like,
Button text, Button background color, Button border color, Button hover text color,
Button hover color, Button hover border color, Dashboard navigation text,
Dashboard navigation active menu, Dashboard navigation background, Dashboard
menu border.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace doesn’t have a feature that matches this though they provide few fixed pre-set default color schemes that are not customizable.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Store Support Tickets
Dokan
Dokan has an exclusive feature for registered users to avail support from vendors that can be obtained via the store support module. This option allows buyers and non-buyers to message the vendor directly and get better customer support. Vendors can provide assistance from the frontend.
In Dokan plugin, customers are able to:
- Create a support ticket exact from the vendor store page.
- Select the order ID for their query.
- Write a mail/subject for their query.
- Include a message they want to send to the vendor.
- See all tickets from their account and also the status of each.
And the vendors will be able to:
- Receive support tickets from their existing customers from the frontend.
- See support tickets directly from their dashboard.
- Get an overview with title, customer name, status, issue date of all the tickets.
- Exchange replies with the customer from dashboard.
- Close tickets if the issue is fixed.
- Reopen any closed tickets.
- View the entire conversation carried out with the client.
WC Marketplace
The closest to store support module in WC Marketplace is the WooCommerce Catalog Enquiry Pro add-on which utilizes the WooCommerce catalog plugin and brings it to the frontend for vendors. Vendors are able to:
- Choose Email template
- Hide Price of products
- Exclude products from inquiry
- Let customers have a copy of the inquiry through email
- Create own button style
- Create custom inquiry button text
In WC Marketplace admins also get a copy of the interested customer’s details in the backend dashboard. Both Admins and vendors are able to reply from dashboard but only vendors can manage, approve, reject, or delete enquiries.
Insight: Though the WC Marketplace customer enquiry feature definitely seems richer on the outset, a lot of the elements don’t come across as meaningful. From the vendor dashboard, you’re unable to view the customer’s name or email but have to open each enquiry to view the details. Moreover, the statuses like approved, published, rejected, expired – do not immediately make sense and are likely to be not very meaningful for most vendors.
Dokan, on the other hand, has just 2 simple options: open and closed. As long as you are conversing with the client, you have an open ticket in your dashboard. When you’re done, simply change it closed. Dokan also has a smoother and easily understandable dashboard for customer support that makes it simple for vendors to store and keep track of all their support tickets. Also consider the fact that WC catalog enquiry pro is $100, on the other hand Dokan store support module comes along with 13 other modules and premium marketplace features for $249. So, there’s a lot of more savings of around $80 per add on with the Dokan package.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Subscriptions
Dokan
With Dokan, admin can create subscriptions memberships packs
from the backend. Admins can create unlimited membership packages. To get
started, simply have to choose Dokan Subscription as product type. Admins can
define the price, number of products that the vendor can upload for that
package, admin commission type, admin commission, categories allowed, add
attributes, and allow recurring payment. Unlimited custom attributes can also be
added. Admins can also allow vendors to buy subscriptions during registration,
and configure the email subject, body, number of days before subscription
expires, and the product status.
When a vendor registers, admins can view it and manage directly from Dokan menu
under Dokan>Subscriptions.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace Memberships is similar to Dokan Subscriptions. But the plugin lets admins configure different types of emails for subscription. WC Marketplace also lets admins select the methods of payment he wants to allow vendors to use while purchasing a subscription. Admins can also customize the frontend layout of the subscription page by modifying the colors of buttons and texts.
For managing subscription requests, WC Marketplace admins would have to go to Vendor Type>Memberships. From this page, admins can define the accuracies of each subscription package individually, such as, access privileges, billing, message, capabilities, limitations, upgrade, etc. The Memberships Manager of WC Marketplace is also better, useful, and instantly meaningful the moment you look at it.
In this way WC Marketplace Subscriptions has more features that admins can choose to configure their membership packages.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Vendor reviews
Vendor reviews let customers spot trustworthy sellers and make quick decisions to purchase. This feature also allows admins to identify authentic sellers in his marketplace.
Dokan
Dokan plugin brings WooCommerce’s default store vendor reviews option to the frontend for vendors allowing sellers to only be reviewed by verified purchasers.
Vendors can also moderate the reviews to control for spam and erroneous comments. Moreover, Dokan plugin also displays the collective rank and number of reviewers in the storefront for better customer experience. Dokan plugin thus provides a better control to vendors on how they want to be showed.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace however takes a different approach, and admins can only allow or disable reviews, but vendors cannot manage themselves.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Bookings
Dokan
Though both Dokan and WC Marketplace are integrated with WooCommerce bookings, Dokan plugin allows vendors to create a bookable product from the vendor dashboard for bookings. Thus allow sellers to create bookable products and manage all bookings from one place.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace also allows vendors to send notifications and create bookings from dashboard.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Auctions
Dokan
Dokan WooCommerce Auctions lets vendors add auction-able products from the frontend or create an auction store like Amazon or eBay. Vendors can enter details auction-able products just like regular products, enable automatic relisting, proxy or sealed bidding for the product.
Admins can configure settings from backend panel and the same can be done by vendors from frontend.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace, auction-able products can be added from the vendor product manager. Admins don’t have separate settings for the marketplace except for the default WooCommerce settings. Vendors are required to set it all up by themselves. Apart from this, there are no other mentionable differences with Dokan.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: PDF Invoices
Dokan
Dokan PDF invoices lets admins, sellers, and customers get their invoices in PDF format. vendors can view both packing slips and invoice from the dashboard and download them as pdf file.
While the invoices of both plugins appear the same, it’s a free feature in Dokan and a paid add on in WC Marketplace. In WC Marketplace, admins also have separate control to configure the invoice details.
WC Marketplace
Though this is similar to the WooCommerce PDF invoices settings, in WC Marketplace admins can define the admin and customer invoice template separately from a set of predefined templates. Admins can select the details to show in the invoices, terms & conditions, and whether to send via email. Vendors can also select the template for their invoice and define the terms and conditions. In both plugins, customers can view the invoices from their account and also have it mailed to them.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Vendor Vacation
Dokan
Dokan has the simple interface that lets vendors close store temporarily. Vendors can select the date and leave a vacation message for his customers. When vendor is on vacation, purchasing options is closed.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace plugin lets vendors select multiple dates together, and select if he wants to avoid customers. Vendors are also able to configure custom notifications to avoid purchase and set notification threshold. This add-on lets vendors change the Add to Cart button text and add any custom message along with it. This is a default feature in Dokan.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Store Opening & Closing Times
Dokan
In Dokan plugin, the store time option comes as a module and sellers can set time of operation for every day of the week. Sellers can also set custom text for store opening and closing. Admins can choose to disable the store opening and closing time widget from backend.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace, vendors are able to configure store opening and close times for every day of the week, add custom text after store closes. However, this feature comes with the vendor vacation as add-on only.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Vendor Verification & Social Login
Dokan
Vendor verifications are an excellent way of exhibiting assurance to customers about the authenticity of sellers. Vendors have the verified label or batch in their stores and products are also likely to be trusted more by users, have more sales, and become long term clients.
Dokan plugin lets vendors verify with social profiles, SMS, ID and address. The SMS method includes popular gateways like Nexmo and Twilio. WC Marketplace allows vendors to verify using social profiles, ID and address.
Dokan plugin now makes it easy for vendors to login using their social media accounts like Facebook, Twitter, Google, LinkedIn. Users can both register and login using these social profiles to start selling.
Dokan also lets admins to approve verifications before they can be displayed on the vendor’s profile. These verification requests are displayed in a separate and easy dashboard in the admin backend. Admins can individually approve IDs and addresses and phone numbers are verified via an SMS code.
WC Marketplace
In WC Marketplace, admins can view verification requests in the to-do list.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Product Importer & Exporter
Dokan
With Dokan, vendors can export and import products in csv. format from the frontend product dashboard. The options are placed directly in the product dashboard so sellers can access them quickly. Admins are autonomous from any extra settings for the import-export module.
WC Marketplace
Whereas, in WC Marketplace vendors have to create a separate page for uploading products to export and import. Thus, admins have to go through some extra steps to set up the feature for his vendors to use.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Staff Manager
Dokan
The WC Marketplace staff manager for sellers is a basic version of Dokan vendor staff manager. Not only is the user interface far superior, but Dokan also allows vendors to precisely configure the permission settings for each staff. The comprehensive range of permission controls for each multivendor element like orders, reports, reviews, products, coupons, etc. makes it easier for vendors to have manage a large number of staffs smoothly. Since the admins already have a lot in their hands, like vendor payments, registrations, orders, refunds etc. to manage, this module is one of those that releases admin of extra hassles and lets the vendor take over. This is one of the features that shifts the task to the vendor’s side.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Flexible customer payments with Stripe, Paypal, MOIP
Dokan
Dokan uses a variety of payment methods like MOIP, with which admins can set automatic payments to vendors.
The core version of Dokan allows admins to use any gateway that’s non-adaptive and compatible with WooCommerce. If admins want to use an adaptive gateway, they can use the Stripe Connect module, which is a popular pay way and is used around the world. This option allows automatic commission disbursals to vendors and releases admins of some extra tasks, like manually splitting amounts between vendors and configuring transaction fees. Customers can directly checkout using credit card or even use direct bank transfer.
Adding other popular gateways and 100+ WooCommerce supported gateways will enable your market to sell in any country, with built-in tax rates.
WC Marketplace
WC Marketplace lets vendors select their own payment methods such as PayPal Masspay and PayPal Payout as well as stripe. In WC Marketplace, admins can choose to automatically disburse commissions or allow vendors to request for withdrawals. PayPal gateway is the core payment feature in WC Marketplace, but the marketplace plugin doesn’t use as many payment gateways as Dokan.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Exclusive Dokan Multi Vendor Modules for a WooCommerce Multi Seller Marketplace
Enhanced customer experience with Dokan Ajax live search, Live chat and Follow store
Dokan plugin incorporates a great search feature for browsing which shows suggestions as users type. The live search feature of Dokan Multi-vendor lets customers search for products using simple keywords and get instant results as they type.
The Dokan Talk JS live chat support option creates a ground for vendors to directly & privately interact with visitors on a real-time basis, solve issues faster, and convert interested users into paying clients. Instant conversations & faster resolutions to clients’ needs are the new hot thing for high retention & sales. Live chats also help to understand users better. Thus, allowing sellers to understand potential customers, what they are looking for and their needs.
Dokan, lets vendors and customers chat from anywhere in the store. Vendors also get the live chat conversations stored in their Inbox in frontend dashboard. Vendors can also receive desktop notifications and reply to offline messages from the Inbox.
The follow store option lets users keep tabs on their favorite stores and stay updated about the new products.
There are no substitutes to these elements. They keep your users hooked and make them come back again and again. Features like these do wonders to transform the online shopping experience and users simply love it.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Enriched vendor dashboard with Geolocation, ShipStation, Product Enquiry
With so many stores in a multi-vendor marketplace, sellers try to stand out and personalize their stores to attract the right customers. There are many ways to personalize a store, such as, adding brand logo, using a theme color, optimizing with keywords, adding a location, and more.
The ShipStation option fully mechanizes Dokan shipping so that vendors can ship products anywhere in less time. Import, manage, generate labels, and ship the orders hassle free.
One of the best ways to let customers find your web store is through searching with your name or product within a certain region. The Dokan Geolocation module allows users to search for products and vendors in a specific area or regions.
Dokan also lets visitors contact with vendors by a simple Product Enquiry form. Visitors can just leave them email address and message, and vendors can reply through email.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Dokan Return & Warranty Request
For customer satisfaction, Dokan lets customers request for return with full or partial refund, get replacement for a product, or refund as store credit. Vendors can also provide warranty for all products or individually and include it with the item or as add-on. Admins can control the return policy while vendors control the warranty policy.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Dokan Wholesale
Dokan plugin lets vendors offer their products at a wholesale price. With this feature, vendors can set the minimum quantity to avail the wholesale rate and the price. Users can become a wholesale customer. And vendors can set product specific rates for any type of product like simple, variable, etc.
Reach audience beyond your local
Dokan is multilingual ready, making it easy for admins and vendors to sell in regions of their choice and make their marketplace customized for a foreign audience. The free WPML integration makes Dokan adaptable in 25+ languages and RTL supported, so your eCommerce is truthfully global.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Styling your Multi Seller Marketplace with Widgets & Theme
Dokan has 14 widgets – one of the best evidences that this multivendor is flexible enough for marketplace owners to re-organize and modify the layout of pages just as desired.
These widgets, such as, the Dokan best selling products, best vendors, featured vendors, geolocation filter form, product category menu, product location information in single page, seller store category menu, vendor contact form, store location, store opening closing time widget, store support button, top rated product widget, seller verifications, live search field – are extremely convenient tools that allow admins to place certain features wherever they want to around the website for better appearance, easier access, and user convenience. Dokan also comes with a free marketplace theme that instantly sets up all the pages, vendor dashboard, and widgets so that you are ready to get down to business.
WC Marketplace vs Dokan: Choose the Best WooCommerce Multi Vendor Plugin to build your Marketplace
WC Marketplace has built-in free version and some add-ons which are very rich. But due to their limitations, WC Marketplace doesn’t yet provide marketplace vendors ways to transform their eCommerce shop into whatever they dream about.
Dokan has also some extremely built-in rich features features faster than anybody else. Users also like the uniqueness of elements in this multi seller marketplace platform.
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This is how @wc_marketplace treat their clients: after paying 400 USD they’ve blocked my account for asking for help as their plugin doesn’t work (bugs), which goes againts Customers rights, and as they are an indian company it looks like that there are no customer protection or law, so they think they have the right to do whatever they want with the clients. They pray 24h customer service, but I am waiting for almost 3 months!.They extorted me to stop asking for help to solve the issues ?
This is how @wc_marketplace treat their clients: after paying 400 USD they’ve blocked my account for asking for help as their plugin doesn’t work (bugs), which goes againts Customers rights, and as they are an indian company it looks like that there are no customer protection or law, so they think they have the right to do whatever they want with the clients. They pray 24h customer service,but I am waiting for almost 3 months!.They extorted me to stop asking for help to solve the issues ?