In 2022, Shopify has 2.3 million active visitors from 175 countries every day, and 3.6 million online stores use Shopify, where 69.67 % of the stores are registered in the United States.
Want to set up an online store? Shopify is your best bet! But how to create a successful Shopify store?
Well, setting up a Shopify store is no rocket science. By the time you reach the end of this blog, you will know everything you need to create a successful Shopify store. So, let’s get ready to explore the basics and other nitty-gritty of this popular e-commerce platform, which will give you a headstart!
What Is Shopify?
Shopify is a popular Canadian eCommerce platform. It was launched in 2006 to make it easy for eCommerce business owners to manage an online store. To run your e-store and to get access to all the perks offered by Shopify, you will need to pay a monthly fee.
Why Should You Choose Shopify?
Many people get worried when they want to start an online business. Looking for the right professionals to set up a brand new website, managing the inventory, ensuring data security, and many other crucial tasks can be hectic for newbies.
The main aim of Shopify is to simplify the hectic tasks for eCommerce business owners. But why should you use this eCommerce platform over others? We searched and found the following benefits, which will make it easier to manage your business.
1. Hassle-Free Site Design And Setup
All you need to do is to log in and start designing and setting up your shop. There’s no need to code or create a unique design for you when creating your site, as Shopify already took care of that!
With just a few clicks and selecting the desired options, you will be only on your way to creating a visually appealing eCommerce shop within a short time.
2. Easy to Use Admin Dashboard
The admin dashboard is easy to use. You can do different things to manage your outlet. And it usually depends on which device you use to log into your Shopify account.
According to Shopify, you can easily manage all the activities when logged in through the browser. Using an updated web browser is best to use all of the available Shopify features.
Shopify supports multiple browsers such as Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Opera, and more.
On the other hand, through their official app, you can manage your orders, update the catalog, and view the recent activities to keep track of your business.
3. Reliable and Secure Platform
Operating an online outlet is much more than just managing the inventory and keeping track of the sales. You’ll also need to deal with customers’ personal and financial data, which are confidential. And this is one reason why security should be at the top of your list.
Shopify takes care of your security concerns as it offers one of the best secure platforms along with the necessary maintenance and upgrades.
4. Get Access to Various Marketing Tools
Marketing is one of the main aspects of any business, and Shopify knows this well. Here, you will have access to helpful tools such as eCommerce shop statistics, eCommerce analytics, and SEO features that help you compete with other online shops.
5. Offers Excellent Customer Support
Offering excellent customer service is one of the best things about Shopify! You can access 24/7 customer support through live chat, email, or phone when you choose this platform.
6. Safe and Easy Payment Setup
When setting up an eCommerce business, the priority should be ensuring secure and safe payment. Shopify offers a variety of payment options. Moreover, you can set up the payment gateway with ease.
7. Integrate Various Apps With Ease
You can easily integrate multiple apps with your Shopify site. Integrating an app is an easy way to add extra features and functionalities. There are multiple ways to install an app.
The Importance of a Business Plan For Create a Successful Shopify Store
Before you decide to open your Shopify store, you need to invest some time in crafting a well-written eCommerce business plan. If you want success, creating a business plan is your first step.
A business plan will help you clarify the strategies, any potential obstructions, and the viability of your idea.
But why? Here are some of the reasons:
- It’ll help you focus on several critical business aspects
- You can come up with product ideas
- Works as a guide/ map when growing your business.
To create one, you must also research and understand your customer and competitors better. You can Search multiple business templates, and Shopify also has helpful resources to get started!
How Exactly Does Shopify Work?
Now that you have a solid business idea, let’s move on! You may be wondering, how does the whole thing work?
We’ve compiled the whole process in brief for you-
- First, you need to visit the official website of Shopify.
- The homepage will offer you to start your journey through the 14-day free trial.
- Enter your email address, password, and a “unique” store name, and click on “Create Your Store” when done.
- In this step, you need to select if you are already selling, your current revenue, your industry, and if you are setting up a store for a client or not (tick the box as appropriate).
- Click Next to proceed to step 2.
- Provide your full name, address, postal code, and phone number.
After you click next, you will get directed to a new page, i.e., the admin dashboard.
The admin dashboard is where you will find all the necessary settings to customize and manage your eCommerce outlet. It’s user-friendly and easy to navigate.
You’re also required to verify your email address.
Now the actual game begins! Get ready to create your unique shop
Designing Your Shopify Store
You can customize your store exactly how you want it to be! You’ll find all customization options in the Shopify dashboard. Remember, being unique will help you stand out from the crowd. There are hundreds of free and paid themes and templates to choose from for your online shop. And all these gems are available at Shopify’s theme store. Always check the customer reviews before making a decision!
1. Selecting a Theme
You can select any theme depending on the number of products and the layout style. Also, you can choose one based on the type of product page, homepage, navigation style, marketing and social media, and industry.
If unsure, you can simply browse through all the available designs and choose the one you find the most suitable instead of filtering.
2. Knowing More About Theme: Features And Reviews
To know more about the theme, click on it. On the selected theme’s page, you will find the option to try out the design or check out the demo. You can do both! The theme page will show you its features and any available reviews. You’ll also find support, documentation, and terms of service for the theme.
3. Purchasing A Theme
If you want to select a paid theme, click “Buy Theme.” Click to confirm if you want to publish your selected theme for your Shopify outlet.
4. Customizing a Theme
You can customize the theme through “theme settings” and “theme actions.” These options are at the bottom of the toolbar. Also, you can always change your theme later on!
Building Up Your Shopify Store in 30 Minutes.
Now that you’re done with the design, it’s time to build up your store. This phase will take some time as much planning is required before adding the items.
1. Adding The Products
You need to add the products through your Shopify admin dashboard. You can add as many items as you want. You need to ensure your product looks the best to your potential customers. All you need to do is follow the steps below:
- You will find a green-colored “Add Product” option on the navigation menu. Click on it.
- Next, you get directed to the product upload page. Here, you need to name your products (product titles) and fill in the relevant details, along with high-quality photos.
- Click the “save” button to save your added items and exit.
- The inventory tab on the menu will allow you to check and track all your uploaded products.
- Shopify will show “Out of Stock” if your stock finishes until you refill your inventory.
2. Naming And Describing The Product
You must clearly describe the product to your customers, as they cannot physically view the item. While adding products, you need to do the following:
A) Write a Catchy And Short Product Description
You have to provide the necessary product information to your customer. Inadequate product descriptions will make the customer go away. So will anything boring or too long or short.
Tell your customer what it does and how it will help to solve the customer’s problem. Break the text into segments with bullet points and sub-headings to make it catchy.
B) Add High-Quality Images
As your customers cannot view the product in a physical location, quality product images will help them decide whether to purchase the item or not. Any low-quality photo will deter them away from your shop.
If you are using stock photos, use the best ones. Or, if you are adding original images, hiring a professional photographer for high-quality images is best.
C) Set The Price
You need to make sure that you are setting a suitable price tag (for a popular product). For this, you must research your competitors and their pricing.
Also, calculate your requirements before doing so. Too low or high pricing will deter any potential customer. Shopify has got three pricing sections that you will need to fill out. These are Price (the selling price), Compare at Price, and Cost Per Item.
3. Arrange The Collection
To group your products into several categories, click Products Collections. Here, you can enter the name of your collection and select the relevant conditions according to your product.
4. Set Up The About Us page
If you want to attract customers to your shop, give a lot of importance to this page! A well-described about us page will help to connect with your customers. Make sure it is original and personal.
5. A Unique Domain Name
When selecting the domain name, you’ll have an option of Shopify sub-domain. However, to look professional and credible, it’s best to go for paid names.
Your domain is the first thing someone will see when they come across your business. There are numerous tools online, including the Shopify search bar, which will help you to check if a name is available or not.
A unique domain name will help to strengthen and enhance your brand image in the long run.
6. Add and Customize Shipping
Head off to the “Settings” to manage the shipping settings. There are different types of rates that you can opt for, and these are:
a) Flat Shipping Rate
Regardless of the product’s weight or size, this shipping rate remains the same for all items while applying to each transaction.
b) Price-Based Rate
The cost of the whole basket will determine the shipping rate.
c) Weight-Based Rate
As the name suggests, the weight determines the rate.
d) Free-Shipping Rate
No shipping rates will apply to the items that are purchased.
e) Calculated Shipping Rate
A Shipping App or a carrier will determine the shipping rate. Always be familiar with the shipping policy! The shopping details will be sent to the third-party provider at the checkout to calculate the shipping rate.
7. Integrate Any App You Want
As we’ve mentioned earlier, you can add an app to increase the functionality of your online outlet. You can check out, download, and test both paid and free apps at the Shopify App Store.
To start, click on “Apps” in the navigation menu. You’ll find various apps according to your shop’s needs and requirements.
8. Setting Up The Payment Gateway
As a beginner, Shopify Payment is the best option. You simply need to input your account information in Shopify to get started.
You can also choose third-party payment gateways such as Stripe, PayPal, Apple Pay, Amazon Pay, and Google Pay.
You’ll come across different options to select from, such as:
- You can ‘Activate PayPal Express Checkout
- Or select ‘Choose a third-party provider
- You can also opt for ‘Choose Alternative Payment.’
You can use the manual payment method if you want to get your earnings processed outside your online outlet. In this case, whenever you receive the money manually, you need to approve their order before it is fulfilled. Here, you can select from a range of options, which are:
- Create a custom payment method
- Bank deposit
- Money order
- Cash on delivery (COD).
There’s another option, which is Payment Capture, where you can go for any one of the options (as appropriate) from:
- Automatically capture payment for orders
- Manually Capture payment for orders
After you are done, click on ‘Save.’
9. View Your Store Details (And Update If Necessary)
To check out your store details or if you want to fix them, follow the steps below:
- Click on Settings (Gear Icon)
- Click the “General” option.
Now you can edit any information you wish, for example, your shop name, address, store currency, the legal name of your company, etc.
10. Legal Terms And Policies
To access the Legal options, you need to click on Settings. You can also get some handy tools from Shopify to help you out.
In this section, you can create your shop’s legal pages, such as refund policy, privacy policy, terms of service, and shipping policy.
You also have the option to use Shopify templates. However, you must read and agree to the disclaimer before proceeding.
11. Fix The Shipping Rate And Delivery
To fix the rate and delivery, you need to visit Settings and click on Shipping and Delivery to edit according to your preference.
Shopify Pricing And Plans: Full Details
Each Shopify price package has its advantages and limitations. Multiple plans are available, along with a free trial option that you can choose when creating your first Shopify shop. No matter which plans you choose, you can always start with a free trial. However, to run your site, you need to select a plan. Let’s get to know about them!
1. Free Trial
If you want to test the water before committing to Shopify, opting for a free trial is one of your best options. When you sign up, your 14-day free trial will start. You can set up your store while on the free trial.
However, if you want to sell through Shopify, you must choose a monthly plan. If you don’t select a monthly plan after the free trial is over, your store will get frozen until you go for an appropriate paid plan.
2. Basic Shopify Plan
If you are looking for an affordable Shopify plan, this is the one! It’ll cost you $29 per month. With this package, you will get a Shopify eCommerce website and a blog. This plan allows a maximum of 2 of your staff members to access the Shopify Point Of Sale and the admin.
Not only that, but you will get 24/7 customer support to help you out if you face any problems.
Some of the features are sales channels for selling on social media (varies from country to country), printing shipping labels, manual order creation, abandoned cart recovery, and up to 4 different locations for assigning inventory to retail outlets, pop-ups, or warehouses.
3. Shopify Plan
If you are looking for more features than the ones the basic plan offers, you should check this one out! It costs $79 per month. But, on the other hand, it’ll give you extra advantages for smooth business management.
Unlike the basic package, a maximum of 5 of your staff will get their accounts to access the Shopify Admin and POS. Also, you will get access to 5 locations, instead of 4, to assign inventory to wherever you want to store your products.
Many of its features are similar to the basic plan. You’ll also get additional features such as professional reports and customizable international pricing.
4. Advanced Shopify Plan
This package is ideal for you if you are looking for some advanced features. However, you’ll need to spend $299 per month.
Unlike the previous plans, this package offers a maximum of 15 of your staffa to access the Shopify Admin and POS. Also, you get up to 8 locations to assign inventory to any place you want. Most other features are similar to the previous two packages.
Some exclusive features of this package are international per variant pricing, third-party calculated shipping rates, and an advanced report builder.
Some Common Features Across The Shopify Plans
Here are the features that are common across the three packages:
- Online Store
- Manual order creation
- Support around the clock
- Unlimited products
- Discount codes
- Free SSL certificate
- Abandoned cart recovery
- Gift Cards
- Print Shipping labels
- Fraud Analysis
- Shopify Point of Sale (POS)
- Sell in 133 currencies
- Supports selling in 5 languages
- Sales Channel
- Shopify POS Pro ($89 per month for each package).
Although the following features are available in all three plans, there are differences in the allotted percentages:
- Shipping discounts are 77% for the basic plan and 88% for Shopify and Advanced packages.
- Online credit card rates are 2.9% + 30¢ USD (Basic), 2.6% + 30¢ USD (Shopify), and 2.4% + 30¢ USD (Advanced).
- In-person Credit card rates are 2.7% + 0¢ USD (Basic), 2.5% + 0¢ USD (Shopify), and 2.4% + 0¢ USD (Advanced).
- Using payment providers other than Shopify payment additionally will cost 2.0% (Basic), 1.0% (Shopify), and 0.5% (Advanced).
Features common in only Shopify and Advanced Shopify plans are:
- Professional reports
- USPS Priority Mail Cubic pricing
- Country-specific optimization of international SEO
- Customization of pricing for different regions/countries
Additional Shopify Plans (That Doesn’t Offer Online Store Option)
Here is the list of other paid plans that one can choose before or after the 14-day free trial. Don’t opt for these plans as they don’t offer online store and blog options.
1. Shopify Lite Plan
This plan is for shop owners looking to sell their products or services and don’t want to maintain an online shop on the Shopify platform.
With this plan, you can easily add a buy button on your blog or website. There are several features available in this package, for example, checking the relevant reports, creating invoices for the customers, product and order management, accessing customer profiles, using the in-store inventory, and issuing gift cards.
Plus, thanks to their point of sale app, now with your android or iOS, you can easily accept payments from your customers. This plan will cost you $9 per month.
2. Shopify Plus Plan
This plan costs a hefty $2000/month or a variable fee for businesses with higher volumes. It is ideal for large brands as they get the appropriate features to help smoothly run a large brand.
3. Launching Your Shopify Store
Now that you’ve completed most of the crucial steps, it’s time to show your online business to the world!
After selecting your preferred plan, you need to:
- Visit your Admin page.
- Click Online store> Preferences
- Scroll down to Password protection
- Uncheck “Enable Password” (this will allow any customer to find your shop without a password. Wow, your site is live!)
Next Steps After Launching
To ensure increased sales, you must promote your brand to your target customers. You need to implement multiple marketing, sales, and shipping strategies to attract potential customers. Focusing on your customer journey is important as well.
Furthermore, carry out any test to ensure that everything is running smoothly and that your customers don’t face any hassles when shopping from your website!
Managing a successful business means you’ll always need to monitor, analyze, and optimize your website accordingly.
You must keep an eye on the following metrics to ensure a growing business:
1. Your Site Traffic
This will help you see how many potential clients are visiting your online shop and where they are from.
2. Conversion Rates Matter!
You may see a lot of visitors visiting your site, but how many of them are becoming your customers?
Conversion rates will help you find out how many are adding your products to their carts, heading to the checkout, and purchasing your items/services so that you can adjust your website and strategies for higher sales and more conversions.
3. Keep An Eye On The Total Sales
To grow your business, you need to monitor this metric closely. A few months’ sales data will give an idea if you need to improve and if there are any shortcomings, you need to overcome for better performance.
Depending on your performance in any particular month, you can create a new campaign to reach more customers.
4. Don’t Miss Out on The Average Order Value
This particular metric will show, on average, how much a customer spends on a single basket. In short, it will give the overall performance of your eCommerce website concerning your product mix, discount, and other relevant applied strategies.
5. Old Returning Customer vs. New Ones
It’s a must to have an ideal balance between getting both new and old customers. New customers will help to increase your business and sales, and recurring customers will add stability!
FAQ:
How much does an average Shopify online store make?
To understand how much a Shopify store makes, Littledata surveyed around 1407 Shopify stores. It showed that the average revenue per customer for these stores was $72
How do I make my Shopify store more profitable?
There are many ways to do so! Most successful Shopify stores implement various strategies. For example, you can build an email list, retain old customers, optimize your store content, and create worthwhile marketing strategies through storytelling.
Is Shopify an ideal option for beginners?
With Shopify, you’ll need a low start-up cost and get to use a user-friendly interface to operate your store. Shopify makes the setup procedure as easy as possible.
Which well-known companies use Shopify?
Many companies use Shopify as it’s reliable and easy to use. KKW Beauty, Red Bull GMBH, Kylie Cosmetics, and Fitbit are some of these.
How do I get paid from Shopify?
As Shopify Payment is fully integrated with your online shop, you can check out the payouts in the Shopify admin. You’ll receive the payments through the Shopify payouts after a customer pays using the Shopify Payment or any other accelerated checkouts.
Be a Shopify Store Owner
Although not rocket science, you need to decide carefully before taking each step when starting your store. You shouldn’t forget to focus on a well-written business plan to give you a better chance!
It’s best to spend some time crafting a memorable business name and look for the best design template on Shopify to help your site look unique. Also, give special attention when selecting a domain name and setting up the product pages.
You need to analyze and accommodate any changes to grow your business in the long run.
Creating a Shopify store is just the tip of the iceberg, but it’s the first milestone you’ve achieved in your business journey! It takes a lot to start a business from scratch. To ensure the smooth running of your store, you need to put in a lot of hard work, dedication, and time.
All the best!
