Tag: Shopify

WordPress Vs. Shopify

Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.

If you’ve ever considered launching your own online business, chances are you’ve thought about the required tools. And while there are several ecommerce platforms on the market, Shopify and WordPress remain the most prominent.

If you already have a WordPress website ready, it would be better to go with WordPress for ecommerce as well. All you need to do is install WooCommerce, and you can launch your ecommerce store as an element of your existing website. It also means much less work on your part.

Shopify is better for those who don’t have a website yet, and hence, would want a hands-off and dedicated solution. It also comes with plenty of advanced features to make your life way easier. Try Shopify free for 14 days, no credit card required.

Comparing the Top Ecommerce Platforms

While Shopify and WordPress are excellent ecommerce platforms, there are several other alternatives with their own advantages:

  • Zyro – Best for setting up your web store in minutes
  • Shopify – Best all-in-one ecommerce platform
  • Wix – Best for flexibility and customization
  • Squarespace – Best ecommerce platform for creatives
  • Bluehost – Best for hands-off WooCommerce store setup
  • BigCommerce – Best for medium to large stores
  • WooCommerce – Best for WordPress websites
  • OpenCart – Best for selling digital products
  • Ecwid – Best for integrating with your current platform

Head over to my best ecommerce platforms guide for an in-depth look at where every product stands, along with what criteria do I think they are best for.

Shopify or WordPress: Which is Better?

Offering unparalleled flexibility and power-packed performance, Shopify is an all-in-one ecommerce website builder that will give you an excellent website in minutes.

Even if you’re new to things, you can always fall back on the 24/7 Shopify support to help you with the technical stuff. If Shopify sounds like the right fit, sign up for its 14-day free trial to test out its features.

As you can imagine, having a WordPress website is a prerequisite to use WooCommerce. But this also gives you direct access to so many other functionalities, ranging from a greater selection of themes and apps to managing content to SEO.

If you prefer a more hands-on solution and have the general technical know-how, I’d recommend checking out WooCommerce, for sure.

WordPress (WooCommerce) Wins

Free and Open Source: WooCommerce is absolutely free and open-source, making it the go-to option for startups and small businesses wanting to create an online selling platform. It integrates well with WordPress, and the fact that any user, designer, or programmer can alter its code gives you access to a large community where you can get inspired and share ideas to simplify site management. That said, keep in mind that certain WooCommerce extensions are chargeable.

100% Customizable: You have the freedom to choose your desired theme from a wide variety of professional-grade and high-quality themes. You can decide exactly how you would want your site to look by customizing the various sections like header, footer, checkout, product pages, and so on. It would be even simpler if you have CSS, HTML, and PHP style code knowledge. Moreover, even the plugins are customizable, but I’ll discuss that in more detail in the next point.

Great Plugins: WordPress plugins are incredibly helpful to ecommerce sellers as they can uncomplicate otherwise complicated tasks. WooCommerce is a plugin itself that converts a standard WordPress site into a fully functional ecommerce store. You’ll have to upload products still, but the overall process becomes ten times simpler. Similarly, there are different plugins for different tasks. For instance, there’s Yoast SEO for website and content optimization, WooCommerce MailChimp for email marketing, and WooCommerce Google Analytics to track store performance.

Flexible Product and Inventory Management: You can create web stores with WooCommerce to sell both physical and digital products. You also have the option to keep adding products regularly and set different product types. What’s more, the platform makes inventory quite simple thanks to its WordPress-centric user interface that allows you to keep track of current stock levels and manage day-to-day inventory.

Mobile-Friendly: We live in a time where mobile devices have become an integral part of our lives. It’s why WordPress’s responsive and mobile-friendly designs and themes are a huge plus point. You can also benefit from its emergent responsive web technology without the hassle of having to create new websites.

Tons of Extensions: You can choose from all kinds of extensions—free and paid—to suit your specific needs if you have a WordPress site. These are great to add functionality to your web store to boost customer experience without writing code. You also have all kinds of extension options, such as store management, product page, checkout, shopping cart, better search, payments, shipping, and reporting. 

Useful SEO Capabilities: WooCommerce SEO isn’t challenging anymore, thanks to the WordPress plugins and extensions you can choose based on your precise needs. You can select any plugin or extension you feel most comfortable for optimizing your site. Further, the extensions and plugins undergo regular updates, which makes them secure and efficient at all times.

Uncompromised Cybersecurity: With hackers coming up with more sophisticated methods to steal your private data, consumers today are more aware of their rights to privacy than ever. Keeping this in mind, WooCommerce prioritizes privacy and protection in transactions to create a trustworthy and secure environment for its users. There are frequent updates to ensure the ecommerce platform stays ahead of security issues and is aligned with the newer versions of WordPress.

Multiple Payment Gateways and Currency Support: WooCommerce offers geolocation support that enables you to accept multiple currencies from people across the globe. Having multiple payment gateways and shipping options is very attractive for customers living in various locations and countries. This, in turn, could help boost your sales and revenue. Even from the customer’s viewpoint, the flexibility to pay in their specific currency and tax rate makes things very convenient. It’s a win-win for both sides. 

WooCommerce Losses

Lacks Many Advanced Features: The whole point of WooCommerce is to help developers build web stores, so you can’t use the platform as a robust ecommerce content management system or CMS. This is mainly because it lacks some of the essential advanced features that could make store management easier. Moreover, most of the themes and features to improve customer experience cost money, which will increase your project overheads. 

Frequent Updates: Yes, the regular updates ensure your online store has optimal security and is aligned with WordPress, but sometimes, it becomes too much. Having too many updates also makes using WordPress for ecommerce more time-consuming. Therefore, you have to prepare yourself to handle common issues associated with updating a WordPress plugin–such as data backup and testing.

Not Exactly Beginner-Friendly: Navigating through WordPress web design, development, and maintenance is challenging, especially for people who don’t have prior experience or knowledge about web development and marketing—and WooCommerce is no exception. As it offers minimal maintenance support, you have to rely on online forums for solutions. You need to have a fair level of web knowledge to understand which advice you should follow. Also, if you want to customize your site, you need coding knowledge.

Performance Glitches: There is something known as too many plugins. Considering WooCommerce users often have to install many plugins to add functionalities, they have to pay the price elsewhere. Firstly, plugins take up a lot of memory. Secondly, you may face slow downloading speed and average performance, which will make the process frustrating. Keeping this in mind, I’ll encourage you to implement desired functions through CSS, HTML codes, or jQuery instead of downloading 24 different plugins. On top of this, whatever plugin you do install, make sure you evaluate the pros and cons with care before proceeding.

Shopify Wins

Professionally Designed and Mobile-Responsive Themes: Shopify has ten free themes and 64 premium themes, starting from $140. Every one of them is mobile-responsive. This means your site will automatically reformat to suit the smaller screens, appealing to customers who have logged on from their cell phones. The themes look spectacular and professionally-designed and are available in different styles to match your brand best. 

Better Security: Did you know that a customer will wait for only three seconds, and if it takes any longer than that, they’ll simply abandon it? It is said that one in ten customers expects your page to load in one second. Shopify understands this, which is why they provide 100% SSL to keep their sites fast. Also, since customers mostly pay via credit cards, it takes the initiative to keep things super secure. But Shopify hires cybersecurity experts to keep their website hack-proof and integrate with multiple payment providers to keep checkouts fast and secure for customers.

In-House App Store: Shopify has an in-house app store as one of its biggest USPs that contains over 1200 plugins and apps. This means you can find anything you could possibly want by either paying the price or potentially finding free options. You can use these apps to automate and streamline your business processes, making them faster while also boosting the efficiency of other processes like accounting, inventory management, and shipping. 

Custom Domain: You’ll get a custom domain name after signing up with Shopify–one you chose for your company–to brand your business more effectively. This also gives you the flexibility to handle your domain on the same site location as your domain store. As such, you can make any changes to your domain site as well as your domain store.

Top-Notch Analytics: You get plenty of built-in analytics features to keep track of your store, including customer behavior, stock levels, and conversion tracking. This way, you’ll have complete knowledge about your store–how is it doing, and which parts need to be optimized for better results. The detailed analytics also lets you keep track of online store sessions, products, total sales, returning customer rate, and average order value.

24/7 Customer Support: There are millions of Shopify sites around the world. And while the ecommerce-rich features of Shopify is a great leverage, it’s efficient customer service is also one of the main reasons customers love the platform. You get direct access to a massive database of FAQs, plus email, chat, and phone support with a knowledgeable rep on the other side.

Scalable: Shopify can accommodate the expanding needs of store owners wanting to take their store to the next level. Built with scalability in mind, they are efficient enough to handle sudden traffic spurts or steadily increasing traffic over time. Besides, you don’t have to worry about changing or redesigning your store due to this.

Shopify Losses

Transaction Fees: Starting from $29 per month, Shopify gives you several subscription plans to choose one based on your needs. There are two problems here: First, the basic plan comes with very basic features, and second, $29 for an ecommerce platform isn’t very cheap. While Shopify does support multiple payment gateways, if you don’t use Shopify Payments, you‘ll have to pay an additional transactional fee on top of the payment processor fee (PayPal or Stripe). Let’s also not forget that you only get ten free themes and will have to pay a one-time fee for others.

Customization Limitations: Don’t get me wrong, Shopify is definitely customizable—it just has some hard-to-ignore limitations. If you want to unlock additional features, you’ll have to work on your coding because otherwise, it will remain locked. Besides this, you can customize your site without spending long hours doing detailed coding on their platform.

Steeper Learning Curve: Every ecommerce platform has a learning curve, but Shopify has a slightly steeper one. What further complicates things is the site’s jargon. For instance, instead of saying Categories, Shopify uses Collections, which might confuse some customers. The main problem with Shopify jargon is it unnecessarily complicates the user experience.

Product Filtering and Categorization: I think Shopify’s search mechanism needs to be more efficient, especially considering the millions of users on the platform. For example, when you go search for jeans, you’ll see a listing for jeans. However, you won’t be able to narrow down your search to view “light wash jeans.” There’s no option to narrow down your search, and even if you do, the filter will apply across all products. This may reflect negatively on your customers and stop them from giving your store another shot.

Lacks Email Hosting Facility: Shopify users don’t get an email hosting feature, which is why you can’t host a domain-based email address like info@myshopname.com. The alternative here is to set up email forwarding, which will forward all emails sent to your domain-based address (in this case info@myshopname.com) to your regular email account. You can also answer your customers’ queries through this feature.

Summary

One cannot simply choose between Shopify and WordPress for ecommerce as each has its own advantages.

While Shopify is one of the best ecommerce website builders that offers excellent support to help you with the technical stuff, WooCommerce is a better choice for those having WordPress-powered websites.

In the end, it all boils down to your specific needs and requirements. 

I’ve done my best to include the advantages and disadvantages of each ecommerce platform in detail. I hope this guide gives you a clearer view of each platform’s high and low points and helps you make the right decision for you.

Shopify Vs. Wix

Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.

As an ecommerce seller, you’ll find yourself making a lot of choices.

Is the clothing niche more profitable than accessories? Which theme would be better: Wokiee or Porto? Is Shopify better than Wix, or is it the other way around?

Of all the questions, choosing the best ecommerce platform remains the most crucial. Although Shopify and Wix have overlapping features, Shopify edges forward in the race if you’re specifically looking for ecommerce functionality.

Still, it’s a close call between the two that boils down to your intent. Small businesses or brand-conscious entrepreneurs will love Wix with its easy-to-use, cheap features, and greater design flexibility.

But if you want a powerful online store, Shopify can do a lot more. So long as you’ve got a bigger budget and the technical knowledge to flatten the learning curve, Shopify is going to be the better long-term ecommerce solution.

Shopify or Wix: Which Is Better?

Shopify is a solid option for ecommerce applications with its fully responsive templates, AMP support on product pages, and dropshipping features. It also supports multi-currency selling functionality and offers useful integrations with other essential apps.

Overall, it’s a more professional choice for anyone who wants to build an online store. If this is exactly what you’re looking for, make sure you sign up for a free trial ASAP.

Wix main page for Shopify Vs Wix

Wix has a drag-and-drop interface and a wide range of bundled templates, making it a great choice for those who want to build a general-purpose website. It also comes loaded with page layout tools, data capture, and email marketing features.

Plus, it’s cheaper, and you don’t have to worry about paying transaction fees. Ready to check out Wix? Give it a try with a free trial.

A Review of the Best Ecommerce Platforms

Shopify and Wix are hardly your only two options for starting an online store, and you owe it to yourself to look around.

My team reviewed dozens of ecommerce platforms and narrowed them down to the eight best options that tick off all the right things on an ecommerce seller’s checklist. Wix and Shopify both made the list.

Head over to my best ecommerce platforms guide for an in-depth look at where every product stands, along with a buyer’s guide to help you navigate your options.

Shopify Wins 

Useful Ecommerce Features: As it’s specially designed to be for ecommerce, Shopify sites come with many useful ecommerce features to cover every little aspect of the sales process. It has multiple payment gateways, inventory management tools, third-party platform integrations, and shopping carts. The platform is also scalable, allowing you to grow with your expanding business needs.

Fluid Themes and Greater Flexibility: Shopify offers 60+ professionally-designed and customized themes, giving you the liberty to add individual product pages based on your needs. Moreover, this customization and flexibility extend to changing page elements too. You can move, add, remove, or resize page elements to make your shop more on-brand.

Tweaking themes is also possible—provided you know HTML and CSS. If you’re tired of how your site looks, you simply have to choose a new theme, and you’ll have a brand new store within minutes!

Shopify themes for Shopify Vs Wix

Custom Domain Name: Every Shopify user gets a custom domain name that allows them to brand their respective stores and online business more efficiently and effectively. You can handle your domain on the same site location as your domain store, which, in turn, allows you to make changes to either with ease while simultaneously managing your domain.

Shopify connect domain for Shopify Vs Wix

Excellent Built-In Analytics: Shopify goes the extra mile by offering you plenty of built-in analytics features like Google Analytics, customer behavior, stock levels, and conversion tracking to know exactly how your store is doing and which aspects need a bit of tweaking for better results.

You can also view online store sessions, total sales, top-selling products, returning customer rate, average order value, and behavior reports (phew!) on the platform to make better decisions.

Shopify analytics for Shopify Vs Wix

Shopify App Market: Nearly every ecommerce plugin and feature are developed for Shopify first due to its vast popularity. Whether it’s free or premium add-ons for marketing to content management, you get all kinds of unique features with this platform. Case in point: An augmented reality feature that allows you to use your smartphone to navigate the product and see every little detail.

What’s more, even other marketplaces like AliExpress and Oberlo offer compatible apps to make your store management easier.

Shopify app store search for Shopify Vs Wix

Faster Checkout Options: Shopify has prioritized customer preference when designing login and checkout options. You can make the registering of users before heading to checkout mandatory, optional, or prohibited. Plus, registration is also incredibly easy as users only have to fill out basic information. As a seller, you can add users manually or import the list via CSV and sort them through a tag system.

More Payment Options: Shopify gives you several options to sell items anywhere in the world thanks to its Amazon FBA or a 3PL order fulfillment support, along with multiple-currency support through a complex, non-supported HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and Liquid hack. This may not be ideal, but it’s definitely there. You also get direct access to 100+ different payment gateways, including PayPal, Stripe, and Shopify’s fully integrated payment system.

No Cap on Products and Inventory: Most web servers or external platforms restrict the number of products you can add to your store—but not Shopify. You can add unlimited products to your Shopify store. Even the lowest subscription package does not put any restriction on the number of products you can add to your inventory.

Shopify payment types for Shopify Vs Wix

Shopify Losses

Learning Curve: Shopify developers claim the platform is the best for creating and managing online stores, but they don’t claim to be the easiest, and rightfully so. Although Shopify uses templates that eliminate the need to edit HTML code and CSS styling, its websites are harder to edit than Wix. It’s because the focus is on the products and how you present the page. If you want to make additional changes, you’ll have to learn to edit the backend code.

Limited Free Themes: While we love how modern and responsive Shopify themes are, it’s the limited number can restrict your options. You have to pay a one-time fee for most themes, ranging between $140 to $180, as only ten themes are free.

Expensive: Shopify gives you a wide range of subscription plans starting at $29 per month. However, not only is it more expensive, but you also don’t get a free plan (only a 14-day free trial). The basic plan includes only the barest of features, so if you want access to advanced features like fraud analysis and reports, you have to pay a higher price.

Further, unless you use Shopify Payments—something that isn’t available everywhere—you have to pay a transaction fee on top of the payment processor fee.

Shopify pricing for Shopify Vs Wix

Lacks Email Hosting Facility: You don’t get an email hosting feature despite web hosting being included in all Shopify plans. So, you can’t host a domain-based email address like info@shopname.com. What you can do, however, is set up email forwarding. This will forward all emails sent to info@shopname.com automatically to your regular email account. You’ll have to set up other third-party email hosting connections to use the email forwarding function.

Wix Wins

Massive Template Collection: The basic Wix editor lets you pick from 500+ beautiful templates for your site and populate it with any content of your choice. There are several built-in dynamic templates—from homepages to blogs to landing pages—suitable for novices and experts. People on a tight budget will be happy to know the platform offers 60 completely free, modern, and stylish ecommerce templates.

Wix themes for Shopify Vs Wix

Intuitive Drag-and-Drop Interface: The drag-and-drop interface is the heart of Wix, making it incredibly user-friendly. Because of this, not only people with all levels of skills can use the platform, but it also gives you enough options to convert your side into a real powerhouse by extending its functionality. You can use the mobile editor to review and edit your site to optimize it for mobile devices.

Wix builder for Shopify Vs Wix

Free Plan: Wix is definitely the cheaper platform, with prices starting at $23 per month. There’s also an entirely free plan and a free domain name facility (for the first year) that further boosts its appeal. Plus, you don’t have to worry about paying any extra fees with the platform.

Wix pricing page for Shopify Vs Wix

Built-In Video Function: Wix seriously lets your products shine, which is one of its biggest USPs. It has a built-in product video function that helps improve customer experience by allowing them to see the product live. You’ll also appreciate the product zoom feature and the fact you can build a distinctive checkout page to make the checking out process as hassle-free as possible.

Secure and Reliable: This is a platform that takes a lot of care in making sure its infrastructure is resilient and never vulnerable to attacks or data breaches. Between 24/7 monitoring, multiple site data backups spread across Wix’s servers, the highest levels of online security and data compliance, and zero-downtime maintenance, your site on Wix will always be secure and available to visitors.

Efficient SEO Guidance: Wix helps you optimize your ecommerce site for SEO by highlighting areas that require your attention. It then does the hard work by letting you fill in keyboard tags and other metadata. You can also modify the URL of each page, so it best fits what Google needs to know.

Wix SEO tools for Shopify Vs Wix

Tons of Extra Features: Aside from the core functions, Wix is built with an entire ecosystem of useful tools and products to make website building easier. It offers your free HTTPS to ensure visitor interactions with your website remain secure, templates to create quotations for customers, and integrated payment options like PayPal and Stripe. There’s also a logo maker to make branding even easier!

Wix logo creation tool for Shopify Vs Wix

Online Store Integration: You can include an online store with your website at no additional cost with Wix. As the interface is easy to use, the integration process is very straightforward, and you don’t even require an external shopping solution.

Wix Losses

Harder to Redesign: The intuitive drag-and-drop interface of Wix makes designing your site simple, but it’s the redesigning where you have to pay the price. You don’t have the flexibility to make any major changes by just selecting a new theme. Instead, the redesigning process is extremely manual. If you want to make any drastic changes to your online store, you practically have to rebuild your entire website. Besides that, you don’t have access to HTML and CSS, which makes the overall process more time-consuming and tough.

Wix builder options for Shopify Vs Wix

Limited Integration With Third-Party Apps: When we talk about app integrations, it isn’t even a fair fight as Wix has far fewer ecommerce developers creating apps for its platform. For instance, you won’t find a Google Shopping Feed or Facebook Product Feed. This means you can’t run Google shopping ads or run dynamic product ads on Facebook from the platform. Native integration with email marketing applications is also absent, making it troubling for owners who rely on email marketing for revenue. The only way you can integrate a Wix store to an email marketing add-on is to use either Zapier or write the code yourself.

Forced Wix Branding: They say there’s no such thing as a free lunch, and Wix very well proves it. If you decide to choose and stay on Wix’s free plan, be prepared to carry Wix branding—right at the top of your site. It isn’t too obnoxious, but it isn’t exactly discreet. What makes it more annoying is it appears before your website header!

Wix forced branding for Shopify Vs Wix

Non-Transferrable Site: While some may justify Wix not wanting users to export websites created with their technology, it’s a con for those who want to migrate. And the fact that scalability isn’t Wix’s biggest forte, makes this an even bigger problem. If you want to recreate and transfer your website away from Wix, you have to pay some serious amount of cash. In short, if you sign up for Wix, they might just have you for life.

Comparing the Top Ecommerce Platforms

While Shopify and Wix are excellent ecommerce platforms, there are several other alternatives with their own advantages. Make sure you check our top picks for the best ecommerce platforms to find the right option based on your specific needs.

  1. Wix – Best for flexibility and customization
  2. Squarespace – Best ecommerce platform for creatives
  3. Bluehost – Best for hands-off WooCommerce store setup
  4. BigCommerce – Best for medium to large stores
  5. Shopify – Best all-in-one ecommerce platform
  6. WooCommerce – Best for WordPress websites
  7. OpenCart – Best for selling digital products 
  8. Ecwid – Best for integrating with your current platform

Summary

Shopify is the more obvious choice since we’re concerned with ecommerce functionalities in particular. But that doesn’t mean Wix has lost its charm.

Shopify is the best solution for sizable online stores that need all the bells and whistles of scaling and selling everywhere around the globe, while Wix is more appropriate for general-use cases and for owners who rely on content creation to acquire more traffic. It also offers more creative freedom as opposed to Shopify.

In the end, the choice is yours—just make sure you make the right one.

How to Become a Shopify Partner

As one of the largest e-commerce platforms on the internet, Shopify offers budding (and established) entrepreneurs a platform to sell their wares and increase their reach. In fact, Shopify dominates nearly 20 percent of the e-commerce market share. That’s not all. With millions of active buyers on the platform, there is plenty of opportunity for …

The post How to Become a Shopify Partner first appeared on Online Web Store Site.

How to Become a Shopify Partner

As one of the largest e-commerce platforms on the internet, Shopify offers budding (and established) entrepreneurs a platform to sell their wares and increase their reach.

In fact, Shopify dominates nearly 20 percent of the e-commerce market share.

That’s not all. With millions of active buyers on the platform, there is plenty of opportunity for brands to grow their revenue.

In addition to a massive audience, Shopify offers users a simple, streamlined experience that allows store set up in record time.

When you join the Shopify platform, you have immediate access to functionality that allows you to:

  • build a website
  • create a domain
  • multiple payment options
  • order receiving and processing

In short, Shopify equips sellers with the tools they need to get their store off the ground.

Shopify benefits don’t only apply to online vendors—through their unique partnership program, individuals can align with Shopify to grow their business and increase revenue through a variety of functions.

Is the Shopify Partner program right for you? Here’s what you need to know. 

What Is the Shopify Partner Program?

The Shopify Partner Program is a set of tools and resources Shopify users can leverage to grow their business. This is done through four main categories:

  • Marketing: For Shopify users in need of a more defined audience, streamlined campaigns, or optimized content, Shopify Marketers can offer their services to help Shopify users increase their reach and employ better marketing strategies.
  • Shopify Developers: Experts in Shopify store development, can build apps that help Shopify’s merchants in a variety of ways, including increased engagement and sales. 
shopify partner store testing
  • Shopify Designers: From graphics to branding, these design experts help stores with design needs, often working collaboratively with developers.
  • Affiliate Marketing on Shopify: Affiliate marketers can offer nearly any service on the platform, from influencer marketing to content creation.

Shopify Partners can also build and sell Shopify apps and themes to generate income. 

In addition to the above different kinds of Partners, there are also different levels of partnership, including: 

  • Shopify Partners: Consider this the entry-level role for Shopify Partners. At this level, you gain access to limitless test stores, allowing you to customize, learn and hone your craft. For each action (client referral, app designed, or graphic completed), you earn a monthly commission.
  • Shopify Plus Partners: This tier is exclusively for Shopify Partners who do excellent work. This level often includes agencies, enterprise consultants, and system integrators, as well as individuals.
  • Shopify Fulfillment Partners: Fulfillment partners make up the Shopify Fulfillment Network and can operate inside or outside of the bounds of the Shopify Partner Program. 

What Are the Advantages of Becoming a Shopify Partner?

Given that one in three Shopify sellers seek services from Shopify Partners, there’s a real opportunity for you to supplement your income when you join the program. In addition to adding some extra padding to your bank account, Partners can access free training resources and perks, including:

  • FAQs 
  • how-to articles
  • live chat
  • the Shopify Academy

The partnership also comes with access to an unlimited number of stores, so you can experiment to your heart’s content.

As a Shopify Partner, you gain exclusive access to offers on tools that can help you run and grow your business. Once you have your dashboard set up (more on that later), select the “Partner Perks” section and select the “Claim perk” button. 

Even better, when you sign up to become a Shopify Partner, you create opportunities to scale your business. Regardless of whether you’re a well-established agency or an individual setting out to grow your skills and client base, enrolling in the Shopify Partner program is a great growth opportunity. 

Sound good?

Let’s break down how you actually become a Shopify Partner.

5 Steps to Become a Shopify Partner

The Shopify partnership comes with plenty of perks we’ve already covered, but there’s one overarching benefit we haven’t covered: Becoming a Shopify Partner is free. 

Now that you have a better understanding of the value associated with a Shopify Partnership, follow these five steps to start growing your business today. 

1. Learn More About Shopify Partners

This blog explores the surface-level of a Shopify Partnership, however, you’ll want to spend more time on the Shopify partner page to read the blog and learn more about partner perks and features. 

2. Join the Shopify Partner Program

This is the easiest step yet! Simply head to the sign-up page and enter your name and email address and wait for your verification.

3. Verify Your Email Address

After creating an account, you’ll receive an email asking you to follow a link to verify your email address. Be sure to do this within 24 hours, as the window for response closes after that timeframe.

After you select the blue button to confirm your account, you’ll land on the Shopify accounts page. From there, choose “Shopify Partners” and then “Create new partner account.”

4. Enter Your Information

Now that you’ve successfully set up an account, you must complete a form that asks for the specifics of your business. Complete all the necessary fields. 

After this step, scroll down to the “Business goals” section and choose the function that best suits your offering. Here you can select:

  • building apps
  • building new Shopify stores for clients
  • providing Services to existing Shopify merchants
  • referring merchants as an affiliate
  • selling products as a Shopify merchant
  • other

After you’ve selected the right category, scroll down the page until you reach the section about platform usage. Here, you’ll identify which platforms you’re currently using, allowing Shopify to equip you with custom tools. 

Categories include:

  • BigCommerce
  • Lightspeed
  • Magento
  • PrestaShop
  • Square
  • Squarespace
  • Wix
  • WooCommerce
  • WordPress
  • None
  • Other

After selecting the relevant category, read the Partner Program Agreement at the bottom of the page and check the corresponding box. 

5. Meet Your Shopify Dashboard

Your dashboard is the hub of your Shopify business. To get started, select the Shopify Partner programs you’d like to apply to from the “Get started” section.

shopify partner dashboard

A short form will ask you to explain your interest in each program.

Even if you’re not accepted into a program immediately, you can still use your dashboard to grow and hone your skills. With endless courses available from the Shopify Partner Academy, you can earn certifications in Business Fundamentals, Theme Development, App Development, and Product Fundamentals. 

You can take the accompanying test as many times as you like, all while using the resources provided through the Shopify Partner Academy to increase your knowledge base. 

After receiving your acceptance to one of the Shopify Programs, you can start earning some cash. Payments occur on a bi-monthly schedule via PayPal.

The Partner Dashboard is also your source for all questions. From the portal, you can contact Shopify support whenever, wherever to get your questions answered.

Measuring the Success of Your Shopify Partnership

You’ve set up your dashboard, been accepted into a few programs, have been working for a few months, and now you want to know how successful your Shopify partnership actually is.

While there are countless metrics you can use to track the success of your endeavors, here are six key figures to assess the strength and success of your partnership.

Lead Conversion Rate

This metric is exactly what it sounds like: a measurement of how many leads converted into customers in a specific period of time, generally within 30-day increments.

Significant due to its ability to highlight how successful your campaigns are at turning attraction into actual leads, your lead conversion rate is a must-track metric. 

How do you calculate lead conversion rate? The formula is pretty simple, as long as you have the numbers.

Lead Conversion Rate = (Number of new customers in the last x days ÷ number of leads in the last x days) x 100

Lead Velocity Rate (LVR)

This figure is representative of real-time sales performance. Given its predictive nature, the metric is perfect for forecasting revenue growth.

How do you calculate lead velocity rate?

Lead velocity rate = (Number of qualified leads this month – number of qualified leads last month) ÷ number of qualified leads last month x 100

Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) 

This metric represents revenue, rather than what is actually actively collected. A good indicator of success, MRR lets you know if your leads are converting to actual customers within a finite time span. 

How do you calculate MRR?

MRR = Number of customers x average billed amount

Churn Rate 

This metric refers to the number of customers who stop using your service during a specific time frame. Churn rate is a valuable metric to determine if your marketing strategies and onboarding process is effective. 

How do you calculate churn rate? There are two types of churn rate: 

User churn = (Cancelled users in the last 30 days ÷ active users 30 days ago) x 100

Revenue churn = (MRR lost to downgrades & cancellations in the last 30 days ÷ MRR 30 days ago) x 100

Average Revenue Per User (ARPU)

Use this metric to learn how much revenue you’re creating from each individual user. This statistic is valuable to assess marketing successes and failures and forecast revenue goals.

How do you calculate ARPU?

ARPU = MRR ÷ active users

Lifetime Value (LTV) 

This metric represents the amount a user will spend on your service throughout the course of your relationship. This figure helps you assess whether it is more valuable to maintain existing customers or pursue new ones. 

How do you calculate LTV?

LTV = Average monthly recurring revenue per customer ÷ user churn rate

I recommend monitoring these figures on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis for a comprehensive view of your success. These metrics let you identify patterns and see if improvements succeed so you can adjust your approach as needed. 

Conclusion

Shopify’s continuous growth shows no signs of stopping.

For any digital marketers, developers, or graphic designers, becoming a Shopify Partner offers an opportunity to broaden your portfolio, sharpen your skills, and earn some extra cash.

If you’re looking to increase your client base and your revenue, Shopify might be the place for you.

If you’re considering wading into the world of Shopify partnership, be sure to actively monitor the right metrics and ignore vanity metrics that have little impact on overall success. 

What part of the Shopify Partner program is most useful to you?

What Should You Look For When Choosing a Shopify Theme

A recent study found that 70 percent of Americans are shopping online more than ever. E-commerce is booming, and there’s never been a better time to start an online store. One of the best platforms to launch your e-commerce store is Shopify. Why do so many people love Shopify? In part due to its: affordability …

The post What Should You Look For When Choosing a Shopify Theme first appeared on Online Web Store Site.

What Should You Look For When Choosing a Shopify Theme

A recent study found that 70 percent of Americans are shopping online more than ever.

E-commerce is booming, and there’s never been a better time to start an online store. One of the best platforms to launch your e-commerce store is Shopify.

Why do so many people love Shopify? In part due to its:

  • affordability
  • ease of use
  • scalability
  • security

One stand-out reason many e-commerce store owners love Shopify is the flexibility it offers through Shopify themes. With thousands of paid and free themes available, you can create a unique e-commerce store that offers your customers a positive user experience (UX).

That could be why over a million businesses use Shopify to build their e-commerce stores.

What Are Shopify Themes?

Shopify themes are a template that determines the way your website looks and feels to customers who visit your store. Different themes offer different styles and layouts. Also, each theme offers a different UX, depending on how it is designed.

Design plays a massive role in the way your store attracts, engages, and converts. That’s why the Shopify theme you choose is critical to your business’ success.

A Shopify theme is a template of what you want your Shopify store to look and feel like.

In e-commerce, your theme of choice must reflect your industry and niche. For example, if you’re in the health and wellness niche, you’ll want a theme that looks professional and feels reassuring.

If, on the other hand, you’re into electronics, you’ll want a theme that’s sleek and energetic.

Will Changing Themes Break Your Store?

One fear that most store owners have when changing themes is that it will break their Shopify store.

That’s not true.

Changing your Shopify theme (or editing your current one) doesn’t affect your content or other parts of your account.

So feel free to play around with your theme settings or even getting a new Shopify theme that you fancy. Your e-commerce store won’t break, and you’ll rarely have any downtime if you do it right.

Why Your Shopify Theme Matters

Now that you know what a Shopify theme is, let’s briefly look at why your theme choice matters so much.

Helps Project Your Brand Personality

One of your most important assets as a business is your brand.

And no—branding doesn’t just mean logo.

An essential aspect of branding is your brand personality. Brand personality is a set of human characteristics that can be attributed to a brand. For example,

  • sophistication
  • excitement
  • fun-loving
  • sincerity
  • ruggedness

Your theme plays a critical role in helping you project these characteristics. As a result, your Shopify store will attract customers who share and love your personality.

Determines Your Website’s UX

Your theme is a crucial aspect of your store’s design because it determines your website’s UX. That’s because your theme determines essential facets of your e-commerce store like navigation, layout, color schemes and aesthetics, and more.

Your theme determines the experience your customers will have as they navigate your store, consume your content, and search for products. If the experience is positive, they’re likely to keep coming back. A negative experience, on the other hand, leads to high bounce rates.

7 Tips to Pick the Perfect Shopify Theme for Your Store

Ready to shop around for the perfect Shopify theme for your store?

Here are a few tips to help you find the perfect one.

1. Decide on Your Budget

Shopify stores come at varying price points. That’s why your first step to choosing your Shopify theme is to determine how much you’re willing to spend on a theme.

Examples of factors that impact the theme’s price include:

  • The developer: More experienced and well-known developers tend to charge more for their themes.
  • Flexibility: The level of customization of your theme impacts its price. For example, if it has drag-and-drop functionality, you can expect to pay a bit more.
  • Level of functionality. Some themes are limited in functionality, while others allow you to turn your e-commerce store into anything you want. Those with extra bells and whistles, like forms or SEO features, tend to cost more.

Like everything else in life, you get what you pay for when it comes to Shopify themes. Make sure to read the fine print and understand what features and functionality a theme has before buying.

2. Prioritize Themes on the Shopify Theme Store

Shopify theme developers are a dime a dozen. You can get a theme for your Shopify store from many theme marketplaces.

However, I highly recommend choosing from the themes on Shopify’s theme store.

One of the main reasons is that Shopify carefully screens all themes submitted, so you can be sure to get a quality, secure theme.

Another reason to prioritize themes on Shopify’s theme store is that you’ll be assured of regular updates and world-class support.

3. List the Main Features and Functions You Want

The key to finding the perfect Shopify theme for your store is to consider the main features and functionality you want for your store.

Do you want a slide-out cart drawer?

Is a video player a priority?

Do you need forms, landing pages, or a blog?

Finding a theme with most of the features you’re looking for will help you cut down on development costs. When you find a theme with one of the most important features you’re looking for but not the others, move on. The key is finding one that has most of the themes you want. You can always have a developer add the missing feature(s).

To find features included in a theme, check out the theme preview page. However, because not every feature may be listed there, you may want to play around with the theme demo.

You can also use the live store examples to help you get a feel of all the features of a theme you’re considering.

4. Consider Your Niche

Most themes are developed for specific industry types. When picking a Shopify theme, you must make sure it was designed for your niche. For example, an e-commerce store that sells various electronics and accessories can’t easily use a theme designed for fine art pieces.

That’s because the electronic store needs a theme that can handle many categories and advanced search capabilities. The art store, on the other hand, doesn’t need as much advanced functionality.

As you hunt for a Shopify theme, make sure to filter your top picks by niche. Fortunately, the Shopify theme store makes it easy to search for themes by niche and number of products.

You can browse Shopify themes by industry and number of products in your inventory.

5. Design and Aesthetics

Global e-retail sales is a whopping $4.2 trillion industry.

To get a piece of the global e-commerce action, you must attract and retain customers to your e-commerce store. That’s the key to growing a successful Shopify e-commerce store.

Attracting customers can be achieved through search engine optimization (SEO) best practices, like keyword research.

But retaining customers on your site is all about your design and aesthetics. The right Shopify theme makes design simple by providing:

  • an attractive storefront
  • color palettes that match your brand
  • clean and easy-to-understand user interface (UI)

A well-designed Shopify store will not only look amazing, but it will also encourage more conversions.

6. Favor Lightweight Mobile-Friendly Shopify Themes

Website speed is crucial to online success, as it can impact search rankings, conversions, and bounce rate. To offer visitors the fast page speed they want, you need a fast, lightweight theme.

Lightweight themes focus more on performance and tend to avoid busy elements like animations, fancy scrollers, and other unnecessary features that increase the size of the file.

Another advantage of lightweight themes is they’re designed to be simple. Their main goal is to help customers navigate around your store and perform the action they came to do.

To deliver a fast, easy-to-use site, you’ll want to choose a mobile-friendly theme.

7. Optimized Checkout

Studies show that the average e-commerce store losses about 75 percent of its sales to cart abandonment. The same studies show that one of the leading reasons for cart abandonment is a complicated checkout process.

That’s why you must make sure the Shopify theme you choose offers an optimized checkout experience.

The best Shopify themes offer a fast and intuitive checkout process, well-designed add-to-cart buttons, and an easy way to check the total cost.

Making the checkout process easy should be a priority, so ensure the theme you choose makes this as easy as possible.

3 Examples of Great Shopify Themes

Now you know how to pick a suitable Shopify theme for your store. Before you run off to find yours, let’s look at a few great Shopify themes and discuss what makes them stand out from the rest. You might just find your perfect match right here!

Brooklyn

Brooklyn is one of the top free Shopify themes out there.

Brooklyn is a free Shopify theme designed for the apparel and accessories niche.

The theme is designed for the apparel and accessories niche. Because of that, it focuses on a brand image by enabling you to show off your inventory with stunning visuals. Some notable features include:

  • A Slide Out Cart: Helps customers easily add items to their cart without leaving the current page.
  • Home Page Slideshow: Use the top of your homepage to showcase multiple products or brand images.
  • Video integration: Grab attention, tell your story, and showcase your best products in action by featuring a YouTube or Vimeo video on your page.

If you’re bootstrapping your way to e-commerce success in the apparel niche, Brooklyn is a the Shopify theme to help you get there. (Did I mention it was free?)

Icon

Looking for a lightweight and easy-to-use Shopify theme that will help you set up a stunning store quickly?

The $180 Icon Shopify theme could be what you’re looking for.

Icon is a great example of a paid Shopify theme you must consider.

One of Icon’s greatest strengths is that it’s built to power omnichannel marketing campaigns. That’s thanks to seamless social media integration and a blog to power your content marketing. Other features include:

  • Sticky Navigation: Keeps your menus fixed to the top of your page as customers scroll down.
  • Product Quick View: Customers can view product details in a popup, so they don’t have to leave the current page
  • Multi-column menu: Helps you feature product images in a large, multi-column drop-down menu.

As the name suggests, Icon is one Shopify theme that will help you build an iconic e-commerce store and generate a lot of revenue.

Expression

Have a large inventory of products?

Then you need a Shopify theme that can help you display them all beautifully. Your theme should also make it easy for your customers to find what they’re looking for.

Expression is one of the best Shopify themes that can help you do that and more.

Shopify theme Expression gives you a lot of features and functionality.

That’s because some of the theme’s prominent features include drop-down menu bars, advanced search functionality, and a dynamic slideshow.

Other notable features you can expect are:

  • Versatile Sidebar Area: You can use your sidebar to display blog posts, images, advertisements, and more.
  • Product Image Rollover: Hovering over products reveals different product images, giving customers a clearer picture before they buy.
  • Grid-Style Layout: This allows you to feature multiple products or promotions in a grid-style layout throughout your store.

Expression will set you back $180, but it’s worth the investment as it helps you create an e-commerce store with attention-grabbing visuals. It’s also designed to make your promotions stand out, thereby encouraging more conversions.

Conclusion

The e-commerce space is fast growing as more entrepreneurs are launching e-commerce stores. One of the most trusted platforms to launch a store is Shopify. As you design your store, pay careful attention to the Shopify theme you use.

Remember, your theme affects your store’s:

  • user experience
  • aesthetics
  • performance

All three are factors that have a huge impact on your conversion rates.

Which Shopify themes have you had experience with? What do you like about it?