Shopify is considered the world’s best eCommerce platform. If you aren’t sure where to start selling online or eCommerce, how to sell on Shopify for beginners is fairly simple. From creating the basics of an online store to setting up Shopify fulfillment services, shipping, and data analytics, it’s all there for you, ready to explore.
Here is how to get started selling on Shopify.
1. Start with a Business Plan
Before you set up a Shopify account, it’s best to write up a business plan for your online store first. Have a name. Know who your target audience is and what their pain points are. Know what types of products you want to sell. Identify how you want to brand your website in colour, tone, and messaging.
2. Buy Your Domain Name
To sell on Shopify, you must buy and register your website name. This is your domain. Shopify offers a free URL. However, these look amateur and are filed under the shopify.com domain. If you want to appear as a legitimate, real eCommerce store, use your domain name.
Your domain name should be the same as your brand’s and appear by the same name across social media, search engines, and other online platforms.
3. Customize Your Shopify Store Template
When you register with Shopify, you are offered a selection of themes. Some are free, and others are available for purchase. Pick your theme. Edit it from there. Set its style and features. Set up its layout. Customize the content, layout, and typography, ensuring it aligns with your brand and its target customer.
4. Upload Your Product Inventory
After your Shopify template is uploaded and customized with the features you want, the next task on the to-do list is to upload your products. This includes uploading professional photos and product descriptions and ensuring the information under products is detailed, concise, and accurate.
5. Consider Shopify Fulfillment Services
Shopify fulfillment services may be something to look at if you have no interest in handling your own inventory storage and shipping. Through Shopify fulfillment, they will hold your inventory and ship it for you as the orders arrive.
It is a popular component of many Shopify businesses as it saves you the cost of inventory, reduces the effort you have to arrange the basics of shipping, and allows an eCommerce store owner to focus on running their business instead of dealing with the day-to-day.
6. Add Additional Pages to Your Shopify Site
You will likely want to add more pages to your site than simple product pages. You may want an About Us page as an example. You may want to start a blog and require a general blog page to classify your future posts. Like every eCommerce Shopify website, you will also want to design an attractive navigation menu to ensure products are discoverable.
7. Set Up Payment Methods
Define what payment methods you accept. Shopify checkout is secure and backed by Shopify servers. When a customer adds a product to their cart, you can check it against inventory. From there, when a customer comes to complete the sale, it’s important to have the security and setup to accept from them a range of payment methods.
8. Decide on Shipping Type and Rates
After a sale closes, the responsibility shifts to shipping. Decide how you will get your order to the customer. You can opt for dropshipping, retailer shipping, local delivery, or local pickup. If you decide to handle the shipping yourself, you will also have to evaluate what sort of packaging you want and the effect that has on shipping costs, what shipping rates are, and more.
9. Select Your Shopify Plan and Go Live
Before launching your website, you need to select a Shopify plan. Your plan will decide what services you receive from Shopify and what your payments to them will consist of. Be sure to carefully compare plans and select the most advantageous to your online store today.
Remember, you can always upgrade in the future. After that’s all wrapped up, you can officially launch your website and open it to the public.
10. Connect Your Shopify Site To Your Social Media
When it comes time to sell on Shopify for beginners, connecting your store to your social media accounts is key. Embed your social media accounts to your Shopify store, such as in the footer. Look into how to sell directly on social media and launch marketing campaigns targeting niche audiences in relevant demographics.
11. Monitor Your Online Selling with Analytics
Shopify provides a lot of analytics, as do services like Google Analytics, that will tell you how successful your website is. You will find all sorts of information about your customers, such as who they are, what products interest them, who is converting and who isn’t, where customers are coming from, and more.
The key to selling on Shopify and moving from a beginner to an expert is continually refining your online store, making it better, better, more efficient, and more effective for your target user.