How to Sell Online with Shopify

by Chirpy Domains 5 min read

Ever thought of setting up an online store? Well, the internet is your oyster, and options abound. But there's a reason any e-commerce expert worth their salt would advise you to look no further than Shopify.

No need to over-complicate the obvious – Shopify stands tall as your ultimate e-commerce solution. It's the best of what the internet has to offer if all you're looking for is a platform to start selling your products or services online. The platform is flexible and can accommodate businesses of all sizes; catering to a broad range of industries. It's also the easiest e-commerce builder – one that even non-developers can use to create their own online stores.

In brief, the platform tries to make the whole process of setting up your e-commerce store both straightforward and painless.

That answers it – if you've been wondering about the buzz surrounding Shopify. It's simply a dream-come-true for online vendors that have been looking to set up their own online store or venture into dropshipping.

What is Shopify?

Before we take the plunge into the technical side of Shopify, like how to set up and run a Shopify store, let's take a breather and focus on what Shopify really is. You must develop a realistic expectation of the platform. Understand that it's not magic; and as with any other platform out there, understand that it also has its own share of strengths and weaknesses.

Shopify is a cloud-hosted ecommerce store platform that small business owners and some of the giant brands you know use to create their online storefronts. It's incredibly adaptable, and one of the world's most popular ecommerce platforms.

With Shopify, it's possible to whip up an online store within minutes or use it to create a multifaceted, highly-customised, multinational enterprise ecommerce platform.

Why choose Shopify?

Shopify is pretty much all-inclusive, meaning that it stacks pretty much everything you'll need to create a fully functional online store.

Ease of use

Shopify is pretty simple and straightforward to use – thanks to its clean, ultra-modern interface which is designed to make it easy for you to both set up and manage a broad range of Shopify labels or "sales channels." Some of these labels include:

  • An online store: this is your main site or the site you'll be creating using Shopify.
    • Facebook: This feature allows you to add a tab on Facebook where your user can browse and shop for your products and services.
  • Messenger: This feature allows you to sell directly to your Facebook users via messenger.
  • Buy Button: With this feature, you can embed the buy button on your website or blog.

You don't need any coding experience

Shopify allows you to set up a fully functional e-commerce website without laying down a single line of code.

There are hundreds of professionally-designed themes – both free and paid – that you can easily use to set up a professionally designed storefront. In terms of flexibility and ease of use, it's an intuitive platform that you can easily figure out by just looking at some of the labeled features on the dashboard.

It's flexible and scalable

With Shopify, you don't have to worry about adjusting to a different platform once your business grows. Neither do you have to shy away from using the platform because your business is small.

Whether you're planning to sell a single product or have hundreds of products to sell through the platform, Shopify will accommodate you to the best standards possible. They also have varied plans to accommodate different budgets or business sizes.

Tons of apps to customise your storefront

Whether it's including a product review section to your storefront or creating a customer loyalty program as a strategy for attracting returning clients, Shopify has it all figured out.

Shipping is a cinch

Shopify has a wide range of shipping options that you can easily browse through and choose one for your products.

You even have the option of setting up a flat rate for shipping, or coming up with base shipping costs based on the individual weight of the products you're selling.

Can I use my AU domain with Shopify?

Yes, you can register a domain with us and point it to your Shopify site. All you need to do is update your DNS records.

Can I upload a spreadsheet of products to Shopify?

Yes, Shopify has a simple CSV template that you can use to make the spreadsheet entries of your products. This template will guide you on how to enter your product data into a spreadsheet. Once you've followed the template and filled your CSV, you can head back to your Shopify dashboard and upload all your products.

What payment system does Shopify support?

Shopify has its own payment system called Shopify Payments. This payment system is powered by Stripe and can be tracked in real-time. But if you have to, Shopify allows you to integrate your site with more than 70 of other payment gateways options including PayPal, 2checkOut, Authorise-Net, and Amazon Payments, to name a few.

Is Shopify secure?

Yes, the platform is Certified Level-1 PCI-DSS compliant, which extends to every single one of the stores it powers. Also, every single one of their plans comes with an SSL certificate, which saves you the trouble of having to buy it from a third party and configuring it yourself.

Time to get started?

If you haven't already, head now to shopify.com and get started building your very own store. (If you use that link, we'll earn a commission that costs you nothing and helps keep our domain prices down for everyone.)