Everything you Need to Know about Shopify for your E-Commerce Business

Everything you Need to Know about Shopify for your E-Commerce Business

If you work in the trade, retail or wholesale industry, you have certainly thought about opening an online store a number of times. The next step is often to turn to a specialized agency, such as EWM, a specialist web design agency in Geneva.

If you aren’t ready yet to hire the assistance of a web design agency, there are a number of ways to approach the process yourself in order to meet sales needs without having to pay upfront investments.

Then, once you understand and “experience” the potential of that sales channel, you can move on to a more structured project.

Shopify is a popular e-commerce platform that enables you to build a modern online store – without the need for in-depth technical skills.

This is a simple and intuitive platform that is sufficient enough to obtain a highly professional and graphically satisfying result for your visitors.

Shopify and your "do it yourself" E-commerce Website: Prices:

The first 14 days are free, then you will be offered to choose a monthly plan from three different options.

These range from a base rate of $29 per month with a 2% commission on sales and platform access for 2 employees, to the advanced plan of $299 per month and access for 15 employees. In the second option, the percentage of commission on sales is reduced to 0.5%.

So let's see that in the monthly cost of Shopify, there is always a fixed royalty which is combined with a percentage on transactions, i.e. on sales, net of shipping costs and taxes.

If you are thinking about the perfect solution for your do it yourself e-commerce website, we suggest that you focus on the first option, because an upgrade from one software package to another can be done at any time and in just a few clicks.

It is certain that once you have exceeded a certain level of sales, say from around €5,000 per month of turnover to increase, it will be mathematically cheaper to resort to the second option since the lower percentage of sales commissions will cover exactly the higher cost of the monthly royalty, making sales after €5000 of turnover more profitable by 1%.

If your DIY e-commerce site were to charge € 10,000 per month, the savings between the first and second package would be € 100.00.

In addition to these three basic solutions, there are two other options, but very different in their characteristics and aimed at an audience with special needs.

SHOPIFY PLUS

This is aimed at big realities, with high turnover, who want to open an online store on the Cloud platform, realizing the concept of "DIY" despite the scale of the project.

SHOPIFY LITE

Intended for those who want to promote their products exclusively on social networks, which helps to streamline the management of the catalogue and activity.

Shopify and your DIY Online Store - Features:

Let’s start by analyzing the basic features, common to all plans, and focus mainly on those related to marketing and sales growth.

The ability to use discount coupons and gift certificates, for example, is a core feature present in all three solutions and is essential for engaging and retaining your audience.

Social campaigns with messages similar to “10% off your first order! What are you waiting for? Click here” or “Hey, we've been missing you lately ... it's been a while since you bought from us! 10% discount on your Christmas gifts! We’re waiting for you!”

How to Create Effective Discount Codes and Coupons for Your E-Commerce Marketing:

·         Offer a discount coupon on the first purchase, such as 10% off (or more!).

·         Offer a coupon when subscribing to your newsletters (usually in these cases, a couple is offered with free delivery too, as it requires a little effort from the user

·         Discount coupon on an abandoned cart (Applicable only in the $79/month plan with Shopify)

·         Anniversary Check (Empathy with customers is always an important aspect, even in digital marketing. When registering customers declaring their date of birth, planning for web marketing related to this data is absolutely possible, and is often also very effective depending on the industry).

·         Discount coupons during holidays and birthdays (Black Friday, Christmas, etc.)

·         Discount coupon linked to company birthdays ("1 year anniversary from the opening of our online store; free delivery for all orders, until the end of the month!)

Coming back to the characteristics of the Shopify service, we find a very useful function - which then becomes indispensable after the very first phase of launching your online DIY store – is the management of abandoned carts.

All e-commerce sites, regardless of the type of merchandise handled, have a percentage of abandoned carts and unfinished purchases.

This is absolutely normal from a statistical point of view; very often users use the buying process on different sites when comparing prices/services, and reach the last step of the shopping process.

They also use this process to look for surprises hidden in the last steps (for example, high shipping costs or slow delivery times that are not acceptable for their needs).

Sometimes these users will complete the purchase; other times they will abandon the cart to complete the order on your competitor’s e-commerce site. Other times they will decide not to purchase the product at that time, postponing the choice for a few hours or days.

In this last case only, it becomes essential to be able to intercept and push the purchase will of the user/potential customer.

To do this, you can contact him or her by e-mail a few hours after leaving the cart, by offering a reminder to complete the pending purchase and, better yet, offering a small discount or freebie in case the individual decides to follow through with your proposal.

Beware, however, if you exaggerate your generosity in the Reminder email about the abandoned cart, as users may become accustomed to this and do it on purpose in anticipation of a promotional code.

Which service to choose?

In conclusion, we suggest buying the intermediate package, unless you are embarking on this journey purely as a hobby.

If you already have a physical store or network or direct-contact distribution system, you already know how to market and sell your products. You also know that this is in line with the prices and specifications of your competitors.

As such, you will find in the Shopify package starting at $79 per month all the necessary functions for your DIY e-commerce website, with the certainty of having professional and high-quality tools.

It might not seem so intuitive at first, but one of the services provided by any web agency, even by us at EWM. Geneva, is a high level of support on these kinds of platforms. If you already use Shopify and came here because you want to improve your bottom line, contact EWM today!

EWM, a professional web design agency in Geneva, offers proven expertise on social networks.

Contact EWM today to discuss your unique needs.