Looking to migrate Shopify to WooCommerce? While Shopify can be an effective way to run an eCommerce store, you may feel the need to move to a self-hosted option for more control once your business begins to grow.
If you want to properly migrate Shopify to WooCommerce, though, there are a lot of different issues to consider.
For starters, you have a lot of information you need to move, such as your products, customers, and orders. Next, there are design and branding elements to think about.
Nevertheless, with the right tools and taking it one step at a time, your new site will be up and running in no time.
In this post, we’ll discuss some of these considerations and more. Then, we’ll show you step-by-step how to export Shopify to WooCommerce.
What you need to consider when you migrate Shopify to WooCommerce
Shopify is easy to set up and can be great for newcomers to eCommerce. However, it can get expensive over the longer term. In contrast, WooCommerce is flexible, versatile, and scalable, as well as a generally cheaper option out of the box (and potentially over the long term.) As a result, many choose to make the jump to WooCommerce on a self-hosted WordPress website.
However, before you take the plunge from Shopify to WooCommerce, it’s important to know what you’re getting yourself into. For instance, the increased customizability that comes with WooCommerce can be a bit of learning curve for some. Furthermore, you’ll need to consider the following elements:
- Migrating all of your products, customers, and orders
- Recreating your website pages
- Replicating the design elements of your Shopify store
- Maintaining your store’s branding
While each of these elements are important in their own right, all of the tools you need are readily available – and in many cases, implementing them may be easier to achieve than you think. All that’s left is to get started!
How to migrate Shopify to WooCommerce in 4 steps
First, before you can migrate your Shopify content, you’ll need to have your basic WooCommerce store ready to go. The good news is that we’ve written another article on setting up your WooCommerce store, which you should check out before you begin.
We’ve also collected the best WooCommerce hosting options to help you find the right spot to host your store.
With this in place, it’s time to migrate!
Step 1: Choose a migration tool
There are many different migration tools you can use for transferring your important shop content from Shopify to WooCommerce. Some of them include WP All Import, litextension, and Cart2Cart. However, of these three, only Cart2Cart is specifically designed for our needs, which is why we’ll be using it today:
Cart2Cart is an effective solution because it enables you to easily migrate your products, customers, orders, and other related Shopify information to WooCommerce. Plus, you can transfer a small eCommerce site for free.
To get started, you’ll need to sign up for an account on the Cart2Cart website. Input your email, password, and name into the required fields and click Sign Up.
After you have completed your account setup, you’ll be taken to the migration page. Next up is the transfer process itself.
Step 2: Migrate your products from Shopify to WooCommerce
Next, you need to add some information for your source and target carts. Your source will be your Shopify information, so first select Shopify from the drop-down menu. Then, copy and paste your old shop’s URL:
Next, you need an API Password. To get this, navigate to your Shopify admin screen and select Apps from the left-hand menu:
From there, you’ll see a Manage private apps link near the bottom of the page. Click on this link, then click the Create a new private app button:
Next, you’ll need to type in a name for the app, which can be anything you choose. For example, “Cart2Cart.”
Under the Admin API section, type in a password and click Save. Your new app will be generated and you now have an API password, which you can copy and paste into your Cart2Cart setup. As far as the Target Cart Setup is concerned, select WooCommerce from Target Cart the drop-down menu and input the URL for your new store.
Next, you need to connect your sites using the Connection Bridge. Click the Download Bridge button, which will download the required files to your computer (the folder should be called connection_bridge.) Within, there is another folder entitled bridge2cart, which must be copied into your site’s root directory.
To do this, you’ll need a File Transfer Protocol (FTP) client. We recommend FileZilla, as it is a simple and effective open-source tool. If your FTP skills need a tune-up, check out the piece we wrote explaining all about it.
From there, you’ll want to click the button on the Target Cart Setup screen to test your connection, then click Choose Entities. For the migration, you want to focus on importing key data, including your products, all their details and image files, customer orders, and blog posts.
Anything beyond that, you can recreate and improve using WordPress. For convenience’s sake, go ahead and tick the Select All option:
When you’re done, scroll down and click the green button. After a pause, this will complete the migration process.
Step 3: Create the pages you need for your WooCommerce store
The next step is to create your Shopify pages on your new WooCommerce store. First though, examine how your store has migrated. Most of your pages (including your products and shopping cart) should be present and may not need to be created again.
For those pages that Cart2Cart couldn’t migrate, you’ll have some work to do. Fortunately, WordPress gives you a lot more control over your store’s design. As such, think about this as an opportunity to fine-tune your store and provide a better overall experience.
Since you’re using WooCommerce, the most direct route to build the pages you need is through the Block Editor. It includes several WooCommerce-specific blocks that let you add over 15 different eCommerce elements to your pages:
These blocks, combined with the overall functionality of the Block Editor, help you recreate your Shopify pages without requiring any special technical knowledge. However, for more complex customization, you may need to check out a page builder plugin, such as Elementor.
This will provide you with a similar experience to the Block Editor, yet with more depth. For starters, there are more WooCommerce modules to build your pages with:
In addition, each module offers more customization options in general than WooCommerce does by default, enabling you to build more stylish product pages:
Once you settle on an approach, take some time to re-create and improve upon your former Shopify pages. Depending on how complex your store was, this may take a while. The good news is you don’t need to re-build your main shop page because this is set up by default when installing WooCommerce.
The Shop page displays the latest products from your catalog, although you will likely want to tweak the style and product selection through either the Block Editor or Elementor.
At this point, you’re almost done! All that’s left is to tweak your new site’s design to match your old one, which is where selecting a theme comes into play.
Step 4: Design your WooCommerce store to match your Shopify store
Finally, we come to design. In WordPress, themes are the foundation of almost every website. Start by returning to your WordPress admin and selecting Appearance > Themes:
Here, you can search for a theme or browse various collections. When you click on one, it will describe its features and customization options. For instance, some themes come equipped with page builders or integrate with popular ones such as Elementor.
There are a lot of themes available, which may make it possible to find one with the same appearance and feel as your Shopify site. For a flexible choice at a reasonable price, check out our own ShopIsle theme:
However, there are many themes available offering different features, looks, and functionality. We’ve taken a look at how to choose the best WooCommerce theme for you in a previous article, although to get up and running quickly you may want to simply find a theme that can match your old Shopify design.
Some next steps to consider
Now that you’re officially using WooCommerce and WordPress, you’ll likely be looking for some further guidance on how to make the most of your site. We’re here to help!
First, you’ll want to consider installing these must-have WooCommerce plugins, many of which can replace key functionality that you might have relied on Shopify apps for.
We also have some other WooCommerce/eCommerce guides that might help you out:
At this point, you’re ready to rock and roll – welcome to the world of WordPress and WooCommerce!
Conclusion
Shopify can be a great eCommerce platform, but as your store grows it can quickly become expensive and inflexible. Migrating from Shopify to WooCommerce may be the solution you need. After all, WooCommerce comes with a lot of perks and is part of the strong WordPress community.
In this post, we’ve provided a step-by-step guide to help you migrate Shopify to WooCommerce. To quickly recap, the four steps are:
- Choose a migration tool.
- Migrate your products from Shopify to WooCommerce.
- Create the pages you need for your WooCommerce store.
- Design your WooCommerce store to match your Shopify store.
Do you have a question about how to make the switch from Shopify to WooCommerce? Ask away in the comments section below!
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Keep reading the article at ThemeIsle Blog. The article was originally written by John Hughes on 2020-01-08 04:58:00.
The article was hand-picked and curated for you by the Editorial Team of WP Archives.