If you’ve started looking for an eCommerce platform, you’ve probably heard of Shopify. That’s because Shopify controls about 20% of the eCommerce platform market [1], making it the second most used online store builder, only behind WooCommerce. In our hands-on Shopify review, we look at the promises offered by Shopify, uncover its shining features and options for scaling up an online business, while also going into important details such as pricing, customer support, and ease of use.
Keep reading our Shopify review to learn if it’s the right place for your online store.
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What is Shopify?
Shopify falls into a category of products called eCommerce platforms. These are software applications for building commerce-oriented websites with product pages, shopping carts, and checkout modules.
Shopify is a SaaS (software-as-a-service) eCommerce platform, meaning it’s accessible through an internet browser, and you pay a recurring fee to use the online software instead of downloading it for one larger fee.
What’s more, Shopify maintains all of the underlying software and hardware for you – you never need to mess around with hosting, updates, security, and so on.
In short, anyone can go to the Shopify website, start an account, and begin selling products, processing payments, and creating content.
In terms of selling, Shopify offers options for:
- Selling physical products online
- Selling digital products online
- Selling at physical locations (using Shopify POS)
What features should you expect from Shopify?
There are dozens of built-in features including:
- Support for selling unlimited products
- Point of sale support for in-person transactions
- Gift cards and discount codes
- Multiple online sales channels
- Finance reports
- Email marketing and online advertising campaigns
- Fraud analysis
- Support for multiple staff accounts
- Abandoned cart recovery
- Shipping rate calculations
- Free SSL certificates
- Shipping discounts
- Integrated payment processing
- Global selling options such as different languages and currencies
Shopify also has an app store to choose from thousands of other store extensions. Some app categories include:
- Store design
- Marketing
- Fulfillment
- Shipping and delivery
- Customer service
- Store management
- Conversion
- Merchandising
- Product recommendations
You can also control how your store looks using Shopify themes.
How does Shopify compare to other platforms?
You have several eCommerce platforms to consider, so what makes Shopify stand out? Are there aspects of Shopify that may push you toward another solution?
Shopify pricing vs competitors
Shopify is similar to most major platforms with its
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This article was written by Joe Warnimont and originally published on ThemeIsle Blog.