It’s no secret that taking your store online comes with instant expansion for your business. But even with the vast opportunities that ecommerce offers, you’ll still need to deal with a few obstacles before you can reach optimal success.
Shopify’s platform introduces the foundation you need to expand. And we take care of the rest! As one of the world’s most trusted Shopify agencies, our team of experts help turn your online challenges into exciting digital journeys. With our combined knowledge and skills, your Shopify store will see progress from day one.
We’ve set out this short guide to help broaden your understanding of Shopify’s most important components so that you know what to expect when you launch your online store.
1 Payment system
Global commerce is booming and you need to get involved as soon as possible! Shopify’s payment capabilities are the shining stars of the platform because they ensure broad, secure, multi-country solutions. You can instantly start selling to some of the largest ecommerce markets across the globe, quickly and safely.
Synchronised, effortless sales management experience
Using flexible point of sale software and hardware lets you lock in on your cross-border opportunities with very little effort. This system keeps track of your sales, data, orders, and inventory from all your stores - no matter what country you’re selling from or in.
When you choose Shopify, you’ll also be able to launch, optimise and sync your sales channels seamlessly across your own online stores, alternative marketplaces, social media, messaging apps and real-life stores. Having this freedom to sell on any platform is your first big step to financial success!
In short, Shopify’s POS provides you with an organised structure that can sell products from anywhere, via any payment method, at any time. What more could you ask for?
Well, to have the financial side of things taken care of too, of course. Shopify also calculates accurate taxes on every order based on the most up-to-date tax rules with Avalara AvaTax.
Manage your sales across multiple currencies
Shopify Payments allows you to sell in multiple currencies. This helps operate in different regions without complex management requirements, and has a great impact on your ability to localise your customer experience.
We must always consider that people like to pay in different ways across the globe, so it’s not good to assume or rely on a single default payment method.
One of the key aspects of multi-currency is that you can experiment with international retail without committing to a dedicated regional store or undergoing intensive development work. The currencies that are currently included in this feature are:
- Australian Dollar (AUD)
- Canadian Dollar (CAD)
- Denmark Krone (DKK)
- Euro (EUR)
- Hong Kong Dollar (HKD)
- Japanese Yen (JPY)
- New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
- Pound Sterling (British Pound) (GBP)
- Singapore Dollar (SGD)
- United States Dollar (USD)
Remember, Shopify will do the currency conversion for you before your pay-out, so you’ll receive your money in the currency of the country where your company is located.
All global talk aside – there are multiple benefits to using Shopify POS, even if you’re planning on keeping things local.
The most important features that smaller or local-only businesses rely on include:
- Have built-in fraud detection.
- Accept credit cards securely with Shopify EMV card reader.
- Create custom payment types for purchases outside of the software.
- Accept more than one payment type in a single purchase.
- Refund past orders to the original payment method.
- Use gift-cards that can be redeemed in-store or online.
- Set up, use and track both unlimited and limited discounts.
- Track card payments using the external terminal you already own.
- Integrate your store with bookkeeping systems like QuickBooks, Xero and more.
- Assign existing barcodes to products or create new ones.
- Work with a centralised inventory across channels.
- Get on-the-go payment solutions so you can expand to pop-ups, fairs or markets.
- Support multiple staff members and cash registers across different retail stores.
- Expect 24/7 support from Shopify’s POS team. We offer extensive support too!
2 Customer management and analytics
Once you start making sales, you can also start learning more about your customer base, their wants and needs, and of course - their shopping behaviour.
Customer profiles are automatically created with every new order, and can be synced with in-store purchases made by the same customer. Names and information are automatically added to your customer list, but you can add, edit or delete customer profiles very easily.
You can read up on Data Protection for Shopify Store Owners to understand how gathering, using and retaining customer information works in the UK and across Europe.
Along with this customer information, you also have access to an actionable dashboard of sales, orders, and traffic. Plus you get reports that let you analyse sales by staff members, locations, time period or customers. Together this valuable data helps you identify gaps instantly, find solutions quickly, plan new strategies robustly, and ultimately make the right business decisions at the right time!
Remember, customer management and behavioural analytics don’t stop with the preinstalled features that you get from using Shopify. You can go the extra mile by exploring new, robust apps to track user activity on your store. We strongly recommend you install a visitor recording and heat mapping plugin like our very own Hindsight to record and evaluate every visitor’s journey through your site. This way you can gather the information you need to improve their experience, increase their return visits and boost overall sales.
We’re running a special pre-Black Friday offer to install Hindsight onto your Shopify store! Use the discount code "HALFOFF" in the app store before 31 October and get 50% off for as long as you subscribe to the app.
Download Hindsight for your Shopify store now
You can also get in touch with us if you want to get started immediately. When we get involved, we gather advanced data and analytics (delivered by multiple platforms and systems), and carefully track a wide variety of metrics. We combine everything we accumulate and present you with rich insight on your company’s progress. This becomes the start of a new journey towards even bigger plans for the future!
3 Mobile first thinking
We’ll never stop highlighting the importance of mobile. Online shopping is becoming more and more popular across the globe, and over 1.2 billion people worldwide access the internet from their smartphones. By 2021, mobile is predicted to dominate online sales, driving 54% (or $659 billion) in sales. So it makes sense that we’ve reached a point where online stores are primarily designed and optimised to accommodate mobile shopping over desktop shopping.
Let’s take Black Friday Cyber Monday for another example, since it's coming up so soon! Last year, online sales on Black Friday jumped to $6.2 billion. That’s up 23.6% from 2017. More than $2 billion of these revenues came from smartphones, with 33.5% of total sales attributed to mobile. Black Friday Cyber Monday is around the corner, so if your mobile shop isn’t in tip-top shape, now is the best time to start.
Shopify lets you create mobile-first journeys from the ground up by offering responsive storefronts and customized checkouts, so you’re 100% guaranteed a flawless responsive website design from the start.
And it’s not just mobile friendly for the users. As a shop owner you can also add products, take and replace product photos, change prices, and manage your inventory - all from your phone. Having this control over your admin at your fingertips means that you can focus on other business responsibilities and still manage your store on the go.
Mobile first design also means having instant access to communication with your clients. Install an app like Shopify Chat on your store and ensure rapid response to all customer queries or issues. You can also use this opportunity to make recommendations or send products, discounts, and new orders directly in the chat. Altogether this creates a better shopping experience, and turns wandering visitors into returning buyers.
If you’re still not convinced that mobile-first is crucial for your business, remember these staggering ecommerce statistics:
- The average American spends over four hours on their smartphone every day, checking it as often as 150 times. That gives you a pretty big chance of being found online. Capitalise on every opportunity!
- 70% of mobile searches lead to action within an hour. On desktop, it can take up to a full month for users to take action on a purchase.
- 67% of consumers enjoy digital window shopping, with 77% of those making impulse purchases when they browse. Make sure your mobile store is well optimised for search if you want to catch some of these impromptu browsing sessions. And don’t forget about localisation!
- Technological advancement is becoming a major player in enhanced mobile shopping experiences. It’s estimated that by 2020, augmented reality will account for over $120 billion in mobile sales.
Are you read to scale locally and internationally?
Shopify’s vast capabilities don’t end here, but these three features sure do give you the initial boost that you need to start seeing real sales. If you want to find out more, give us a call. We’ve been building high-end ecommerce websites and growing hundreds of clients’ brands for many years! When your business is in our hands, you get a stunning online store with up-to-date technological maintenance and smooth functioning user journeys from start to finish.
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