Which of the two most powerful store opening software in the world should you use?

Choose Shopify or WooCommerce

Shopify is currently the world’s largest paid store platform, and WooCommerce is the e-commerce software with the largest number of users in the world. In the highly competitive market of online sales, which of these two shopping cart systems can be used quickly and internationally? ?
When you want to open a store on the Internet, there is a high chance that you will encounter these two leading e-commerce software options, which are better and which are worse, and a detailed analysis and comparison will be made next.

The benefits of running your own online store

If you set up sales bases in online hypermarkets such as Shopee, open-air or foreign Amazon, you will be able to immediately enjoy the huge network traffic brought by the platform. A lot of banknotes.

However, to do business in this type of online store, you must rely on others and abide by the store’s business regulations. Moreover, there are many competitors on the platform, and vicious bargaining among the same industry often occurs. In addition, the store’s listing fee and transaction commission are not low. , which reduces the profit margin a lot.

Another point of criticism is that such stores do not share customer information with merchants, so they cannot carry out future shopping guide remarketing, and they lose an important profit channel.

At this time, choosing to set up an official e-commerce website by yourself will be able to solve the above shortcomings of doing business in online stores. The benefits it can bring are:

• It is convenient to establish its own brand, so that the product has higher added value
• Decentralize sales channels and avoid over-reliance on third-party stores
• Reduce product launch costs and sales commissions, saving operating costs
• It can effectively collect and manage customer lists, and improve customer loyalty through communication software such as Email or Messenger, which is convenient for future remarketing to have a better transaction conversion rate.
• Can master customer consumption big data as a reference when developing the market

Introduction to Shopify

Shopify is a rental store platform (SaaS – Software as a Service). It provides online store opening services for monthly or annual fees. Its main feature is that it is fully functional and easy to use, which can be set up in a very short time. Set up a website and conduct online transactions.

At present, there are more than 2.3 million online stores using Shopify in the world , and the company’s market value is second only to Amazon, which is also in the field of e-commerce. Therefore, some people jokingly call Shopify “Amazon second”.

For e-commerce official websites that want to be in line with international standards, opening a store with Shopify can smoothly create a professional cross-border sales channel.

Shopify fees

Shopify’s monthly rental plan mainly has three levels: Basic (Basic), Normal and Advanced (Advanced). There are also web-oriented lightweight (Lite) and large-scale e-commerce designed (Plus) plans.

And the most suitable basic plan for small e-commerce setup, the monthly fee is US$29 (about NT$850). The price is still low. However, when opening a store, you must also pay attention to some additional ongoing expenses.

This includes a 2% commission on product sales (Taiwan cannot use Shopify Payments, the official cash flow channel free of commission).

In addition, many application plug-ins are monthly fee, if there are many installation items, the total cost is not small.

Shopify Store Features

In addition to being simple and easy to use, Shopify’s platform also provides many additional value-added services, allowing customers to enjoy additional help and rich resources while operating e-commerce. These features include:

1. Shopify App Store
The online store built in the Shopify system is basically functional. As the demand for the website increases, installing plug-in applications has become the most effective tool to enhance the store’s functions.

This App store provides more than 6000 applications, whether it is in merchandise sales, marketing, order shipping, inventory and customer management, etc., as long as the online store generates demand, almost all of them can find suitable plug-ins to use here.

2. Oberlo
This affiliated platform of Shopify provides one-stop service for merchants to purchase. In addition to screening suppliers and saleable goods for you, Oberlo will also help you manage other follow-up warehousing, packaging and shipping. it is good.

Therefore, as long as the store owner selects the products they want to sell from Oberlo, they can directly import and start selling them in the Shopify online store. When receiving the customer’s order, Oberlo also arranges the shipment, which will significantly reduce sales management. burden on.

3. Second-hand e-commerce website trading platform (Exchange Marketplace)
If you don’t want to spend time running a brand new Shopify site, buying someone else’s existing store will be a quick way to market.

Shopify provides Exchange Marketplace, a second-hand website trading space. Those who are interested in engaging in cross-border e-commerce can choose from sales regions, industry types (such as fitness equipment, pet supplies), business models (such as traditional e-commerce, Dropshipping), Turnover and profitability, etc., to buy a successful online store.

Of course, if you have no intention of buying a second-hand store, you might as well use this platform to observe other people’s business practices as a reference for opening your own store.

Pros and Cons of Shopify

Shopify’s store opening system is relatively easy to use, and after simple basic settings, you can complete a professional-level e-commerce website.

Advantage

• The setup is simple, and people without computer technology background can easily complete the online store setup
• There are many professional and beautiful theme themes. In addition to the layout on Shopify’s official website , ThemeForest , the world’s largest layout trading platform , also has thousands of templates to choose from.
• There are more than 6,000 plug-in applications, which can fully meet the needs of e-commerce websites
• Provide a powerful cloud hosting and CDN content delivery network, the speed of the website is excellent, and there is no bandwidth limit for use
• The platform will be responsible for the technical maintenance of the website, including software updates and network security protection measures
• 24/7 customer service, able to deal with customer problems immediately
• The official email marketing software is provided, and the number of customer lists is free within 2500

Shortcoming

• Most of the plug-in applications need to be paid. If the number of add-ons is more than one, the total cost will increase significantly.
• Some advanced features are only available in more expensive advanced plans
• The website is bound to the Shopify single platform, and it is not easy to move
• Taiwan users cannot use Shopify Payments, the platform will deduct 0.5% ~ 2% of the sales commission
• The online store is limited by the platform’s usage policy, in case of violation of the terms, the store may be closed
• Development tools use a custom Liquid programming language, which creates some barriers to customization.
• The blog function is not as powerful as the WordPress system used by Woocommerce, which indirectly affects the effectiveness of content marketing

Introduction to WooCommerce

At present, nearly 30% of the world’s e-commerce websites use WooCommerce, with a total number of more than 4 million users, and it is the most popular free store software today.

The advantage of choosing WooCommerce to open a store is that it has strong independence, sales will not be drawn, and there is no so-called e-commerce platform terms of use, so it has better protection in terms of management rights.

In addition, since WooCommerce itself is a popular open source software (Open Source), the number of designed theme (Theme) and plug-in (Plugin) are very large, the flexibility of website function expansion is very large. If you want to do further customer service It is also easy to find helpers for assistance.

The perfect combination of WordPress + WooCommerce
WooCommere is a shopping cart system plug-in (Plugin) attached to WordPress, that is to say, you must first install the WordPress website software before you can apply this application plug-in.

Therefore, a store opened with WooCommerce is innately equipped with a powerful blog function. Whether it is in the management of graphic content or SEO search engine optimization, it has a very outstanding performance. Of course, it will become the future operation of content marketing. sharp weapon.

Like WordPress, using the WooCommerce shopping cart system can be achieved by renting an e-commerce solution from WordPress.com or renting a host by yourself. The former has high monthly fees and more restrictions on use, so it is mainly for self-service users. stand to discuss.

WooCommerce self-support station installation process
To install WooCommerce by yourself, you must first rent a website host. For a small e-commerce business that is just starting out, choosing the basic WordPress hosting plan should be able to meet the needs of use. When the customer traffic increases, it is not enough to upgrade. Late.

Cheaper and more popular hosting providers like Bluehost and A2 Hosting. Installation details can be found in this article .

The installation process of the simplified version is as follows:

• Buy Domain Names and Web Hosting Plans
• Install WordPress and WooCommerce shopping cart plugin
• Through the built-in Setup Wizard, fill in the basic information of the online store and select the appropriate theme (Theme)
  Goods on the shelf
• Setting up of cash flow and logistics pipelines
• After the test, it will be officially launched and start making money by taking orders
• While the website is running, you can add appropriate plug-ins (Plugin) to expand functions according to actual needs.

WooCommerce Pros and Cons

Advantage

• Free open source software, with a huge user base and application development resources. Flexible in function expansion and customization
• Built on top of the most popular WordPress hosting software with powerful content marketing features
• Different from other store opening platforms, you don’t have to worry about being charged for sales
• Have independent website ownership, don’t worry about being closed

Shortcoming

• Need to rent a virtual host outside by yourself
• Operation and management are slightly complicated. It takes more time to update software and maintain website security.
• Some plug-ins require payment, which will increase operating costs
• best online shop software
• On the whole, Shopify will outperform WooCommerce in terms of software and hardware. Users do not need to deal with technical management details, but can concentrate more on the market operation and marketing promotion of the online store.

Related Reading:

10 Affiliate Marketing Platforms Commonly Used by Online Earnings

The strengths of WooCommerce are low operating costs, strong autonomy of online stores, and will not be subject to the specifications of the store opening platform. And sales will not be drawn.

Therefore, if you have a lot of products or want to make management easier, Shopify is an ideal platform to start a store.

If you have few products to list or are already familiar with the WordPress operating environment, then WooCommerce may be better cost-effective.