Let's start with an overview of what Shopify is. An overview of Shopify is a web app that allows you to build your own online store. It runs in a web browser, so as long as you have internet shopify transaction fees, you can use the platform from anywhere - in other words, you don't need install software locally to use it. Because it's a 'hosted' solution, you don't need to worry about buying hosting either. The precise functionality you get from Shopify depends on the pricing plan you opt for — we discuss all these in depth — but all Shopify plans allow you to sell an unlimited number of products digital or physical and all but one allow you to pick a template or 'theme' which you can use to present your products with i. Shopify is a software as a service 'Saas' tool - this means that you don't own a copy of the software but rather pay a monthly fee to use it. You aren't restricted to embedding single products either — you can embed entire collections of products. This is ideal for anyone with an existing site that wants to add simple e-commerce functionality. You might already have a Wordpress blog or website, for example, that you want to display products on — this solution is ideal for that. Shopify Lite and digital products One of the things that I most like about Shopify as an e-commerce platform is the way that shopify transaction fees facilitates the sales of digital products. Shopify seems to be alone amongst the major website builder platforms in catering adequately for this. You'll need to install a free 'Digital Downloads' app and make a couple of changes to your Shopify settings, but once you do, the correct tax rates will automatically be applied. As such, the 'Shopify Lite' plan may work out better for a lot of people who set up their site on another platform - I'm thinking in particular of or customers - and now want to sell digital goods without building a whole new website. The 'Lite' plan offers a relatively-low cost workaround for this. Although this site is built in Squarespace, I sell my via a 'Shopify Lite' plan. As things stand it seems that users browsing your store can only buy one item at a time. For most businesses, this is annoying, but for some businesses it will render the Facebook store pretty useless. To be fair to Shopify, it would appear that this issue stems from a limitation on the Facebook side of things. Either way, shopify transaction fees, it'd be great if it could be sorted out. Finally, another limitation of the Facebook integration is that you can't use it to sell digital products. So in essence, whilst you can use Shopify Lite to sell on your Facebook page, you might find the functionality doesn't quite meet your requirements. Using Shopify Lite as a backend system for a physical shopify transaction fees 'Shopify Lite' is a good option for those who sell in physical locations and need a solution for processing payments and manage their inventory. This syncing of real-world sales to an online selling platform also makes and accounting a bit easier. Transaction fees are charged by the company providing your online store, and credit card fees are charged by your payment gateway provider a payment gateway is basically the software used to process credit card payments. There are no transaction fees to worry about with 'Shopify Lite', so long as you are prepared to use Shopify's own payment processing option — Shopify Payments — as the payment gateway. If you use a third party payment gateway, you can expect to pay a 2. If you're on the 'Lite' shopify transaction fees and using Shopify Payments, credit card fees are 2. What about dropshipping with Shopify Lite. Many potential users of Shopify will be wondering how it facilitates dropshipping, a fulfilment method where you don't keep what you're selling in stock you take the order, send it to a supplier, and they deliver the goods to your client - your store is in effect a middle man of sorts. If you want to dropship with Shopify, you need to install a third party app to do so. You can get one from Shopify's app store - a popular choice is Oberlo which integrates with AliExpressbut there are many others available. You can use a dropshipping app on any Shopify plan, Lite included, but you'll probably find that they are more useful on one of the as shopify transaction fees products you are selling will be displayed, and browsable, on a fully-fledged online store. Is 'Shopify Lite' for me. If your needs are a bit more extensive, it's time to look at. It's important to note that there is a key thing which you don't get on the 'Shopify Basic' plan: the full set of point of sale features. These are reserved for customers on more expensive Shopify plans, and we'll discuss them later in this post. Let's take a look at some of the key features you do get on the 'Basic' plan which you won't find on 'Lite': templates, support, abandoned cart saver functionality and blogging. Templates Once you're on a 'Basic Shopify' plan or higheryou can choose from a wide range of templates for your online store - there are 10 free ones, and 58 paid ones. Shopify's theme store is very easy to browse, because it provides a lot of search filters which you can use to locate a suitable theme for your Shopify site. You can filter all the templates using a wide range of criteria, including paid vs free, industry, layout type and visual effects i. One thing that's important to note about the themes is that if you need any support with installing or configuring them, you may end up dealing with a third party; Shopify only support themes that the company has developed themselves. This means that Shopify will support you with any query you have about the free ones, but you may be referred elsewhere if you buy a paid theme. Support on 'Shopify Basic' vs 'Shopify Lite' As mentioned earlier, although support is included with Shopify Lite, it is limited to email and chat only. A slight word of warning about the phone support however: phone numbers are only provided for North America, United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand - there's no shopify transaction fees other countries' option. Abandoned cart recovery allows you to identify site visitors who add a product to their cart, get to the checkout and then leave your store without completing the purchase. You can then either choose to use Shopify's abandoned cart saver manually i. I suspect most users will plump for the automatic option, due to the time-saving implications. Abandoned cart recovery can significantly increase shopify transaction fees revenue with little effort — other than the time investment in setting up an automated message — being involved, so it's a feature which may prompt a lot of Shopify users to go for this plan over the 'Lite' option. The interesting thing about abandoned cart recovery's inclusion on this plan is that it means Shopify offers this functionality at a considerably lower price point than many of its key competitors. Because of the importance of abandoned cart saver functionality, the inclusion of this feature constitutes one of the strongest arguments for choosing over competing products. It's not going to rival in the functionality stakes as it doesn't facilitate content versioning and the post categorisation options are fairly limited; that said, it's perfectly usable and, with the publication of good content, can facilitate an inbound marketing campaign perfectly well. Transaction fees and credit card fees When it comes to transaction fees, they are the same as 'Shopify Lite' i. Credit card fees are also the same as the 'Shopify Lite' ones: 2. As mentioned earlier, the above rates vary by country, so you may enjoy cheaper rates than the above depending on the territory you're operating from. Is Basic Shopify for me. Moving up the ladder, we come to. Gift card functionality is probably most relevant to stores with a relatively good level of brand awareness - i. As such, I would argue that this functionality is not a deal breaker for all brand new store owners - but it is definitely a good thing to have if you are an established business. Professional reports In-depth reporting functionality is quite a big omission from 'Basic Shopify' plan and one of the biggest reasons why you might want to plump for the 'Shopify' plan over 'Basic. Regardless of the type of Shopify plan you select, I'd recommend adding to your site too, as you'll get a host of additional insights by using it. As with all the other Shopify plans, if you're using Shopify Payments, you will avoid transaction fees. In terms of credit card fees, you can expect to pay 2. If using an external payment gateway, the transaction fee applied by Shopify on this shopify transaction fees is 1%. You also get lower credit card rates and lower transaction fees if using a third-party payment gateway. You can select various dimensions and metrics and use them to create bespoke reports which you can save and refer to in future. You can also apply a multitude of filters to your data to get a view that suits your business activities. Users of Google Analytics will be familiar with this sort of thing. As with the other plans, if you're using Shopify Payments, there are no transaction fees. The credit card fee is 2. Using an external payment gateway costs 0. Significantly, it allows you to automate a lot of e-commerce related tasks via a visual workflow builder called 'Shopify Flow. Is Shopify Plus for me. Beefing up your Shopify plan using apps If the functionality included in your chosen Shopify plan isn't quite enough, you can enhance it by adding apps to your store. Shopify's app store contains thousands of apps both free and paid that are straightforward enough to integrate. Some are better than others though: always check the user reviews before committing to one. Shopify transaction fees key example of where you might want to add an app and as touched on above is in the department - there are several available to help you start a dropshipping business with Shopify. Although the app store represents a selling point for Shopify — it contains a myriad of apps that can be used to enhance your store — it also highlights a potential weakness of the product. Whereas with Shopify you often find yourself reaching for the app store and your wallet to add certain shopify transaction fees of functionality, other platforms — notably — provide it as standard out of the box. On the plus store, the shopify transaction fees app store means that you can integrate your Shopify store with a very large number of other web apps. Buying a pre-built Shopify store Shopify now offers a service that allows you to. The advantage of buying a Shopify store rather than building one is that it takes a lot of the legwork out of setting one up and, assuming the store you buy is already profitable, can reduce the risk of making a bad investment. Stores on the Exchange Marketplace are vetted by Shopify before they are listed, and the escrow method — where an independent third party holds the payment until both buyer and seller are satisfied with proceedings — is used to handle the buying process. In terms of how much buying a Shopify store will cost you, this depends on how profitable the store already is. You can spend anything from a couple of hundred dollars for a pre-built store without a customer base up to a few million for a store that is generating a healthy monthly profit. Free trials I hope this discussion on Shopify pricing has helped clarify which plan is best suited to your needs. If you're still undecided about which Shopify plan is going to work best for you, you can shopify transaction fees of a free 14-day trial of the product. This allows you to test out the product's core functionality and work out which Shopify pricing plan might be the best fit. More Shopify resources We build Shopify stores for clients, so if you are thinking about using Shopify as a platform, do to find out how we can help. Or to receive lots of useful Shopify and other e-commerce resources in your inbox. Got any thoughts on Shopify fees. Feel free to add a comment below. An important note about affiliate advertising: writing and updating the reviews in our blog involves a lot of time and effort. So to finance this, we sometimes include affiliate advertising links in our posts. This means that if you buy a product or service after clicking on a link to a product featured in one of our reviews, we may receive a commission on the sale. If you'd like to unsubscribe from our mailing list.
