What is Shopify? How to Start a Store with Shopify

Why should I choose Shopify? 

Entrepreneurs love Shopify because it’s affordable, easy to use and has a lot of powerful features built in. Read on for our top 15 reasons to choose the Shopify platform over any other: 

1. Affordable

2. Secure and Reliable

3. Available in 20 Languages

4. Mobile Responsive 

5. Visually Appealing

6. Customizable

7. Excellent Loading Speeds

8. Scalable

9. 24/7 Support

10. Easy Payments

11. Powerful Marketing

12. SEO Friendly

13. Gift Cards

14. Reviews

15. Shipping

1. Affordable

Shopify offers multiple plans and pricing, including a basic plan. At $29 per month, the basic plan is a great option for new eCommerce businesses that are just starting out. The basic plan is anything but basic. It includes everything on our list, and you can easily switch plans as needed, as your store grows or if you need additional features.

2. Secure and Reliable

Every Shopify store includes a free 256-bit SSL certificate. That means all pages, content, credit card, and transaction information are protected by the same level of security used by banks. You’ll have peace of mind knowing that your customers' information and business data are secure. With the enhanced security comes the added benefit that the Shopify platform is also reliable. Good news for you and for the over 450 million people who have purchased products on a Shopify store.

3. Available in 20+ Languages

You might not be ready to sell internationally, however, Shopify will be ready for you when you begin to sell outside of the United States. You can translate content in up to 20 languages and can sell in over 100 currencies. Customers around the world will enjoy viewing content in their native language because they can better understand your marketing, product details, shipping, and return policies. And that will potentially lead to more sales.

4. Mobile Responsive

With more and more sales occurring on mobile devices, it’s important to have a site that looks great across all devices, not just on desktops. Shopify includes a mobile eCommerce shopping cart in both free and premium mobile themes. Your customers can easily make purchases with their smartphones, tablets or computers. And, you can easily ensure that the store is performing optimally on any device. 

5.Visually Appealing

Shopify offers over 70 professional themes as well as numerous free themes. The themes, also known as 'templates', are beautifully designed. You can brand and customize your template to give it your unique look and feel – no one else will have the same store because of your customizations.

6. Customizable

The Shopify App Store has thousands of free and paid apps. These expand the functionality of your store by adding more features and capabilities. The apps provide features such as: email marketing, accessibility options, subscriptions, pre-orders, local delivery, etc.! So many options, but that’s the topic for another blog… 

If you can’t find the functionality you need in one of these apps, you can hire a Shopify expert to build a custom solution. 

7. Excellent Loading Speeds

Shopify is constantly updating technology to provide a faster, more flexible and improved shopping experience. They utilize a content delivery network, a large network of servers placed around the world, to ensure that stores load quickly. 

8. Scalable

With servers able to handle thousands of transactions per minute, Shopify’s uptime is typically in the impressive 99.9% range. Increased transactions will not slow your store’s performance and Shopify can scale with you to manage high or sudden store growth, whether for a small business or an enterprise. 

9. 24/7 Support

You’re never alone if you run into an issue, no matter what day or time. Support is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can contact Shopify support by email, live chat or phone. There is also an extensive community that you can search by Discussion, Group, Event or Blog. 

10. Easy Payments

Setting up payment methods in Shopify is very easy. You can quickly set your store up to accept all major payment methods, by using the Shopify Payments option. Shopify Payments is included in your subscription plan and the only other fee you’ll need to pay is the credit card fee. The credit card fee can be lowered by upgrading your subscription plan. The accepted payment methods will vary depending on your country. Other payment choices include Paypal, Amazon Pay, Apple Pay and more, and carry their own service fees.

11. Powerful Marketing Tools

Shopify has several powerful built-in tools to help with your marketing efforts. These include:

→ e-mail marketing

→ discount/promo codes

→ chat functionality

→ ad integrations with Facebook, Pintrest, SnapChat

→ automations like post purchase offers and abandoned cart recovery

12. SEO Optimized

Shopify has built-in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) that simplifies your management of these features and helps you to optimize content so you can get found in web searches. Why is that important? Making your store search engine friendly will bring more traffic to your store and more traffic means more sales!

Some SEO is automatically generated from themes, but you can also optimize your content by editing title tags, meta descriptions and URLs for webpages, products, collections, and blogs.

13. Gift Cards

Gift cards are currently available on all Shopify plans. Gift cards can be sold online as a product, shared via link on social media or issued to customers as free rewards or incentives.

14. Reviews

Shopify’s free review app allows you to collect import feedback from customers who have purchased. This helps build trust and encourages more sales.

15. Shipping 

Most shipping rates can be set up with the native Shopify shipping. More complex shipping options may require the addition of an app. Shopify works with major carriers like USPS, UPS, FedEx and DHL, among others. You can purchase your mailing labels directly from Shopify with excellent discounts on carrier rates.