Hosted ecommerce platform, ideal for testing the market
If you are starting out with an ecommerce idea, Shopify can be a good way to test the market.
As we describe in our article about market research and validating your products and pricing, testing before committing to a custom designed ecommerce website can be a good idea.
Shopify is a hosted ecommerce solution, so unlike WooCommerce or OpenCart, the software cannot be downloaded and installed to your own hosting account. Shopify take care of all the server and software related aspects and you login to their system to update your website content.
Shopify is a hosted ecommerce solution whereas with WooCommerce you will need to install WordPress to a hosting account you have control of, like our green web hosting, and then install WooCommerce.
There are pros and cons to each approach, but Shopify can be quicker and easier to set up for non-technical people.
To change the appearance of your Shopify website, you can choose a free or paid Theme from the marketplace to be applied to your online shop.
Adding functionality like accounting or email marketing is done by installing an ‘app’, also available from the Shopify marketplace.
If you’d like help setting up a Shopify website, we can get you up and running and train you how to use it. We’re also working on Shopify themes so we can offer custom design for your Shopify website.