Why Choose Shopify For Your Online Store
If you take a peek at any Facebook group for product-based businesses, you’ll see lots of questions about what platform is best for your website.
And there will be so many different answers, it’s hard to make heads or tails of it.
Let’s get into what a website platform is and isn’t, some of the options you have, and then why Shopify is my #1 recommendation.
What’s a website platform?
Shopify store for Luna & Jade, site by Launch Party
A website platform is where you’ll build (and sometimes host) your standalone website. This is often confused with a marketplace, like Etsy or Amazon.
A marketplace is someone else’s website that multiple vendors sell on. Using Etsy as an example, it has established traffic, it’s own policies, fees and more. It’s very easy to get started on a marketplace because it’s essentially filling in your own products and details into their container.
One of the biggest downsides of a marketplace is the lack of access and control. Most of the time, you don’t see your customers email addresses, making it difficult to get repeat customers. Also, many customers aren’t aware of what brand they’re shopping with, just that they’re shopping on a marketplace (like, “I got it on Etsy!”).
Your website is different. It’s all by itself, with no one else but you selling on it. You’re in charge of the way it looks, how you display your products, what pages you put on it, and more. You’re also in charge of bringing traffic to it, which can be one of the hardest parts of having your own website.
There are pros and cons to both the marketplace and your own website. Thankfully, you don’t have to choose one or the other. You can use both! If you do that, make sure all of your marketing efforts point toward your website, that should take priority since it’s a space you own.
Platform Options
Your website is where you’ll create your own standalone online brand presence, and there are quite a few choices for helping you do that.
The top 3 I like to compare are Squarespace, Wordpress and Shopify. I’ve used all of these platforms many times in my years as a web designer — and they’re all great for different reasons.
Squarespace
Squarespace is a drag-and-drop all-in-one platform that’s very easy to use and design-forward. I recommend it for simple service based websites.
It does have e-commerce capabilities, but they’re pretty limited. My clients often run up against inventory issues, wanting to expand and offer more features, and integrate with other platforms and just can’t with Squarespace.
You’re typically paying the same amount monthly for Squarespace e-commerce versus Shopify, and Shopify wins hands down in terms of features and support.
Wordpress
Wordpress is a platform that you self-host, meaning you install it on your website. That alone can get complicated with Wordpress, as you need to have some tech abilities to get started and choose a good host.
I recommend Wordpress for blog and content heavy websites that need a lot of customization. I use Wordpress for Launch Party’s website and it’s great for that.
I don’t love Wordpress for e-commerce.
Woocommerce, which is Wordpress’s e-commerce add-on, is quite cumbersome to use. And with Wordpress you’re responsible for your own website security, and when dealing with highly sensitive information like credit card transactions, it’s a big deal.
You have to stay on-top of your Wordpress maintenance, manage your backups and buy your own SSL certificate. And since Wordpress is self-hosted, there’s no main central place to get support, so you’re pretty much on your own.
Shopify
Shopify is an all-in-one platform for your website. That means you can buy your domain at Shopify and hosting is already included in your Shopify plan.
Shopify is best for e-commerce.
Shopify was designed specifically for e-commerce and it shows. It’s easy to add products and manage your inventory. Shopify also includes 24/7 easy-to-reach support (I know, because I talked to them rather frequently).
Shopify dashboard product input area
Shopify store blog for Orange Lingerie, website by Launch Party
One of the misconceptions with Shopify is that it’s for your products only.
The reality is that it’s for your whole website. You can build beautiful pages in Shopify.
You can also use Shopify to blog, which is a great way to educate your customers, build a community, keep people on your site longer and drive traffic. Our client Orange Lingerie has a wildly successful blog on Shopify that does exactly that (pictured above).
Examples of client pages we’ve done at Launch Party
About page for ice pop company, Joy Pop
FAQ page for stationary brand Paper Farm Press
Contact page Sesen Spa
Shopify: The best choice for e-commerce
Shopify store for Mockingbird Hospitality, site by Launch Party
The sky’s the limit with sales
Big brands use Shopify — like Kylie Cosmetics, Pattern Beauty and the NYT Store. The reason that matters is because there is no point that you’ll need to switch your store to the better e-commerce platform. You’re already there with Shopify. If Shopify can handle these huge stores, they can handle yours as it grows too!
Sell everywhere
This is such a big one. With Shopify, your Online Store (your website) is just one of your sales channels. You can also sell on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, Tik Tok, Google, Wholesale in-person with POS (point of sale) and more. This is such an important factor because it really maximizes your marketing efforts to be able to directly link your products anywhere.
You can also offer installment payments like Sezzle, Afterpay, or Shopify’s own Installment Payments.
Expand
The Shopify app store allows you to add tons of different functionalities to your store.
You can add subscriptions, gift options at checkout, upsells, size charts, customizable product options, and so much more.
Customizable product options available on Luna & Jade’s Shopify store
Subscription-based product on Paper Farm Press’s Shopify store
The app store enables you to customize and expand your store based on your specific needs and gives you the possibility to create a branded and unique online experience for your customers.
Shopify store for Sesen Spa, site by Launch Party
There’s a lot to love about Shopify, and the bottom line is that if you’re selling products online, it’s the best choice out there. You can try Shopify free for 14 days right here! (affiliate link)
Written by Shelley Easter of Launch Party. Shelley’s a Shopify partner and owner of Launch Party, an e-commerce design studio that specializes in dreamshops and branding for luxe product businesses. She’s also the creator of Shop School, an online program that teaches you how to build your own Shopify store.
This is a guest post by our friend, Shelley Easter of Launch Party who’s an expert in all things Shopify. We strive to connect you, our readers, with as much info as possible, and when we don’t know something, we want to bring in someone who does.