7 Shopify pros and cons that will interest you

Shopify pros and cons

Did you know that more than 600,000 retailers use Shopify (May 2018)?
This is not surprising for those who know this platform. It is really very easy to launch an online store, with all its benefits, but without the hard work required for its development.
But is everything offered by this platform really positive, what are the pros and cons of Shopify? Discover them in the following lines!

5 Shopify pros that will surprise you…

7 Shopify pros and cons that will interest you
Created in 2006 by Tobias Lütke, Scott Lake and Daniel Weinand, Shopify has become a great ally for emerging companies. This platform provides the basic (and not so basic) elements to start this commercial odyssey.
For e-commerce entrepreneurship, it is important to have an online store that brings together these four basic ‘pillars’:
● An attractive design, fast and adapted to the branding of e-commerce.
● Optimal usability, fluid and accessible to all devices.
● An easy-to-manage product catalog (for workers unfamiliar with programming, HTML, etc.).
● Optimal security and protection for the company and its customers.
Naturally, web design for e-commerce is an art that goes beyond this summary. But these keys are the must that cannot be missing in e-commerce, not even during its first steps.
All of them are present in Shopify, and for that reason, several entrepreneurs decide to open a shop with this platform. Even the official shops of World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Tesla, RedBull, Herschel or Budweiser were created with Shopify.
However, this platform is far from perfect. It is true that it helps to quickly launch an online store, that its design is very customizable or that it offers great security to customers.
But it also has very limited checkouts, payment add-ons and multiple commissions that end up making your plans more expensive.
Do you want to discover these advantages and disadvantages of Shopify?

Your e-commerce, in just a few steps

Launch an online store in just a few steps and without having to deal with hostings, CSS and other complications? This is the great advantage of Shopify.
This platform is designed for entrepreneurs who want to launch their e-commerce quickly, at an affordable price.
Your CMS has a simple, accessible and intuitive interface. Familiarizing yourself with it is a matter of minutes.
Shopify does not want its customers to spend hours and hours on these details: it is designed to start selling from day one.

Design and multiple applications to customize

Shopify’s pros and cons include 160 themes or templates to choose from. To these, we must add the additional ThemeForest templates.
However, customizing existing themes is quick and easy. No knowledge of CSS or HTML is required.
In addition, Shopify has its own App Store: apps.shopify.com. If we want to add new features or improve some aspect of the design, these apps will help us – there are over 1,500!

No code or hostings (or your problems)

Don’t know CSS, HTML, and other programming languages? To customize Shopify themes, you don’t need to be familiar with them.
However, more advanced users can edit these codes if they wish. That’s why the customization possibilities are unlimited in Shopify.
But in addition to providing e-commerce software, Shopify takes care of web hosting. In this way, your customers can concentrate on managing their store, selling more and building customer loyalty.

Excellent responsive version

Up to 61% of Shopify salespeople’s sales come from mobile traffic!
This data, provided by the platform itself, helps to understand the importance of another of Shopify’s star features, available in all its plans: responsive design.
Mobile traffic has increased year after year since 2014, and there is no indication that its growth will stop in 2019.
Therefore, having e-commerce adapted to mobiles and tablets is not an option: it is a necessity.
It is not surprising, then, that this quality of Shopify is one of the most applauded.

Optimal customer service

Another of Shopify’s strengths is its technical support and customer service.
Both are available in several languages and have very interesting resources, such as the Communities and the different guides and informative documents, available in their ‘Help Center’.
For direct queries, this platform makes available to the client the email [email protected] and its social messaging systems on Twitter and Facebook.
Response times are very fast!

… and 2 Shopify cons you should know

Checkout with limitations

Among the pros and cons of Shopify, the presence of such limited checkout processes is surprising.
Despite being optimized to improve conversions and be effective, their customization is reduced.
It is only possible to modify small parameters, insufficient to adapt this page to the corporate branding of e-commerce.

Multiple commissions and payment add-ons

As you probably know, Shopify has four plans: Basic Shopify, Shopify, and Advanced Shopify, for $29, $79 and $299 per month, respectively.
However, some of their customers are annoyed by the number of hidden commissions. For example, certain forms of payment apply commissions that many consider abusive.
On the other hand, Shopify’s business model is also based on payment add-ons.
Through the subdomain ‘apps.shopify.com’, this platform offers a catalog with different extensions to perfect our online shop: Kai by ZipThunder, Tshirtgang TShirt Fulfillment, MailChimp Forms by MailMunch, Omnisend Email Marketing, etc.
However, most of them have very limited free versions. It is almost always necessary to pay a monthly fee for their premium features.
To make matters worse, their integration does not always produce good results. Sometimes it damages the aesthetics of the site or slows down its loading times. Consequently, this is not the brightest aspect of Shopify.
In short, it is important to consider these advantages and disadvantages of Shopify before betting on this platform.
A bad decision could greatly complicate the future of your e-commerce, so do not rush into your choice and consider alternatives such as Volusion, Oberlo, BigCommerce or WooCommerce.
 
 

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ECN Team
E-Commerce Nation is The 1st B2B Web Media about E-Commerce in Europe. The team of E-Commerce Explorers help businesses to reach new potential market through delivering useful content. Let us know in comment if you enjoyed this content.