Learn How Shopify Experts Can Build an Online Store for Your Business
20 Sep 2021
ContentGorakh Shrestha
Table of Contents
As of November 2020, Australia had the 4th largest number of Shopify users in the world.
If you want to sell products online, then Shopify is one of the best e-commerce platforms to choose from. With the rising number of Shopify users in Australia, Shopify can help you find the right customers and get your products in front of more people.
But setting up a profitable Shopify store entails more than clicking a few buttons. A Shopify expert can help you get the right systems in place from the start so you can focus on what’s most important: growing your business.
Keep reading to learn how Shopify experts can build an online store for your business and why hiring professional help is important.
What Is Shopify?
Shopify is software that lets you set up an online store and sell your products online. Shopify is subscription-based and has 3 different monthly plans, from basic plans for new businesses to growing and rapidly expanding businesses.
Shopify isn’t one product like a store builder. It’s an entire e-commerce platform that lets you do everything you need to sell products online.
For example, it lets you showcase your products to customers, communicate and engage with them, ship your products, accept payments, and manage your daily operations.
This is why Shopify is so popular. By putting all the essential business tools you need in one place, Shopify lets you manage your entire business from your Shopify store.
This means you don’t have to keep switching tabs, accounts or have dozens of different business subscriptions.
How To Start a Shopify Store
To get started with Shopify, you’d start by signing up for one of the subscription plans depending on which stage your business is at.
After you sign up, you’d create your online store using the following steps:
- Get a domain name (name your store)
- Pick your theme and template
- Customize your template
- Add your products
- Write your product descriptions
- Add payment methods
- Set up shipping
- Preview and test your website and ordering process
As you can see, Shopify lets you do everything you need to start your e-commerce business.
But although it’s great to have all your business tools in one place, the process of starting a Shopify store can be overwhelming, especially if you have never had one before.
This is where hiring a Shopify expert comes in.
What Can Shopify Experts Do?
Although Shopify lets you use templates and doesn’t require coding knowledge, Shopify also lets you create your online store from scratch.
When you have a custom Shopify store, you stand out from your competition and create the best customer experience possible.
Not only can Shopify experts build your perfect online store from scratch, but they also have specialized, high-level knowledge in the areas required to run and market a successful e-commerce business.
This knowledge includes:
- Branding and design
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Website speed optimization
- Social media strategy
- Creating secure checkout processes
- Integrating inventory and POS (point of sale) systems
- Optimizing your website for mobile
You may know how to do some of these tasks yourself, but chances are you’re a beginner at some of them.
An expert can set up your store the right way from the start, which saves you time and money in the long run.
What Are the Benefits of Hiring a Shopify Expert?
To become an official Shopify Experts partner, a company must have at least 5 successful stores.
They have to achieve and maintain this status, which means staying up-to-date on Shopify updates and trends. They also know the platform inside-out and know how to best optimize your Shopify store.
Every business owner knows that you have to wear many hats in the start-up stage. This means that you have to do web design, branding, writing, and customer service simultaneously.
And if you’re not an expert in all these areas, you could make some costly business mistakes when you’re starting. Hiring an expert helps you avoid these mistakes while setting you up for success.
Now, let’s take a look at some of the specific benefits of hiring a Shopify expert to build your online store.
Identify Your Unique Selling Point
If you’re starting your business, one of the first things you need to do is identify your unique selling point (USP).
This is one or two sentences explaining why your business is better than the competition. It details why customers should buy from you.
Part of figuring this out is to understand your customers’ pain points. What problem are they looking to solve? Is there a gap in the way your competition is trying to solve these pain points?
One of the biggest benefits of hiring Shopify experts is that they can help you figure out these answers before going through all the trouble of building a website.
Shopify experts will take the time to understand your audience, your products, and your company’s value proposition. Experts will also review your competitors so you know how you can stand out to customers.
Effective Branding From the Start
Branding is vital both for setting your business apart from your competition and for helping it connect with your audience.
And when you connect with your audience and show them your brand values, you increase the chance that customers will trust your brand and buy from you.
Having an expert help you with branding can include deciding on your website’s colours, fonts, and design to your brand messaging and brand values.
Most important in this process is that your branding stays consistent across your website and all company materials. An expert can help you catch where your branding might be inconsistent so that you avoid confusing customers.
A Customized SEO Strategy
No matter how good your products are, your business won’t grow if no one can find your store.
SEO is critical for e-commerce websites because it helps your target customers find you through organic search traffic. Organic search is when a user types keywords into a search engine, and your store appears on the search results.
SEO helps you market your Shopify store because it gets your product in front of an audience already searching for it. They are more likely to click on your store when they see that you offer products that can help solve their particular problem.
Your website and your product pages need to be SEO optimized, especially because users so often look at Google when making a purchasing decision.
Shopify experts are well-versed in SEO and can help you create an SEO strategy customized to your needs and your business goals. This will help you get your product in front of the right audience when they’re looking for it.
Ongoing Help
The work doesn’t stop when you’ve built your e-commerce store. To become profitable, you need to continue to drive sales and keep your customers happy.
Having a Shopify expert on board means that you’ll get valuable help every step of the way.
For example, let’s say your e-commerce store is set up and you’re making sales, but a few customers are having trouble with the checkout process.
Since your Shopify experts already know your brand and your business goals, they’d best be able to help you. Maintaining a working relationship with your Shopify experts is crucial as you’ll be able to ask them questions as you continue to build and grow your e-commerce website.
Increase Website Quality
If you try to do everything yourself on your Shopify store, chances are you may miss something or not have all the parts of your website at the same level of quality.
An expert will make sure that every part of your website functions properly, looks aesthetically pleasing, and is easy for the customer to navigate.
Let’s say you have great reviews for your t-shirt company because you use high-quality fabrics and construction. Yet, if your photographs are low resolution and your product pages don’t convince the reader of your product’s quality, then you’re doing your brand a disservice.
An expert can help you make sure your website is top quality so that your customers can trust your business and see it as professional. You need to show that you are committed to your customers’ experience, not only making money.
Since Shopify experts have seen and worked on so many websites, they’ll be quick to catch any errors or problems and let you know so that you can fix them together.
Better Customer Experience
Customer experience is even more important than the quality of your product. This is because a confusing or frustrating customer experience will drive current and potential customers away, no matter how good your product is.
For example, you could have the best quality office supplies on the market. But if your customers can’t figure out how to check out or your product descriptions are confusing and unhelpful, you can be sure that the customer will go elsewhere.
An expert will know the must-have features your e-commerce website needs, from displaying reviews to having a trustworthy return policy.
When a website is clear, smooth, and easy to navigate and your product excels over your competition’s, your customers are more likely to be satisfied with your store and see you as trustworthy.
Save Time
There comes the point for every business owner when it’s more profitable to outsource certain tasks than do everything yourself.
This saves you time so you can focus on growing your business, whether that’s marketing, creating new products, or expanding your social media following.
Even if you don’t hire a Shopify expert to take care of all the aspects of your online store, you can still outsource certain tasks. For example, you may already know how to do SEO from a previous project, but you may not be very good at web design and branding.
Hiring an expert to help you customize your website according to your brand lets you spend more time on the tasks that will turn your business into a profitable one.
Plus, you won’t have the frustration of trying to do something from square one while juggling all the other aspects of your new business. An expert will get a high-quality job done in the fraction of the time it would have taken you to learn and perfect a new skill.
Before You Contact an Expert
To make the most of your consultation with a Shopify expert, you need to have a few things finished first.
Always make sure that you have calculated your budget, timeline, and intended results. You need to do this so that the expert can give you an accurate quote (and so you’re not shocked by the bill later).
You also need to be familiar with any jargon or terminology in your industry so that you can best communicate your desired results with the expert.
Finally, make sure you’ve done at least some initial research. You want to be able to show the expert what you want, what you don’t want, any relevant examples, and how you’d like to stand out from your competition.
Let a Shopify Expert Build Your Store the Right Way
Shopify is one of the most popular e-commerce platforms out there for a good reason. With the number of tools at your disposal, you can perform all the tasks needed to run a successful e-commerce website from one place.
A Shopify expert can help you get these tasks done faster and more efficiently so that you can focus on serving your customers and growing your business.
EB Pearls has been named the #1 e-commerce web developer in Australia in 2021. Our services can help whether you need a new Shopify store built from scratch or need help optimizing your existing one.
If you need a Sydney web developer to help set up your e-commerce store for success, then contact our Shopify experts today.
“During the entire project, what I witnessed was an unwavering determination to keep forging ahead and readily adapting to every new challenge that came our way. The performance was outstanding, and we owe our success to you. Without your contributions, this wouldn’t have been possible. Great job!”
— Marketing Manager at Mondial VGL