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Shopify

Shopify

Overview

What is Shopify?

Shopify is a commerce platform designed for both online stores and retail locations. Shopify offers a professional online storefront, a payment solution to accept credit cards, and the Shopify POS application to power retail sales.

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

Shopify is a versatile platform that fulfills various use cases for businesses of all sizes. Users have found success using Shopify as …
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Shopify Makes Selling, Easy

7 out of 10
November 11, 2022
We use Shopify for the sale of one of our product offerings. We needed a platform for people to easily purchase our product from instead …
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King of E-Commerce

10 out of 10
December 02, 2021
I'm using Shopify in my organization for my online E- Commerce platform. Shopify helps us to showcase our products properly in a very good …
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Shopify, or not?

8 out of 10
June 22, 2021
Incentivized
We use Shopify as our eCommerce tool across the whole organization. We're a small company, so we needed something we could set up and …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 20 features
  • Product catalog & listings (131)
    8.6
    86%
  • Branding (130)
    8.4
    84%
  • Visual customization (129)
    7.5
    75%
  • Product management (129)
    7.2
    72%

Reviewer Pros & Cons

View all pros & cons
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Pricing

View all pricing

Shopify Lite

$9

Cloud
per month

Basic Shopify

$29

Cloud
per month

Shopify

$79

Cloud
per month

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://www.shopify.com/pricing

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Starting price (does not include set up fee)

  • $29 per month
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Product Demos

1-Minute Demo of How Packwerk Works | Shopify Engineering

YouTube

Basel Shopify - Use One Click Import Demo Tool

YouTube

Shopify Online Store 2.0 Demo: Dawn, the new Theme Editor, and Metafields...

YouTube

Instant Search + for Shopify Demo

YouTube

Australia Post Shipping Labels for Shopify - App Demo

YouTube

Hydrogen Coding Demo with Tobi Lütke | Shopify Unite 2021

YouTube
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Features

Online Storefront

Features for creating an online storefront with a browse-able product catalog.

7.4
Avg 7.7

Online Shopping Cart

Features that facilitate the collection of items so that customers can purchase them as a group.

8.1
Avg 7.6

Online Payment System

Features related to processing online payment for eCommerce purchases.

9
Avg 8.3

eCommerce Marketing

Features related to marketing for eCommerce websites

8
Avg 7.5

eCommerce Business Management

Features related to business management and administration of eCommerce operations

8
Avg 7.8
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Product Details

What is Shopify?

Shopify is a commerce platform that allows anyone to easily sell online, at a retail location, and everywhere in between. Shopify offers a professional online storefront, a payment solution to accept credit cards, and the Shopify POS application to power retail sales. Shopify is used by over 90,000 retailers in 100 different countries.

As a SaaS, Shopify's stability and always-on availability are touted. The eCommerce site presents the customary inventory and presentation controls typical of eCommerce solutions. Items are organized into collections, or using smart collections customize groupings to fit the merchandise (e.g. less than $20 items, gift ideas, bundles, etc.). Content management features (e.g. a blog) are present for tailoring the look and interactivity of the site.

For selling online, the $14 Starter pack includes a basic eCommerce site with 1GB of storage, chat & email support, and support for 25 listings. The $29 Basic pack includes POS and unlimited products, as well as fraud analysis tools. The $79 Professional Pack bumps storage space from 1GB to 5GB and adds gift cards, professional reports, and abandoned cart recovery. Finally, Unlimited, at $179 per month, makes space unlimited, and provides advanced reporting and real-time carrier shipping.

Shopify Features

Online Storefront Features

  • Supported: Product catalog & listings
  • Supported: Product management
  • Supported: Bulk product upload
  • Supported: Branding
  • Supported: Search & filter
  • Supported: Mobile storefront
  • Supported: Product variations
  • Supported: Subscriptions & downloads
  • Supported: Website integration
  • Supported: Visual customization
  • Supported: CMS

Online Shopping Cart Features

  • Supported: Abandoned cart recovery
  • Supported: Tax calculator
  • Supported: Shipping calculator
  • Supported: Integration with Amazon
  • Supported: Integration with eBay
  • Supported: Checkout user experience

Online Payment System Features

  • Supported: PayPal integration
  • Supported: Returns & refunds
  • Supported: Single-click checkout
  • Supported: eCommerce security

eCommerce Marketing Features

  • Supported: Promotions & discounts
  • Supported: SEO
  • Supported: Product reviews
  • Supported: Social commerce integration
  • Supported: Customer registration

eCommerce Business Management Features

  • Supported: Order processing
  • Supported: Inventory management
  • Supported: Shipping
  • Supported: Custom functionality

Shopify Videos

Subscribe to Shopify
Shopify is a powerful tool for ecommerce, but users will have to know how to setup products and collections to get the most out of it. We go through the process step by step.

Shopify Technical Details

Deployment TypesSoftware as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationApple iOS, Android

Frequently Asked Questions

Shopify is a commerce platform designed for both online stores and retail locations. Shopify offers a professional online storefront, a payment solution to accept credit cards, and the Shopify POS application to power retail sales.

Shopify starts at $29.

PrestaShop, Volusion, and Miva are common alternatives for Shopify.

Reviewers rate Website integration highest, with a score of 9.2.

The most common users of Shopify are from Small Businesses (1-50 employees).
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Comparisons

View all alternatives
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Reviews and Ratings

(593)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

Shopify is a versatile platform that fulfills various use cases for businesses of all sizes. Users have found success using Shopify as their primary webpage to showcase and sell unique products, catering to different brands and the general public. The platform's easy-to-use features and integration with third-party apps make it the go-to choice for most small business e-commerce requirements. Shopify has proven particularly useful for selling apparel, books, and various other products, with its seamless printing and package preparation capabilities. Additionally, organizations benefit from Shopify's efficient inventory management, integration with the US Postal Service, and discounts on order fulfillment. Notably, Shopify stands out among other e-commerce platforms due to its beginner-friendly user experience, ease of use, and integration with popular platforms like ShipStation and MailChimp. It is also highly regarded for its SEO capabilities, low cost as a hosted solution, and integrated shopping cart functionality. Overall, Shopify serves as a powerful tool for managing sales, stock, shipments, and online presence - making it the backbone of many small businesses' operations.

Based on user reviews, there are three common recommendations for Shopify. Firstly, users highly recommend Shopify for its quick and easy setup process. Customers mention that they were able to get their eCommerce stores up and running in no time, thanks to Shopify's user-friendly interface and intuitive features. Secondly, users often describe Shopify as the best plug-and-play solution for eCommerce stores. They appreciate the seamless integration of various tools and extensions, allowing them to easily customize their online stores and enhance the overall shopping experience for their customers. Lastly, reviewers also highlight the reliability of Shopify as a platform for managing their eCommerce businesses. They praise its robust infrastructure, reliable hosting, and responsive customer support team, which provides assistance whenever needed.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-25 of 30)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
April 26, 2022

Shopify Satisfy

Hamada El Shahat | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
One of the best tools to run your E-commerce, Shopify is a well-designed platform that enables you to sell products to the market. Shopify provides you with customized websites and domains. I enjoyed the 14 day trial before the actual subscription. I managed to successfully edit and build my store online easily in a few days. In order to run the site effectively, you should install Oberlo to facilitate the process of loading your products.
  • Easy bulid for your website and domain
  • Very effective and cost oriented and in the same time professional Theme
  • Help you to market to your products
  • Increase your visability with SEO
  • You have to select effective and efficient Domains
  • Some of the extra helpful tools with extra fees
  • Annual subscription not recommended if you are a starter
Overall it's very good, and helpful to sell and market your products. You can link with other social media platforms like Instegram, Facebook, and Google. [It is a] well-designed platform and you can edit inventory for your products, prices ...etc. Reports in Shopify are one of the strong points of this software as you are able to read and get results for all your marketing efforts on a daily basis.
Alex Charles | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Overall, Shopify is the best solution for me to create and build an e-commerce store without having any difficulty in planning and executing ideas. Shopify has all the features that I needed to create a store on my own. It is helping me in the organization to create stores for my clients by saving time much more. Intuitive in nature, fast processes, and built-in apps to clear the needs easily. I would definitely recommend these other platforms have this in their business to create stores easily.
  • It is easy to set up, the dashboard is easy to handle, designed with modern techniques so that we cannot have any problem while using this platform.
  • Integration with other software is amazing.
  • There are a lot of themes available for store creation which helps a lot in designing a store easily according to the needs.
  • It allows us to have several payment gateways on the store for receiving the payment which makes it greater.
  • The main drawback that Shopify has is that it lacks good apps to manage the software for free.
  • Shopify has different apps which are best to run the store on max strength but they are very costly like inventory management, generating multiple discount codes, and more robust customizable editing.
I am giving it this rating because I am a very satisfied user of Shopify. I have been using this platform for a very long time in my organization for creating a store for my clients and for the organization itself too. A perfect platform to have in the ecosystem to easily develop an idea, create a store according to the idea, set up easily, and manage the store across various channels.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
This is the number one go-to application when it comes to creating an online e-commerce store. There are a number of benefits and flexibility in setting up things and working on them. Code is quite simple and preset functions are there to take care of things that are complicated to set up for users.
  • Ease of setup.
  • Vast community of developers.
  • Great customer service.
  • Costly extensions and plugins.
  • Need third party apps to avail features.
  • Not focused on the back-end systems.
The API is quite advanced which also makes advanced scenarios. Super easy to set up and get it running. You don’t necessarily need to be a developer to set up your online store. There are graphs for analysis and reports for the sales made which make work easy. Take the best advantage of the trial.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
The need to have an affordable online e-commerce solution became even more of an issue since many businesses could not carry out their regular brick-and-mortar operations during the past 15 months. As a company that provides web services to small and medium businesses, Shopify presented a fairly straightforward solution for us to offer websites that could be launched very quickly and be easily maintained by either the customers themselves or our technical staff. The Shopify Partners program is a great option that allowed us to facilitate setup and management of Shopify accounts on behalf of customers who could not mange it themselves.
  • The Shopify platform has built-in templates which are offered either for free or for a price so that the look of a site can be customized. Even after choosing a template, the platform allows for a great deal of customization in terms of colors and the order of certain features on the page.
  • Even though Shopify is a subscription service, it has some very flexible options for stopping the service for specific lengths of time with varying permissions. For example, if a small business owner needs to step away from the business and not have the store "open', they can do so for up to 3 months at no cost as long as certain conditions have been met. These options are worth checking out especially for seasonal businesses.
  • The availability of the Shopify Partners program is also a great help for customers who might not have the knowledge or time to build the site themselves. For businesses that offer developer services, it is also a good way to help potential customers.
  • Shopify is affordable if you just need the basics for your store. However, once you start to customize it or try to add more features you can quickly find yourself paying additional monthly charges. While this good for the developers who invest time and effort to build apps for Shopify, it can leave businesses spending more than they intended or going without certain features.
  • While Shopify offers backup and restore options for sites if you need to leave the platform completely and return later, leaving the platform to move your data to another platform isn't very easy. This means that businesses need to think carefully about what they will need in the long term before committing their resources to Shopify.
  • On the ability to customize, Shopify has made great improvements in the selection of available themes and apps but the selection is nowhere near as diverse as other popular e-commerce platforms. So again as a business person, you need to carefully consider what your e-commerce roadmap looks like in terms of features and functionality. Shopify may be ideal to get most businesses started, but may not scale well as the business grows.
Shopify is best suited to small businesses that have a fairly simple product offering and a straightforward order process and are not too particular about every little detail of the site design. The platform to work for businesses whether they offer delivery services or pick-up services. If the off-line model of the business has a fairly complicated order process system, is highly technical, or requires lots of option-setting or even conditional logic during the order process, then Shopify may not be the best platform. If the business has advanced custom designs in mind for the site then Shopify may not be the best fit.
May 21, 2021

Shopify for ROI

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Shopify to sell a variety of merchandise online. We sell everyday merch and special edition merch to brand enthusiasts in the bass fishing industry. We use Shopify to organize inventory catalogs and sell merchandise directly on Instagram. We use the Instagram Shopping and integration to track conversions and sales to measure ROI on our social media advertising spend. We also use Shopify's built-in Google Analytics tracking to measure website behaviors and sales performance.
  • Integrates well with Instagram Shopping API
  • Real-time reporting for website analytics and sales performance
  • Catalog grouping and reporting
  • Inventory customization and branded design
  • Conversion reporting from Facebook with the new iOS 14 updates could be improved
  • Experienced hassles with connecting the Facebook business page multiple times
  • Google Shopping integrations with tracking pixels have been glitchy at times
  • Extremely user-friendly, especially for beginners just breaking into e-commerce
  • Excellent real-time reporting and tracking features
  • Very customizable, especially with inventory grouping
  • Very organized dashboard with almost endless integrations
  • Reasonably priced for the basic features
  • Excellent customer service and support team
  • Clean interface with robust training and tutorials for ease of deployment
  • Brand safe user settings and permissions
May 21, 2021

We love Shopify!

Matthew Bernstein | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Shopify is an amazing resource for any organization that is looking to sell goods online. It simplifies the entire e-commerce process and makes it incredibly easy to monetize a company's goods. We have not come across another e-commerce platform that has been as simple to use and implement as Shopify.
  • create new stores
  • monetize all products
  • one stop shop for all things e-commerce
  • free trial could be longer
  • increased app options
  • increased customization
Shopify is best for companies that are looking to increase their e-commerce sales and open up new revenue streams. It is incredibly easy to set up, and offers the ability to try it out on a free trial basis before unlocking the premium version, which includes more bells and whistles and features to increase the offering.
Dan Hanna | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
ResellerIncentivized
I am currently in Shopify's partner program. I build web stores for clients who are looking to start there own E-Commerce store. We also help customers who already have Shopify stores. We help them grow and upgrade their current stores. I am able to manage all parts of Shopify without having the need for more employees.
  • Shopify makes it easy to create new development stores.
  • They also make it easy to request access to customers that already have a store.
  • Shopify is a one-stop shop for all e-commerce needs including domain and hosting services.
  • It would help if I could offer my clients more than a 14 day free trial.
  • The web design can become confusing on their platform.
  • It would be nice to have more app options.
Shopify is great for someone looking to become an affiliate marketer. They have multiple features to help you sell their product. I would say it is a little less appropriate for people who have limited web design experience. It can be a little confusing when you are first starting out. Overall though, I would say that it is easy to use.
Brian Chung | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Shopify for our online e-commerce store. We use it throughout our whole organization. It's solving the business problem of having an easy e-commerce solution. The back-end system makes it easy for everyone to use. We have a bunch of Shopify sites for each of our brands that our company uses.
  • Easy back-end system
  • Beautiful and customizable templates
  • Collecting payments
  • I'd like to see more free templates that are similar to Squarespace
  • Better designs for websites that only have 1-3 products
  • Make customization easier for non-tech savvy people
Shopify is good if you have a lot of products and are looking for an e-commerce store. It handles many products better than squarespace, and is easier to manage/learn than websites like volusion. It's a great website for starting off. It feels less appropriate if you only have 1 product - use something like squarespace instead.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Shopify is being used as the eCommerce backend for two of my clients' websites. They use it to set up and sell products online along with the design and layout of the website itself. It's a great single-solution platform for most online sales and the management and creation of products for the stores.
  • Simple and easy product setup and inventory management.
  • Wide selection of design templates both free and paid.
  • Sometimes the navigation between pages when editing the site can be a little confusing.
  • Small amount of website basics are recommended for the site setup.
If you're looking for a simple one-stop shop to get your online business and eCommerce up and running Shopify is an excellent solution. Super easy to set up with just a small amount of website knowledge and extremely easy to set up and customize products. Excellent inventory management and integration with several shipping and postage apps. I would recommend having a basics knowledge of websites and eCommerce or it could get a little confusing. Their support is excellent though if you get stuck.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Shopify is a handy website management tool. We have multiple websites through Shopify to sell different products through our companies. Our customer care team uses Shopify to get orders and then enter them into our system and get them started in our company. I update our websites with new products and promotions that I can run through Shopify, such as free shipping.
  • I've used many website management tools, and Shopify was the easiest to learn. I was able to pick up the coding language and make many customizations easily.
  • Shopify has the broadest range of apps that can add specialized functionality to websites. The only downside is that most of them do cost a monthly fee. BigCommerce provides more features free than Shopify, but they have fewer apps.
  • The main reason we had to switch from Shopify for a couple of our websites is because we use the accounting software Avatax. You must be on the most expensive plan of Shopify to be able to use this. BigCommerce and Magento both provide this with any of their plans.
  • Some Shopify apps have a lot of room for improvement. You really must look at what the reviews are on the apps because some of them are not very good at providing support, or the apps are very glitchy.
Shopify is well suited for any company needing to get their website up and running quickly. The only issue is if you need to use Avatax, other than that, it is a very robust platform that is easy for anyone to use, whether they know coding or not. Unlike Magento and 3D Cart, the file structure is straightforward to understand and make changes to the pages.
Steven Duran | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We're using Shopify as the sales platform for a subscription service that we offer customers. It's being used by our e-commerce line of business and it has been fairly successful so far. It allowed us to take an idea that we had and implement it really quickly without a ton of development resources.
  • E-commerce.
If you need to create a widget and start selling it fairly quickly, then Shopify would be my first recommendation as an e-commerce platform. It's really affordable and has a generous ecosystem of applications that can be used to serve your custom business needs. It's certainly the first place to start when just beginning your e-commerce journey.
December 14, 2019

Shopify Works

Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We currently use Shopify as the platform for our official skincare e-commerce website. We have found it to be the best platform we have discovered thus far, especially if you are someone who is not very good at developing a website from scratch.
  • Shopify offers limitless themes, some are free and others are available at a decent cost.
  • The platform is more cost-effective than a lot of other platforms on the market currently.
  • Some of the apps available on the platform are lacking in quality.
  • It would be nice if the free trial would be 30 days. It does take a little time to get everything into their system.
Shopify is great for any e-commerce website. It would be a great option for someone with little to no experience in website development. It can be a little limiting when it comes to design, so if you are someone looking for a more of customizable website this may not be the best platform.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Shopify Plus is the version that we are using and it is the best online platform that we have found, bar none. We have used several different systems, including but not limited to OFBiz, Magento, and BigCommerce. Each of those other platforms have severe limitations or problems, and we have encountered none of them with Shopify. The best part for us is that we are saving thousands of $$ per month, from just hosting and general fees for merchant accounts to developers and server issues. And between the 3 active sites that we have on Shopify Plus, we are doing around $20M in sales. We love the app store and that really provides so many quick fixes or plugs gaps that we need and most of them cost little to nothing to add into your store. We couldn't be more pleased with Shopify and it has changed how we do things for the better!!!
  • Much more cost effective than any other platform that we have found.
  • Speed, speed, speed. The load times are much better than any other sites that we have used or found.
  • The app store provides solutions for any of the little changes or things that we want to do on our sites.
  • Customer service is fantastic, very helpful and quick to resolve issues that we have.
  • None that we have come across yet.
If you are wanting to run an online business, Shopify is the place to go. We have tried so many other platforms and nothing can compete with Shopify Plus. They have a slick interface, easy to use tools, and it is open enough for you to get in there and code to your heart's content. They have an awesome feature which allows you to setup wholesale clients and give them custom pricing that only they can see. It allows you to do both retail and wholesale on 1 site, which is great and has been very helpful for us to condense the number of sites that we need. The pricing is very fair too, especially when you work out multiple sites with them.
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We run Shopify Basic for eCommerce as a second storefront for our luggage business. It is used as an independent store platform alongside our BigCommerce platform. Given Shopify is a top eCommerce platform, we decided to try it and test out its performance compared to our BigCommerce store.
  • The pool of available premium themes for different sellers to purchase is deep.
  • Storefront speeds.
  • Comprehensive and deep pool of customised apps.
  • Default, out-of-the-box SEO with basic subscription is very poor over time (over 18 months) for search engine crawling.
  • The control panel speed for the merchant is very slow and nothing like the storefront speed.
  • Product creation listing is not fast or simple enough.
Shopify Basic is good for users with some level of coding knowledge who want minor theme adjustments and have SEO knowledge. For anyone completely new to Shopify, it is daunting and complicated to launch an eCommerce store without paying a professional to help set it up properly.
Mandy Cramer | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I manage the Shopify for my brand producing enamel pins and accessories. I love Shopify because I can integrate my web shop with my social media like Instagram, Facebook, etc. 97% of all my sales come from Instagram and being able to have an easy way for my customers to click on products and easily access my very user-friendly website is probably the number one reason for my sales.
  • They are partnered with tons of companies to offer app integration and channels for sales
  • I love the Instagram integration that allows my buyers to buy directly via Instagram
  • It's easy to update my orders and fulfill them via the app or the website.
  • I'd love if they could lower the fees, but they're still better than Paypal.
  • I wish there were more free layout options.
  • I'd love a way to prevent certain items from being excluded from discount codes.
I love using Shopify overall as it has definitely given me a way to sell my products. I also feel like it is well-trusted and offers enough ways to pay for goods. Another positive point is that it is so simple to use and create websites, update, and make changes to.
Marlon Seijas | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I must confess that I use this product only to carry out a personal project of a third person. My company has its own web page. In this sense, I want to tell you that during the time we were in this project, it was very useful for me and I learned it for myself. I have always played in the role of a computer, but when you discover the world, you may see something on your computer screen and you can go shopping virtually or do other things, and your amazed. I said that I have been reborn. I have discovered the communication highway.
  • One of the pluses with Shopify is that it offers unlimited storage and bandwidth. This can be helpful because you have no limitations on how quickly high-quality images, video or other content loads on your site, and you can have as many of these things on your website as you need since there’s no storage limit
  • This eCommerce platform integrates with online stores like Amazon and eBay, so if you’d like to sell your merchandise through these tools, Shopify can help you track sales and inventory.
  • With Shopify, creating and launching an online store is a matter of seconds. An important advantage is the practicality to open an online trade in a very short time. The platform guides you step by step in the process of setting up your own store, customize it to your liking, develop the design and, finally, add your products
  • Some of the features of Shopify are not very customizable. There is great adaptability in terms of design and payment gateways. However, the Checkout process is more standardized, it only gives you room for some modifications of the appearance.
  • There are free hosting platforms and, in front of Shopify, the price could be a disadvantage. But free options will never have the same characteristics, support and benefits of a payment platform. It is necessary to evaluate what is intended to be achieved and the business plan in a medium or long term
  • The helpline telephone service is currently only available in English, as are several parts of its website and the informative materials.
  • We have in mind that the models are limited and we run the risk that another merchant has, in appearance, the same view or mode
In the beginning, this platform was ideal for small businesses, however, it has already proven the falsity of such a claim, because with the service package plus stores with very high traffic can work better with Shopify than with open source software. Although, working with open source guarantees greater control of content and background changes.
September 07, 2018

Easy eCommerce with Shopify

Daniel Choi | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Shopify was being used across the whole organization. I used it to list a curated list of products. The reason I used Shopify was because it allowed me to create a website in a clean manor with minimal time and also accept payments. It also had a free trial of 60 days which allowed me to play around with the design of my website before launching live.
  • Easy to begin using
  • Lots of tutorials available
  • Offers nice layouts even with free themes
  • All the apps make it pricey. I wanted to add things like currency converters and other email marketing which would have bumped my monthly fee up by 100%.
  • A low barrier to entry means there is more competition in the eCommerce space.
Shopify is suited for people who are beginning ecommerce. They offer the best way to make a website and integrate payments. It is also suited for businesses who have expertise in their products but not necessarily in website design and coding.
August 20, 2018

Easy for ecommerce!

Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is being used across the sales department. We built us a shop online and are selling everything we can on it. It addresses the problem of having to go through Amazon or setting up shop on Craigslist. This has made us a lot more successful in selling things. We also don't have to go to many trade shows anymore s it has saved us money there.
  • There are many options to build your storefront the way you want it to look.
  • The number of apps you can add for free is awesome. Inventory counter, customer service, help us be better.
  • One of the best things is their support line is really good and helpful.
  • The transaction fees can be hurtful to the company.
  • The apps are great but they can add up when you start buying a lot.
  • Some of the coding that you have to know can be challenging if you really want your store to look like you want it to.
A small business trying to boost their online presence is very helpful. It makes it easy to sell your goods without trying very hard. It can tell you very many helpful things also when people visit your site. I think if you had more of a product that needed to be hands on it would not help your business as much.
Tony Phan | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Shopify is used for my start-up fashion shop. This allows me to push the products out to the market effectively, especially in an e-commerce booming market like the Philippines. The setup process is relatively easy for a non-tech person to set up which makes Shopify ideal for business owners who want to create a strong online platform with the purpose of pushing out their products online.
  • Inventory management: Managing inventory on Shopify is hassle free, the only part that will take time is the input of your inventory to the Shopify inventory.
  • Customer Management: Details customers fill in when surfing your website are all recorded and you will be able to access to this data for marketing purposes.
  • Order management: hassle free checkout which makes it easier to convert sales from visits.
  • Lack of good website templates: There are plenty of templates you can choose from but unfortunately, it is not free. And the free ones are not good enough.
  • Integration with Facebook Store: if you want to connect Shopify with Facebook Store on your business fan page, you might have a problem since sometimes the inventory on Facebook cannot match the inventory on Shopify.
  • Limited payment options: depends on where your business is, you will have different available payment options and it's extremely hard if you want to use a local payment gateway.
If you have some products that you want to push out to the market, let's say you are a start-up business that does not have a lot of capital to invest in a coder to develop your own website. This creates a perfect start for your business website that looks good, is responsive and professional enough for your customers to make a purchase.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Shopify is used for select e-commerce clients, all of which are privately funded startups. It is maintained by myself and our account team, while clients are responsible for day-to-day management. Shopify allows those brands manage, track, and maintain e-commerce sales in a unified platform, as well as providing easy integrations with other tools in their roster.
  • Ability to integrate with a range of other SaaS tools and platforms.
  • Easy-to-digest analytics and reporting.
  • Customizability of online stores and websites.
  • Only so much you can do with their themes.
  • Analytics may not be meaty enough for "power users."
Shopify is an excellent low-cost option for small businesses and startups, vs. larger, established retailers. Its feature set is straightforward and simplifies much of the day-to-day management of running an online store, so that owners/managers can focus on growing their business.
Jeremy Hawes | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
ResellerIncentivized
Shopify serves as our company's primary eCommerce website application software for small to medium size businesses. We both customize Shopify themes and work with 3rd party plugin developers to creates online stores for our customers needs. I personally develop in Shopify and love their semantics in liquid including their built-in version control - very friendly for developers to work with vs other eCommerce platforms. Out of the box Shopify handles all the basic needs our clients have, though there are often a few 3rd party plugins needed to solve some functional preferences that aren't included... the added prices are residual and usually very fair. The biggest con for Shopify is that for pages and collections they require /pages/ and /collections/ to be part of the URL string, which has no SEO value, but aside from that the platform is very SEO friendly.
  • Extremely quick setup and intuitive UI
  • Fast load times and hosting
  • Robust 3rd party plugin support
  • Perhaps the most developer-friendly platform I've used with built-in version control and great documentation
  • Great payment gateway compatibility (including their own, which competes well with the best of the best)
  • Overall there is great control of SEO, though they do unfortunately require /pages/ and /collections/ to be part of your URL string for those respective sections of your website - these words have pretty much no SEO value to any website and waste URL string real estate
  • Their support is good when they provide it... but they kind of don't. They offer 1 hour free support for each website, which I've had strangely become used up when I contact them for the first time. Not sure how they track that 1 hour, but you'll find it disappear faster than 1 hour for sure. You can always retreat to their support forums though.
Shopify is a great turn-key solution for most small to medium size businesses. Out of the box it handles all the functionality a basic online storefront would need. Beyond that it's scalable and robust with a vibrant and healthy 3rd party development community, who both make powerful plugins and themes and who can provide technical support at a reasonable fee. Where it is less appropriate is hard to say and would greatly depend on some very unique store customization. My recommendation would be to see consultation ahead of time if you need your store to do something you don't commonly see in other stores (emphasis on the word 'commonly').
Jared DeLong | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We're currently using shopify to sell apparel and our founder's new book. We use it to sell everything and it easily allows us to print and prepare packages thru purchasing postage right on their website. We can also work with a fulfillment service to handle all of our book orders, which cuts down on staff time and increases efficiency.
  • Easy to use software for adding products as well as building a website. Fairly customizable too.
  • Great customer service. Very quick response time.
  • Powerful and can handle lots of orders at once. I've heard of other weaker e-commerce sites crashing, but never Shopify.
  • I wish there was some more features offered in their website builder.
  • I think in the navigation, there are so many options, it may be better to condense them and also make it easier to get to your website editor.
  • Pricing is slightly high for a store that doesn't have a huge number of products.
Shopify is great for our apparel and book sales because we were able to create our whole store for free through Shopify. This store does what we need, but we would like some features to be more customizable. However, it's great to have something we can quickly update and is extremely user-friendly to change as necessary.
February 07, 2017

Shopi-No!

Heather Sahli | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I used Shopify as a sales platform for my paper collections. It was meant to increase sales and reduce the profit loss on the backend. It was used across my organization. Etsy takes 50% and it's super frustrating. Shopify takes less and the learning curve wasn't as steep. But the traffic flow to Shopify isn't as large as Etsy and driving traffic to the shop became a huge time suck that cost me more in the end than just using Etsy.
  • User Interface - learning to use Shopify took less than an hour and the storefront was ready by the end of the business day.
  • Commission - You get a bigger take on your sales compared to Etsy.
  • Inventory System - I never worried about the inventory updating. As soon as an order was placed the inventory updated immediately. Overselling was never an issue.
  • Payment Integration - It was so easy to take payments and the fees were low.
  • SEO - honestly, it sucks on Shopify. No matter how it was tagged it never showed up.
  • Driving traffic to my store was a pain in the butt. It cost more in marketing labor than Etsy ever cost.
If you're selling some cute handmade trinkets and mugs, Shopify is the place for you. The customers on there aren't really looking for professional services or professional work with real world prices. It's a something for nothing kind of customer. Shopify is not for a professional designer at all. People rip at your prices and think you're nuts because you charge them storefront prices. Definitely not the place to find your ideal client.
Gerardo S. Valerdi | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I first used Shopify last year when I needed an upgrade from my other e-commerce platform, I was very happy with how easy to use and understand the platform is. The interface makes it easy to manage your activity, track sales, stock, shipments and even product SKU. It really helped my business and I would totally recommend it!
  • Wide variety of themes.
  • Ease of use.
  • Coupons and promotions are so easy to use and share with customers.
  • Sometimes refunds can take a while.
I personally like the wide variety of themes provided and also the option to customize and make your own using Shopify's features to benefit your business and storefront. The built-in mobile shopping cart is also a great feature that has really helped my business. Nowadays customers use their devices for everything and shopping is definitely one of these things, so this feature is really beneficial for every shopify user.
Ian Smith | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I work with Shopify with my client-base. I have a lot of clients that sell things like t-shirts, mugs, and other knick-knacks, and I recommend they use Shopify. I help create graphic elements for my client's Shopify stores. Shopify helps address a lot of issues, actually. It's very easy to use, so initial setup is a snap. A lot of users are turned away by other competitor programs, but Shopify's interface and brand makes everything really easy to use. Plus, people recognize it, so they're more comfortable making purchases through the program.
  • Shopify offers 100+ amazing template-themes, so your online shop will look great. It builds credibility and trust right off the bat.
  • Shopify is super flexible and has a ton of tools/apps to meet your needs, with the functionality of your online store. They have a huge app store, where you can choose from over 1,500+ Apps (free and paid) for you to plug in.
  • Shopify offers 24/7 customer support, so if you ever have a question, you can always call! It's pretty amazing.
  • I think they could always improve on functionality. There's always room for improvement!
  • The app store could be a little easier to navigate.
  • I'd like to be able to have easier access to my store traffic statistics.
If you're selling t-shirts, knick-knacks, and other small items, Shopify is an amazing service. However, if you're more into a "human element" of service, it maybe a little problematic to work with. I've never worked with a bigger shipment, say, 2,500+ shirts for example, so I can't say much to that, but Shopify may not be ideal for that.
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