Tips & Tools For Starting A WordPress eCommerce Store ⭐

WordPress — the most popular blogging platform — is undoubtedly the most popular e-commerce platform as well. WooCommerce by Automattic — its most popular plugin for creating e-commerce stores — runs over 25% of the world’s online stores, according to BuiltWith. So, it brings us to the question:

Why is WordPress so popular? First and foremost, it’s free (except the domain and hosting costs), and it’s supported by a large community of developers and users. Then, you’ve got various e-commerce plugins for WordPress — most of the plugins are free and avails additional features for affordable prices.

That said, if you’re looking to create an e-commerce store, you’re at the right place. Whether you’re looking for great tips and tricks for beginners or the best plugins and tools to run your online store, I’ve got you covered. In this write-up, I’ve compiled the best tips/tricks along with the top plugins for WordPress.

10 Tips For WordPress-Powered E-commerce Store?

Let’s begin by reading the must-know tips and tricks for starting an e-commerce store. You must implement the following tips/tricks to get successful.

1. Add quality images

If you add high-quality images, it helps people to know your product’s details — especially if you have a design or fashion store. Then, it also helps your store to get featured or participate in shopping campaigns on Google Search.

2. Add product videos

It’s essential to add product videos for selling more — especially if you’re selling an electronic or digital product. It helps people to trust your product since they can view your product in action in the video and get to know it better.

3. Optimize product titles

You must optimize product titles (and even descriptions) for SEO. It helps your product to get featured or rank higher in search engines. In short, your titles must be descriptive, and they must contain relevant keywords too.

4. Transparent policies

People always look for policies before buying a product. If you keep them short and simple (maybe an explanation at the top), it builds trust in your customers. They’ll know they’re not being lied or deceived using legal jargon.

5. Simple registration

People are usually in a rush while buying their favorite products online. If they get stuck at a long registration form, they get annoyed and cancel the process. That said, your registration page must ask only the necessary info.

6. Easy purchase process

The purchase process should be quick and simple. You must include only the required steps and data. For example, it shall be totally optional to add coupons (maybe a button on the cart; not a pop-up demanding some action).

7. Promote on social media

You must promote your products online to grow your customers. Maybe you can connect with influencers, plan an advertising campaign, run a promotional contest, or post useful videos or tutorials on social media platforms.

8. Add a blog to your store

A blog helps in many ways. First of all, your store gets more content, which can lead to better search engine rankings. Then, you can post news or tutorials to inform your customers. Finally, it engages probable customers.

9. Manage loading times

With mobile now being the primary platform, site speed is crucial for selling more products. If your website loads slowly, people may abandon and buy from a competitor. So, you must invest in a fast website infrastructure.

10. Build mobile-friendly

Since the majority of people now browse the web through mobile devices, it’s a must for every e-commerce store to support mobiles. Your mobile site should be quick to load and offer easy navigation and impressive features.

10 Plugins & Tools for WordPress E-commerce Store

Now, let’s discuss the best plugins and tools for launching an e-commerce store with WordPress. I’ll start with WooCommerce. Did you guess it?

1. WooCommerce

WooCommerce is the most customizable — and the most popular — eCommerce platform that leverages WordPress. It’s customizable and extendable; you can use its extensions to add new features or customize old features.

It also avails mobile apps so that you can manage your store on the go. Since it’s the most popular e-commerce platform, you get a lot of options while choosing a theme, a service provider, or support for setting up the store.

2. MemberPress

MemberPress is a membership plugin for WordPress, which allows you to add a paywall to your blog or website. That means you can use this plugin to restrict content and charge your users for gaining access to the premium content.

You can create and manage memberships with MemberPress. Then, you can allow or disallow access to posts, videos, and digital files per membership.

3. Easy Digital Downloads

Easy Digital Downloads boasts of a superb solution for selling digital products through WordPress. Whether it’s ebooks, photos and videos, software, songs, or any other digital good, you’re in good hands with this solution.

You can localize your website and add payment gateways per requirements. Also, you can extend it using extensions to supercharge your online store.

4. ConvertKit

ConvertKit is an email marketing solution that works with WordPress. It helps you to customize and embed forms on your e-commerce website for turning your readers into loyal subscribers. But, that’s just the start!

You can organize the subscribers using segments and tags. Then, you can send personalized emails to them, and also integrate it with other tools.

5. HubSpot

HubSpot is a popular customer relationship management solution. HubSpot for WordPress brings its power to your e-commerce store. Its plugin helps you to grow your business by improving marketing, sales, and services.

It offers numerous features such as contact management, forms and popups, live chat and chatbots, email automation, built-in analytics, and a lot more.

6. Veeqo

Veeqo is an inventory and order management solution for WooCommerce. It’s a centralized platform for managing orders and shipping, syncing inventory, and processing returns. It supports other e-commerce platforms as well.

You can sync inventory across numerous online and physical stores to avoid overselling products. It also helps at returning or shipping products efficiently.

7. LearnDash

LearnDash is a superb tool to start your e-learning platform. It offers numerous features to build courses, monetize them, and do everything in between. You can create quizzes, incorporate forums, and award badges and certificates.

Also, it features subscriptions, memberships, course bundles and licenses, and more for monetizing your courses. Doesn’t it sound like a great tool?

8. Relevanssi

Relevanssi is a “better search” solution for WordPress. It replaces the de facto search engine to provide superior results along with the better presentation.

It comes with lots of features and customization options. It allows searching for phrases and supports fuzzy matching for matching partial words. It can also index custom post types, and it provides “Did you mean?” suggestions.

9. 404page

404page is the most-used plugin for creating error pages in WordPress. Since 404 pages don’t provide any information, you lose customers if someone visits an unavailable page and lands on a 404 page on your online store.

However, 404page helps you fix this. You can create custom pages to replace the default error pages, which may include helpful info and product links.

10. Clever Ecommerce Ads

Clever Ecommerce Ads is a powerful marketing automation tool for improving your marketing strategy with Google Ads. It helps to auto-generate relevant keywords based on the products and categories in your store.

If you opt for Google Ads, it’s a helpful solution. This plugin optimizes your advertising campaigns, adjusts your bids, and maximizes your budget.

That’s all about the best tips and tricks and the must-have plugins and tools for launching an e-commerce store with WordPress. (Source: hongkiat)

Happy learning!

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