E-commerce store owners have lots of opportunities to make money online using Shopify. In fact, in certain instances you don’t even need to sell anything! Some affiliate and sponsorship programs allow users to make money by simply supplying referrals for a commission. Between selling products and services, and creating successful referrals from your shop to Shopify’s platform, there’s a lot of potential to make good money.
For savvy sellers with a unique product or niche, good marketing strategies, and knowledge of alternative revenue-making opportunities (like affiliate programs), there’s a lot of opportunity to grow your online business effectively and quickly with Shopify.
This is just one of the many reasons why Shopify has become so popular, and is operating in over 90 countries worldwide. As the fourth biggest e-commerce platform on the planet, Shopify recently celebrated a record 90% growth rate, reaching nearly 1.75 million operational stores across the globe.
Let’s take a look at how you can leverage Shopify to cash-in and grow your own business.
Will I Be Able to Earn Revenue With Shopify?
Shopify is great for small business owners looking to start a new money-making venture. And, although many find success–there are some tricks of the trade to be aware of. With only 5% of Shopify stores finding success, there are some tricks of the trade to be aware of.
High Shopify failure rates can be tied to not knowing enough about your options. Let’s explore some common questions and answers that can help you build greater success with your Shopify store.
People also ask: What Types Of Websites Make The Most Money?
What Should I Know About Shopify, Before I Open a Store?
Before building a Shopify store, do your homework. It is a good idea to map out your business plan. Identify your goals, your product niche, your target demographic, and any immediate obstacles you’ll need to account for. With these basics in hand, you’ll be better positioned for next steps. To help you get started, consider the following tips—before you start building your Shopify store:
- Look into the Shopify store builder (a good tool to help you grow your business ideas, before finalizing anything).
- Perform a thorough market research before investing any cash.
- Find a niche that is suitable for your business, perform client research to understand your target e-commerce audience, and cater for their unique needs.
- Explore setting up a campaign, or marketing strategy, for the first year of your business.
- Explore different digital channels to help you create, market, and promote your brand.
- Experiment with different SEO tactics, to help you figure out what works best.
- Create your own content streams, start a blog, or launch a YouTube channel in your niche. This can also be helpful in boosting your website traffic.
- Research and teach yourself how to use tools (like analytic trackers) to better understand your website (with Shopify, there are simple tools to help you do this).
- Decide on the shipping and payment methods you’ll be using, and do a test run to better gauge the quality of and reliability of your shipping.
- Make sure your website is fully Google Search compliant. Use Google’s design specifications to help ensure your site is optimized correctly. (Most Shopify stores are Google Search Engine compliant. How you design your store will impact your SEO.)
- Carefully create and edit your store content. Watch for grammatical and spelling errors and only post content original to you and your site (no plagiarized or previously published pieces).
- Aim to build a cohesive look and feel to your site, and select images and designs that reflect your niche and style.
What Are Some Of The Ways I Can Make Money With Shopify?
There are various ways to make money using Shopify. Just a few of the methods we’ll discuss later in this article include:
- Starting an e-commerce store
- Offering dropship products for other businesses
- Becoming a Shopify affiliate
- Selling niche products
- Building an e-store for local shops
- Marketing digital product sales
- Monetizing your social media channels
- Offering freelance services
Start an E-commerce Store
Building an e-commerce store is perhaps the most popular way to earn from Shopify. This platform makes it easy to set-up shop, without having to deal with many hassles. You don’t have to manage hosting services, servers, or web development. And, with nine premium plans to choose from—you’re sure to find something that fits well with your business needs.
What can I do with Shopify?
You can sell a variety of products, offer various services, and resell goods from other brands through Shopify’s platform. You can easily curate items, leverage tools to help you build Google SEO-compliant pages (without needing development experience, and select from a variety of themes. Shopify’s UI is very beginner friendly, and gives your customers a seamless checkout experience—along with trustworthy shipping and tracking services.
People also ask: How Long Do Shopify Stores Last?
What can’t I do with Shopify?
Shopify does have a standardized list of prohibited items that can’t be sold through its stores. To avoid any issues with your online shop, prior to set up, spend some time getting familiar with Shopify’s policies regarding apps and store operations. It’s also a good idea to use the free policy generator tool to create your business policies.
Shopify’s prohibited list of items and services includes:
- Cigarettes
- Drugs
- Prostitution
- Pornography
- Firearms
- Alcohol
- Explosives
- Fireworks
- Live animals
- Waste
- Poison
- Flammable chemicals
- Refurbished items sold as new
- Hazardous medical equipment
- Virus, trojans, and malicious software
What are some of Shopify’s value-add features?
Shopify’s Buy Buttons, Apps, and Plugins Store add even more functionality to your Shopify site. Make use of strategies like blogging to drive more traffic to your storefront and give you a better chance of increasing your sales. There are different apps available on the store that provide help for managing abandoned cart email notifications, upselling apps to pair related products, and much more.
Dropship Products for Other Businesses
Dropshipping is a popular way to make money with Shopify, because of its low costs and good profit margins. Without no pressure to stock inventory, and no hefty marketing campaigns required, dropshipping can be a beneficial option for Shopify merchants hoping to increase their earnings. But, it also offers a great service for business owners who can’t (or don’t want to) stock products sold through their online store.
What is dropshipping?
The dropshipping business model allows store owners to outsource products, shipping, order tracking, and storage to a third party. This reduces the strain on business owners who may not be able to keep an inventory. And can be mutually beneficial to dropshippers, as they don’t need to make actual sales or market the products sold through their partnering seller’s e-commerce site.
How do I make dropshipping work for me?
To put dropshipping into action for you, find suppliers with products similar to your niche, and upload a new SKU (Stock Keeping Unit). Whenever a customer makes a purchase in your store, your dropshipper will handle everything from product shipping, inventory tracking, customer claims, managing defective products, tracking delivery, and any other services you want to provide to your customers.
People also ask: How Much Does It Cost to Monetize My Website?
Shopify partners with some of the world’s best dropshipping suppliers, like Oberlo, Spocket, and DSer. This makes the dropshipping experience easy for both dropshipping suppliers and sellers.
Become a Shopify Affiliate
To earn revenue with Shopify, you don’t always have to rely on selling or offering services. The Shopify affiliate program offers a great way to make a fair amount of money in a short amount of time.
Being a Shopify affiliate can be a good option for content creators, teachers, influencers, celebrities, and anyone who wants to inspire others to start a Shopify store. As a Shopify partner, you simply leverage your existing audience to refer visitors to the Shopify platform, and you get paid a commission for each successful conversion. So, for example, every time someone registers for a Shopify premium business plan from links on your site, you get paid a commission, based on how much they spend.
Sell Niche Products
Market and niche research are essential for establishing a successful brand and getting a better understanding of your customer’s goals.
Selling products to a select group of people is easier, when you have an understanding of your target niche. With that info in-hand, you can more effectively draft a marketing strategy that can translate into solid sales. Knowing who your customers are, how to address them, and their specific needs can help you grow your sales and build leads.
Start an E-commerce Store for Local Shops and Vendors
Another way to make money with Shopify is to offer your e-commerce services to local stores and vendors. You can either get paid to run a store for local entrepreneurs, help them build a store, or make deals to purchase discounted products from them. For example, pawn shops and antique stores can make for good Shopify partners.
Search engines like Google and Bing allow you to increase your online visibility by providing your store’s physical address on Google Maps, and provide the relevant details like what time you are open, contact details, and more.
Market Digital Download and Product Sales
Selling digital products and downloads is a great way to make money without spending much on physical inventory.
The beauty of selling digital products is that you only have to create it once—and it can be sold an infinite number of times. You can sell Ebooks, NFTs, video game currency, video game skins, podcasts, video lessons, lectures, or educational courses and tutorials.
Monetize Social Media Channels
Social media is one of the best ways to market anything in the world, and can be monetized in numerous ways. If you have a healthy social media following, your audience traffic could be leveraged in an affiliate program.
Shopify’s “Buy Now” buttons can be a great tool to help monetize your social media channels. Offered through many Shopify plans, a Buy Now button allows you to market your products on various social media platforms. If your customer clicks the button, they can make a purchase without leaving the app they’re currently within.
Offer Your Freelance Services
If you are a freelancer looking for new projects, Shopify can provide a solution to your problem. A Shopify store allows you to showcase your portfolio, offer paid consultant services, and can give your potential clients a more polished, professional experience.
The cost of maintaining a Shopify portfolio site can be very low, and good traffic will help you score more jobs and make more money.
How Do I Get Started Using Shopify?
It can take time, knowledge, effort, dedication, and marketing to build a successful brand and Shopify business. And there are no shortcuts. But knowing the basics and having a clear strategy can help get you on the right track. Be sure to check out our library of articles on how to effectively use Shopify, monetize your website, and market your business here. Be sure to also take advantage of Shopify’s 14-day free trial (it’s the best way to learn more about what the platform has to offer).
Learn more
Be sure to check out our recent Shopify articles and discover ways to ensure your Shopify store is successful.
