How to Set up a WooCommerce Shop

WooCommerce is the most popular free e-commerce solution around. The software boasts over 4+ million active installs and a 4.6 user rating on WordPress. In fact, WooCommerce now powers more than 8% of all online stores, and each day their band of loyal digital store owners grows larger.

Online shopping has become increasingly popular. If a retailer in today’s market does not have an online presence, they are seriously missing out an opportunity to grow their brand and increase their sales in a major way. If you’re ready to open up your own virtual shop on a platform like WordPress, WooCommerce is the perfect integrative technology to meet your needs.

We’ve provided you with a few simple steps you can use to get WooCommerce up and running on your website.

STEP 1: SELECT A HOSTING SITE

We all know that when you’re trying to run your own business that time is money. That’s why it’s important to ensure that you have a fast and reliable WordPress host to maintain higher conversion rates and ROI.

There are several hosting companies that provide pre-installs of WordPress and WooCommerce with ecommerce-specific features. For example some hosting sites devote a IP and SSL certificate to your webpage so that you can feel confident that your online store is protected and secure.

STEP 2: INSTALL WORDPRESS

Once you have setup a space to begin building your website, it’s time to integrate your hosting site with the WordPress software platform.

You’ll find that most hosting companies offer one-click WordPress installation. If for some reason you can’t find this feature on your hosting site, make sure you ask if this option is available. If it’s not, you can easily download from WordPress.org and follow the instructions to complete your installation.

STEP 3: CHOOSE YOUR THEME

This by far will be the most rewarding part of setting up your online store. Your theme is the look and feel you want for your website. You can choose from one of the free themes included with WordPress or purchase one of the premium themes available.

There are literally thousands of themes and tens of thousands of plugins you can use to improve the functionality of your WordPress site. The plugin developers also allow you to purchase extensions from their extensions store. Most of them are WooCommerce specific themes that feature tons of styling options.

STEP 4: GET WOOCOMMERCE ACTIVATED

Once your website is ready to go, your next step will be to activate WooCommerce and ensure it is complete with the ecommerce functionality you need to start selling!

You can sign up for a free WooCommerce account on WooCommerce.com

• Create an account with WordPress.com and WooCommerce.com

• Choose from one of the following options:

• • A pre-installed solution with a trusted host
  • Auto-installing WooCommerce if you have a WordPress site already
  • Download the zip file and do it yourself

• Download the WooCommerce plugin

After downloading the WooCommerce plugin, go to your website and complete the following steps:

• Go to: Dashboard > Plugins > Add New > Upload
• Select the downloaded plugin
• Once installation is complete, select “activate”
• Once your plugin is activated, your will be directed to launch the Setup Wizard. The Setup Wizard is a great tool that will help guide you through all of the required steps for setting up your web store. After clicking begin, the wizard will automatically generate a shopping cart, checkout, and user account pages for your store.

You’ll then be able to adjust your store’s basic settings, including which currency to use. On the next screen, you’ll be able to decide whether to charge sales tax, and determine what shipping features you’d like to require. Lastly, you can select which payment methods you’d like to accept.

You should note that WooCommerce only supports PayPal and Stripe, however you have the ability to add additional gateways by using extensions.

STEP 5: TAKE ADVANTAGE OF WOOCOMMERCE EXTENSIONS

You can greatly enhance the customer experience of your online store by using extensions to improve the functionality oWooCommerce is the most popular free e-commerce solution around. The software boasts over 4+ million active installs and a 4.6 user rating on WordPress. In fact, WooCommerce now powers more than 8% of all online stores, and each day their band of loyal digital store owners grows larger.

Online shopping has become increasingly popular. If a retailer in today’s market does not have an online presence, they are seriously missing out an opportunity to grow their brand and increase their sales in a major way. If you’re ready to open up your own virtual shop on a platform like WordPress, WooCommerce is the perfect integrative technology to meet your needs.

We’ve provided you with a few simple steps you can use to get WooCommerce up and running on your website.

STEP 6: ADD YOUR FIRST WOOCOMMERCE PRODUCT

The final step before you’re officially ready to start selling is to get your products up on your site! To do this, go to your WordPress dashboard and find the new Product tab. Clicking on it will open up a new page that allows you to add in your first product.

This page is where you’ll create your product name and description and add a featured image. You can even add multiple photos for each product as part of a gallery.

Are you looking for other ways to help grow your business? Listing Mirror has a number of products to help streamline your business through listing management, order fulfillment, inventory synching and warehouse management. We’re here to help you sell more so you can work less. Register now to get started!