How to build your own website with Shopify in under 1 hour

Unlock a Profitable Handmade Business
in Just 12 Weeks Without Using Etsy
or Social Media

FREE WORKSHOP

This workshop is for anyone who makes and sells a handmade or physical product, including jewelry designers, artists, paper designers, bath & body product makers  and more!

What You'll Discover

The #1 mistake people make with Etsy & social media that causes shops to FLOP

 The secret to making it with your handmade shop so it's no longer just a hobby

How to make sales in your handmade shop with ease so you can finally get to 6-figures

TAKE ME THERE

  1. Victoria says:

    How lucky for me that I came upon this article!
    It’s been one of the most useful articles/tutorials I’ve read since considering using Shopify.
    I have a question: do I have to launch my site right away or can I wait a bit?
    I still have to get products and for now will have to use each vendors stock images and that will take some time. One vendor won’t sell to me until I can show him my website (even it it’s incomplete) so I’m kind of stuck in a chicken or egg situation.
    Do you see a problem with this? Thanks!

    • Mei says:

      Hey Victoria!

      Two things –
      1) You have a 14 day trial when you start your Shopify account. This way, you’ll have some time to set up your site before you’re ready to launch!
      2) I can’t remember exactly how this worked, but I believe they only asked you to pay for your Shopify account when you want to start taking payments/make sales on your site. So you can definitely have a site up that the public could view but in order to start getting orders, you’ll need to start your account with Shopify. This is what I recall when I started, but could be wrong. The Shopify team are super helpful, so I encourage you to ask them too! https://www.shopify.com/contact

  2. Karla says:

    Thank you! My son and I are starting a shopify store and this was very helpful. Especially the part about how to add shipping.

    • Mei says:

      I’m so happy to hear you’re benefitting from the information! :) Be sure to check back again for more useful topics!

  3. Jon C says:

    Thank you for your helpful article. I noticed that you mentioned selling digital products. I’m looking for a way to sell both physical products and make referral sales. I’ve not found a solution after several hours of research. Any suggestions? Thanks again.

  4. Janell says:

    Hi there, this was very helpful. I have a few questions…

    1. What if I already purchased a domain from another website host? Can I use that for my Shopify account? I was not happy with the other site and cancelled.

    2. Does Shopify allow you to set up your own email addresses? For example: my site is http://www.JaeBiRdThReads.com and I want to set up email addresses xxxx@JaeBiRdThReads.com.

    • Mei says:

      Hi Janell!
      I’m glad this was helpful. If you purchased your domain from elsewhere, you can definitely use that for your Shopify account. They walk you through how to point your domain name to your shop comes up. You’ll have to configure some settings on your domain registrar side, where you bought your domain name.

      Shopify doesn’t set up email addresses for you, but you can get your own custom branded domain using Zoho Mail. https://www.zoho.com/mail/
      Since you use Gmail, you can set up Zoho to forward all emails to your Gmail account, so you don’t have to login to multiple email inboxes, and just manage email from one place!

    • Hello Mei
      Thank you for this amazing article and your generosity in sharing your knowledge
      My initial 14 day trial just expired while I was trying to figure everything out and Shopify has now started charging me . I feel better equipped to set it up now or continue setting it up.
      I’m confused about buying the domain name
      I purchased it years ago Mollybloomflowers. com from Hostgator when I was trying to do WP but I dont know if its mine still since I abandoned them . And if its not available how do I know its not taken by me ?
      I need your help badly as you can see?

  5. Carolina says:

    Hello Mei,

    I currently run an Etsy shop selling digital items. I can’t live from it yet, but I have income that could pay for Shopify. I did open a Shopify shop but I closed it because I felt that driving traffic to both shops could be very hard, especially to Shopify. What I was thinking was to first position my Etsy shop and then move to Shopify. I would like to hear your thoughts if you consider this the right path or if I should re-open my Shopify store and focus there?

    Thanks very much

    • Mei says:

      Hey Carolina,

      What you just described is a trap I’ve seen so many makers fall into. Running their own website is hard, so they focus months and years of time and energy into their Etsy shop. Only to find out that when you DO want to switch over your focus, it would have been too late and it’ll feel a lot like starting over from scratch. Making that switch over is not easy and will definitely feel like you’re starting over.

      Focus on your main website (Shopify) and treat Etsy as a source of semi-passive income, meaning that you can work on optimizing your listing titles and tags and letting Etsy search do the hard marketing work for you. Once you get your listings optimized, getting sales on Etsy is hands off. But Etsy is not a place for you to build a brand that lasts over years. You have little control over how they send traffic to your shop.

      See here for a more comprehensive explanation for this: https://www.creativehiveco.com/the-etsy-argument/

  6. Wendy says:

    I am a distributor for a company that doesn’t allow us to have a website with pay button. It must be invoiced to the buyer. I know there is a way, because all the independent distributors are talking about Shopify on Facebook and that it is compliant to the company rules. How do I avoid a “pay button”. Also, on that note, there is a $9.00 monthly option that appears to be the option without payment options–is that the one I want?

  7. paula says:

    Hi there!What a great, step-by-step tutorial-thank you so much!
    I was wondering however, is it possible to begin with the $29/month plan, and then switch up to the $79/month plan in a month or two if I find that will work better (or visa versa)? I just don’t want to find myself “stuck” in a plan that isn’t working for me.

    Thank you so much!

  8. keisha manley says:

    Hello, I am writing because I would like to know how much should a person start off with if they are selling online? I tried to set up a store on the Square Up website, and I wanted to try another online store. Th difference between the Square Up website and others is that they accept only credit cards for payments. I was thinking if I wanted to sell an item I would have to have a certain amount in the bank for deposits and transactions. If I use the website Square up, I think that the prices would add up because of of the credit card interests and because they do not accept cash. What website is better suggested for a person who wants to start an online store but has less than 1,000 and wants to sell five products online to start off with?

  9. Hello Mei, thank you sharing your experiences in your podcast and blog post about Shopify. I have been testing the site for free and wonder about the blog aspect.

    I’m wondering if I should I blog within Shopify or continue to use Blogspot, which is linked to many places over the web including Pinterest (which drives over 50% traffic to my Etsy shop)?

    If I were to transition to blogging on Shopify, how would I fix all those Pinterest links?

    Thank you for your time!
    Cecelia

  10. Emily says:

    I have the same question

  11. Rasheedah says:

    How would you recommend setting shipping rates. I want to sell handmade jewelry, primarily earrings? What would be the simplest way to set a shipping rate? I was thinking flat rate but I don’t know how much I would need to charge or how to figure that out.

  12. I’ve had my items on ebay to start with and then on Bonanza I have almost 2,000 to 3000 items I do not want to have to start relisting each and everyone. Is there a bulk load to get my items to Shopify? Can I still use my PayPal account via Shopify? Right now those are my two main questions

  13. It’s Amazing Information! Shopify is the leading E-commerce platform designed for all sizes of businesses. You can read tutorials and courses available on Shopify blogs.

  14. Suzanne says:

    Thank you for this helpful info! I have a question for you. I am not big on social media, and abstained from FB for Lent 3 years ago, and when Lent was over I never went back and closed my account because I found I didn’t really miss it. But, I realize that if I am going to start a business, I will probably need to put my product out on as many social media outlets as possible. Is there anyway to create accounts on those platforms that are not “fake” so to speak, but not directly linked to me personally? Any information in doing so would be greatly appreciated!

  15. Allison Villagran says:

    Thank you so much for this! I was nervous about Shopify and was going to go with Etsy, thank God I found you! This eased my stress a little bit and now I am so excited to start my business.
    Could you do an informative video or post about taxes for small businesses? That scares me the most.

  16. Elzy says:

    Hi Mei.
    I am so happy to have found you on YouTube! I am running your April 2020 workshop in the background while writing this and everything makes sense! It got me to start picking up my dream again. That is such an encouraging impact you have!

    I opened my Etsy store in March for digital planners. Had 10 sales and 5 star reviews, but I never had a payout from Etsy. My very low sales went into paying their ads. I have a WordPress website and had a Content team, which didn’t work out. So I’ve been in a gap for 2 months know.

    Would you recommend Shopify for digital products?

  17. manimix508 says:

    A great-looking website design can do wonders to make an online business successful on the internet. I am impressed with your creativity. Keep it up. Thanks for providing useful information to us.

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