If you’re an eCommerce store owner who wants to reach customers internationally, Shopify makes it easy to do. Now that Shopify Markets has launched, we can put a stop to the age-old question: should I sell through a marketplace or directly to consumers?
If you think about it, even a small eCommerce business with a few hundred sales per week or a day can add up to be a lot of profits lost when you consider international shipping and added duties. That’s because most businesses choose to sell internationally through a marketplace where they get lower fees.
The first step to gaining international customers has always been to set up shop in different markets. If a business wanted to sell on Amazon, they had to demonstrate knowledge of the market, understand the local laws and customs, and coordinate sales with a partner who would handle pricing and shipping.
Shopify introduced Shopify Markets, which opens up the global market to merchants by removing the need for a third party to handle cross-border sales.
How is Shopify making selling to international markets easier? Shopify is removing the complexities of enabling cross-border eCommerce from a single Shopify site. Instead of setting up a multi-region site, or using a marketplace or another retailer, merchants can now reach consumers worldwide directly from the one Shopify store they already have.
Merchants will no longer need to worry about different customer payment methods, currency conversion, language localization, and duty and import taxes that come from selling through a third party. It’s as simple as checking off which countries you want to sell to and hitting publish.
Shopify Markets is the fastest, most reliable way to sell internationally.
What makes Shopify Markets Unique?
Shopify has announced the launch of Shopify Markets, a new app that lets merchants sell to customers in other countries.
With Shopify Markets, you can:
- Easily enter new markets. You can now sell your products in more than 20 countries with just a few clicks.
- Create tailored experiences for each market. Create custom listings and product pages with translated descriptions and pricing information.
- Customize variables. Set up multiple currencies, tax rates, and shipping rates for different countries within one store.
How to Sell Internationally with Shopify?
#1 Identify & Explore International Markets
Let’s face it: selling internationally isn’t cheap. Start-ups in particular tend to focus on domestic sales and not necessarily global expansion. But, if you do decide to go after international markets, here are some things to keep in mind:
Identifying international target markets is one of the most crucial steps in expanding your business to new markets. You’re going to need to look at your traffic and sales data, as well as competitors’ strategies, in order to determine where you should be focusing your efforts.
Understand your international market with Shopify’s analytics features. Identifying the right target markets for your business requires an understanding of not only your target customer but also the demand for products within their region.
#2 Prices must match your buyer’s local currency
If you’re going to sell internationally, the first step is to ensure that your buyers can pay for your products in their own currency. After all, 33% of international visitors won’t even consider making a purchase if their local currency isn’t offered.
This is a crucial first step in converting and one that we take care of on your behalf so you can focus on creating winning products instead. Shopify Payments makes it easy to offer prices in your buyers’ local currency, helping you make more sales while reducing customer confusion and friction.
#3 Control your International Pricing
International pricing can be confusing, especially when non-native currencies are involved. Luckily, Shopify makes it easy to sell online internationally with automatic or manual FX rates.
Shopify helps you manage and grow your online store, no matter where it’s based. Automatic FX rates are a great “set and forget” strategy that can help you save time and money on currency conversion fees.
Manual FX rates, on the other hand, allow you to preselect an appropriate rate that will be used to convert your prices into foreign currencies. This means that your product prices will remain stable until you change that rate again.
#4 Sorting Taxes
When it comes to taxes, businesses need to know where their customers are from and ship accordingly. Shopify makes it easy to display prices in various markets around the world, including North American markets that prefer exclusive and other markets that usually mandate inclusive pricing.
#5 International Shipping
Shipping is a substantial part of the price for customers in other countries. To help cover these costs, you need to create specific shipping zones for your new international target market(s) in your Shipping settings and create different shipping rates for each zone.
The specifics will vary based on several factors, including what carriers you are using, but even if you are only shipping some items internationally, set up at least one zone with a rate that corresponds to what you plan to charge.
#6 Use International Domain Names
International domains are a great way to target specific markets and localize the storefront experience for them. They allow you to leverage local top-level domains (.com, .co.uk, .de, etc.) or subdomains that you can set up with your current hosting provider.
By using international domains and ccTLDs, your website can automatically adjust to suit buyers in specific markets. This helps to improve the buyer’s experience by setting local currency pricing and defaulting language to their own.
The international domain provides a more compelling visual indicator to buyers that they are browsing in their own market’s version of your storefront. International domains also increase the likelihood of buyers paying in their own currency without having to do anything because they set pricing and language defaults for each market that you are targeting.
Conclusion
In conclusion, there are many reasons why Shopify is a good choice to market internationally. Setting up your store with Shopify is simple because it’s not international-specific like other marketplaces. Best of all, you can choose whether you want to sell through a local country storefront or a more global storefront on the Shopify platform.
Ultimately, the decision of choosing whether to sell through a marketplace or directly to the end consumer rests on a few factors. If you are confident that your business knows what it’s doing and is ready to handle international sales, selling directly has many benefits. However, if it is your first time dealing with overseas customers, a marketplace can help you grow more quickly and get your name out there faster before committing to setting up shop abroad.
Want to reach more customers internationally and boost Shopify Sales organically? We have something for you. JustHyre now offers Shopify SEO plans, where a team of Shopify experts will examine and understand your site’s SEO issues and work on bettering it in order to reach more international customers and boost sales.