Dropshipping is one of the most sought-after business models in today’s Internet age. This is especially true for entrepreneurs who don’t want to make a large initial investment. Dropshipping businesses can use many hosting platforms to help them manage their online stores. These platforms include Shopify, WooCommerce.
Both are well-known in the field of hosting solutions for eCommerce businesses. What are the differences? Which one should dropship? This article will discuss the strengths, weaknesses, and potential benefits of Shopify and WooCommerce dropshipping. Then you can make your own decision based on your specific needs. Let’s get started!
Dropshipping with Shopify
What is Shopify?
Shopify allows you to create an online store using a website-hosting platform. Shopify includes all packages and you don’t need to purchase separate hosting. Shopify offers all the features you need to create and run an online shop .
Shopify doesn’t require you to pay for it immediately. You can use Shopify for 14-day free trial before making a final decision. Shopify offers a free trial period where you can create a website on your own using the free themes and apps.
Shopify is software as a service (Software as a Service) tool. You don’t have to own the website and hosting. Instead, you pay a monthly subscription fee. You can access your Shopify store anywhere you are as long as you have an Internet connection and a web browser.
Pros and cons of Shopify
PROS:
Functional and well-designed Dashboard:The Shopify dashboard interface has been designed to be very user-friendly
Shopify dashboard will allow you to manage your eCommerce site. The Shopify dashboard offers a variety of reports and features that will allow you to see how your online shop is performing in terms sales, orders, and other metrics. With just a few clicks, you can view a live report on the number of orders you have received, which products are performing well, and check your inventory.
Free features:
Choosing a theme is a key step in building a website. Shopify is different. Although themes aren’t free, they can be purchased for a nominal fee. You can find many free themes that are suitable for multiple purposes on the Shopify theme shop.
These themes are completely free. These themes have no limitations in functionality. The theme can be customized to fit your branding style. You can use any fonts you like, change your color scheme, insert photos, and many other options. You can also use thousands of stock photos that Shopify photographers have taken to illustrate eCommerce themes. This offer is perfect for those who are just starting out and want to see how it works before investing.
No matter your level of expertise, there is a plan that will suit you:
Let’s not be too harsh. While it’s fine to start with freebies, once you are confident that you can manage a serious online business, investing money is necessary. Products, marketing costs, domain fees, and Shopify plans will all need to be paid.
But don’t panic. Shopify offers a variety of pricing plans. You can sign up for the Shopify Lite, which costs $9 per month. The Basic plan costs $29 per month if you have a bigger budget. The Shopify Plus plan will suit you if your business idea is very promising and you want to open a large store immediately. For more information, you can read our review on Shopify plans.
Tons of’ apps:
You can find an app to perform almost any function in your Shopify store . Apps can be used to countdown times, dropshipping apps, or product sourcing apps. You will have to pay for many apps. There are many free apps you can also use.
Lots of support:
Shopify offers many support options. Shopify’s ultimate goal is to help users succeed on their platform. They do everything they can to make that happen.
The Shopify Academy is a free course that is available to all eCommerce entrepreneurs who are new to Shopify. This course covers a variety of topics related to Shopify, eCommerce, and business. Shopify has a team of support representatives that are available 24/7 to help you if you have any problems with your store. Shopify has a community where eCommerce experts are available to offer their help and advice to newbies.
Selling on multiple channels:
Shopify allows you to integrate your platforms with multiple sales channels, allowing you to reach more customers and increase sales. These are the top channels you can integrate with your Shopify store.
- Amazon – Connecting Shopify and Amazon Professional Seller.
- Shopify Products on Facebook: Sell your Shopify products through a Facebook page
- Pinterest: Sell your products directly through pins
- Shopify Apps for Sale – Sell Shopify apps that you create.
Outstanding site performance:
Shoppers don’t like to wait in long lines and don’t like websites that load slowly. Customers are more likely to abandon a site that loads slowly than they are to visit your website. If customers leave your website before visiting it, your products won’t be seen or sold. Shopify websites load quickly so you don’t need to worry about slow loading sites.
Shopify powers more than 1,000,000 stores as of 2019:
Shopify already has the number.
CONS:
Shopify has its strengths and weaknesses, despite all of its great features.
It uses a specific coding language.
Shopify themes are all coded in this way. It makes it difficult to customize your theme if you don’t know the language. Although this is not a problem for Shopify, it is an issue for many Liquid users. This is not a problem as Shopify support is always available to assist you with customizing your theme.If you wish to modify Shopify themes yourself, Liquid is required.
Monthly subscription:
Although Shopify starts at $9/month, this Lite plan is only for Buy Button sellers and doesn’t require a separate website. Shopify is available starting at $29/month if you are looking to create and manage a functional, standalone website.
Transactions Fee:
Shopify charges a 1% transaction fee for all users. The fee was charged for all Shopify plans. However, it is no longer applicable if you use the Shopify payment option to process your credit card.
Dropshipping with WooCommerce
What is WooCommerce?
WooCommerce does not offer hosted solutions like Shopify. WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin that allows you to add eCommerce functionality to your WordPress website. This will allow you to have an online store that can be standalone and functional.
WooCommerce is a WordPress-based content management platform that allows you to create an online store. Wordpress is a content management system that powers millions upon millions of blogs around the world. WooCommerce converts this content platform to an eCommerce platform.
WooCommerce combined with WordPress remains the most widely used method to create and manage an eCommerce website.
WooCommerce’s Pros and Cones
PROS:
Customizations are unlimited
WordPress is an open-source platform. This means that the code is freely available and is written in PHP. WooCommerce is customizable in many ways thanks to this. Your store can be customized however you like. WooCommerce is the most customizable eCommerce platform in the world.
More advanced features for larger online shops:
Businesses who require a larger online shop are likely to use WooCommerce. You need to be more flexible as your business grows. WooCommerce offers a wide range of plugins, both paid and free, that can be used to enhance the flexibility and power of your store.
Powerful SEO
WordPress, a content management platform allows you to dig into the source code of data and has the infrastructure for blogging. This will allow you to fully take advantage of SEO, and rise to the top position in Google Rankings for your niche.
CONS:
WooCommerce can be difficult to use for beginners.
WooCommerce’s strengths are also disadvantages for those not experienced in website development. You will need to have some knowledge about websites to be able to use WooCommerce to create a decent website.
WooCommerce doesn’t offer phone support. WooCommerce Support can be contacted, however it may take longer to receive support than Shopify. There are solutions to problems that you might encounter in WooCommerce communities. However, this will require more effort and you will need a lot of self-learning. Although freedom sounds great, it can be dangerous if you don’t know how to manage it.
More work Shopify allows you to submit a support request directly to Shopify. They will take care of everything. It will take more effort to maintain a WooCommerce site as you are responsible for all aspects of website hosting, website security, and the installation of plugins.
How do you choose the right eCommerce platform?
There are many things you should know to help you choose the best eCommerce platform for dropshipping. These are the key features to consider when evaluating an eCommerce platform.
- Load time
- Use it quickly
- Support
- Mobile-readiness and design flexibility
- Site search
- SEO tools
- Upselling & cross-selling
- Products
- Solid content management system
- Apps and integrations
Below, I’ll break down each factor and you’ll know which one is right for you.
Shopify vs. WooCommerce Dropshipping
Pricing comparison:
Shopify and WooCommerce have very different pricing models.
WooCommerce:
WordPress can be used for free, and WooCommerce is an open-source plugin. So it doesn’t seem like it will cost much to create a store on this platform. This is not true, as those are the only free things. A theme, hosting, and other plugins are required to make your store work properly. These are just a few examples:
- Domain names can be as low as $12/year and hosting servers are $5-$25/month.
- A theme will cost you between $59 and $69.
- Plugins and extensions are available for as low as $25 per plugin.
- You might need to hire a developer if you are not an expert in website development. This will cost you between $20-$150 per hour depending on the job.
These are the plugins that every WooCommerce store needs. You might have to pay for them.
- Yoast SEO – $49
- WPML (for multilingual sites) – Free
- ConvertPlug (to create newsletter subscribers) – $24
- AliDropship – $89 (Use the code GETPLUGIN10 to get a 10% discount).
These costs add up and can make it expensive to build a decent WooCommerce store.
- WooCommerce Starter – $500 – 3000 (Shared Hosting, fewer paid plugins and other services).
- WooCommerce Custom : $5000 – $10,000 (Managed WordPress Hosting, Custom eCommerce Design, More Paid Plugins and Services).
- WooCommerce Enterprise – $10,000+ (Dedicated hosting servers with custom design and features, advanced plugins, and paid services).
Shopify:
Shopify makes pricing much easier because you don’t have to calculate each plugin’s cost separately. Shopify has several pricing levels, each with its own built-in features.
You can get started with Shopify starting at $9/month (the Basic plan). However, this plan is a buy button that allows for you to sell on Facebook and integrate your offline shop with Shopify.
A standalone website that can host a functioning online business costs between $29 and $299 per month.
You will receive a fast-loading site, a free SSL certificate, inventory management system and abandoned cart recovery with any one of these plans.
Shopify’s pricing problem is not the monthly subscription fee. Its transaction fees are the problem. Shopify will charge you 2.0%, 1.0% and 0.5% for each sale from the Basic to Advanced plan. This cost is not borne by WooCommerce.
Shopify is more affordable if your dropshipping business has a small sales volume and is relatively inexpensive. Shopify can be more costly than WooCommerce if your sales volume increases.
You will need to purchase your own domain, similar to WooCommerce. This is not included in Shopify’s packages. This isn’t expensive, as Shopify charges $9/year for a generic domain.
You will need to pay for themes. Shopify themes cost between $60 and $180
Shopify allows you to buy more than the functions that you require. If you only need third-party real time shipping, you will still need to upgrade to higher plan to get it.
Apps are required to enable your store to automate tasks and increase sales.
Sum up:
Shopify is cheaper than WooCommerce if you’re just getting started. Shopify might be more cost-effective than WooCommerce in the long term, especially if you have a dropshipping business that generates a lot of sales.
Comparison of performance:
Shopify performs better than WooCommerce overall. Shopify’s speed and load times are the best on both mobile and PC. Shopify is the best choice for traffic from social media. If your website loads slowly on a social media site like Facebook, many people will leave your site before it loads. However, you still need to pay for those clicks.
Shopify, however, is not optimized to SEO. WooCommerce is able to generate more organic traffic than WordPress, which is optimized for SEO. These metrics are shown in the following table.
Load time
Shopify is the fastest eCommerce platform in terms of speed, as you can see. Shopify loads 2 seconds faster than WooCommerce (1.3 seconds and 3.4 seconds, respectively).
While you can improve your WooCommerce site’s loading speed, it will require a lot of time and money. Your hosting provider also plays a part. This means that even if you spend $3 on hosting, you can’t expect a site that loads quickly no matter how many SEO professionals you hire to speed up your website.
Product Page SEO
SEO is one way that customers find you. Your customers won’t be able to find you if they don’t know where you are. This is Shopify’s weak point.
Blog and Content
WordPress is the WordPress system makes WooCommerce the ideal platform for Content SEO. While you’ll still need some plugins to fully harness WooCommerce’s SEO power, WooCommerce gives you more advantages than Shopify when it comes to content. WooCommerce allows you to create blog post templates that are appealing and pleasant to the eye. This will allow you to retain customers longer. A pleasing design is an advantage when creating content, particularly long-form content.
These features are not included in Shopify’s packages. These features are not included in Shopify’s packages. You will have to pay extra for them. For example, Shogun Page Builder costs around 19/month.
Google Speed Score
Your website will be slower than it should, which can lead to customers abandoning your site and losing potential sales. Online shoppers expect websites to load quickly. Your website will not load quickly enough to be competitive.
WooCommerce’s biggest weakness is its slow loading speed. It doesn’t even match the average. WooCommerce’s loading speed score is only 51.5/100 on mobile, and 61.9/100 on PC. Shopify is second in loading speed, with a speed of 63% and 75 respectively for mobile and PC, just behind Wix.
Sum up:
Shopify is faster than WooCommerce when it comes to speed. Shopify is a better option than WooCommerce if you plan to drive most of your traffic through paid ads, and not content SEO.
Comparison of features:
WooCommerce
WooCommerce comes with built-in SEO tools. WooCommerce allows you to sell unlimited products, both physical and digital. You also have the ability to search for and rate products, provide reviews and zoomable photos of your products, and even cross-sell. These features are all included, and there is no additional cost.
There are important features that you may not be able to get, such as customized products, import/export with a CSV file, subscriptions etc… so you might need to purchase them from third-party developers. These are basic features that everyone hates. These features aren’t really necessary if you only sell a few items. However, if your collection is large, it will be greatly appreciated to be able upload using a CSV file. You can either pay for the feature or manually edit each product.
Keep in mind that the more plugins your WordPress store has, the slower your site will be.
Shopify:
Shopify isn’t really better than WooCommerce in terms of features. It has one major advantage over WooCommerce: it offers abandoned cart email in all its packages.
You will have to pay, just like WooCommerce to access many of the features every store requires, such as upselling and cross-selling, SEO tools and reward points.
Sum up:
WooCommerce and Shopify are both great features, but Shopify is better if dropshipping is your goal.
Comparison of design:
WooCommerce themes
WooCommerce offers many themes to choose from
The WooCommerce theme marketplace offers over 1,000 free themes (more than any other platform). These themes are not always completely free. To get all the features, you will need to upgrade to the premium version. These themes are not recommended for use if you don’t want to pay an upgrade.
There’s an alternative. You can pick a basic theme for free and hire a developer who will modify it to your specifications. This is the flexibility WooCommerce offers, but at a price. Sites like ThemeForest have great themes for WooCommerce.
Keep in mind that your store’s theme is only one part of the overall design. Your product photography and how you organize your collections will determine the look of your website. It will look better the more you work on it.
Astra is a WooCommerce theme I love. It can be modified in many ways, even with the free version. Many themes hide their codes and force you to upgrade.
Elementor, the landing-page builder, allows you to take your design to new heights without having to know a single code line.
Shopify themes
Shopify offers ten themes free of charge, which is a big difference from WooCommerce. The premium themes available on Shopify’s theme store cost between $140 and $180. Shopify offers a smaller selection of themes than WooCommerce. Shopify themes look more professional design-wise. These themes are more contemporary and professional for eCommerce businesses.
Sum up
Below is a table listing scores for Shopify and WooCommerce themes, based on several key metrics.
It’s hard to choose a winner design-wise. However, I prefer Shopify because its theme design is contemporary and appealing.
Support for customers:
Shopify:
Shopify is known for providing high-quality customer service. They provide 24/7 support so that you can reach them whenever you have a problem. They can be reached via email, chat or phone.
Shopify offers its customers a vast library of self-learn documentation, which provides answers to all kinds of questions.
WooCommerce:
WooCommerce doesn’t offer the same level of support as Shopify. They take longer to respond to your questions and can only be reached via email. You can still get support from the WordPress community via its forum. If you really need WooCommerce support, you can set up a free account with an email address to get it.
Sum up
There are many blogs that discuss WooCommerce and how to do business online. WooCommerce is the right choice for those who enjoy doing their own research and are able to solve problems. Shopify, on the other hand is for those who want to talk to a customer service rep. A living, breathing individual with expert knowledge is the best way to provide customer support.
Use it quickly and easily
It is important to think about ease of use as you want the platform to make your job easier and not more difficult.
Shopify:
Shopify’s ease-of-use is what makes it so powerful. All you have to do is log in to the dashboard to use Shopify. The backend (coding, hosting, etc.) is not something you need to worry about. This is a great option for beginners.
Shopify makes it easy to set up your store. Shopify provides helpful tips and tricks that will guide you in the process.
Shopify is easy to use for newbies once you have set up your account. With just a few clicks, you can add products and create descriptions. It should take you about a day to learn Shopify. After that, you can focus on other things.
WooCommerce:
WooCommerce can be used just like Shopify, once it is fully configured. However, the difficulty lies in the setup process. It is much more difficult to set up WooCommerce stores than Shopify.
WooCommerce is a plugin for WordPress. WordPress is an open source platform. This comparison is easier if you imagine you are in search of a house and don’t know if WooCommerce or Shopify are the best options. You will be able to see what each has to offer you right away once you have.
WooCommerce will only offer you a small piece of land. Hire builders, house designers, and so on. To build a house. Shopify, on the other hand, offers both a piece land and a house. Shopify allows you to buy furniture and decorate your home.
WooCommerce allows you to build your home and own it. No one can take it from you. Shopify is a service that lets you rent out your house. If you don’t pay your bills Shopify will take it back.
This should seem simple enough, doesn’t it?
To have a working website with WooCommerce you’ll need the following:
- Domain name
- Hosting
- Installation of WordPress
- WooCommerce plugin
- WordPress theme
- Many WooCommerce extensions are required
- Extensions in security
Once you have all these things in place, you will be able to have a secure and functional store. It’s more difficult than setting up Shopify stores, as I mentioned.
Sum up:
Shopify and WooCommerce can be used easily once they have been set up properly. Although it takes only about an hour to create a Shopify store it can take several days to set one up for WooCommerce depending on your technical skills. For a hassle-free selling experience, it would make sense to move from WooCommerce into Shopify.
There are many SEO options.
Shopify:
WooCommerce is more SEO-friendly than Shopify, and WordPress and WooCommerce are optimized for this feature. Shopify can still compete with WooCommerce in terms of Google rankings. Shopify offers the necessary SEO practices, such as customized URLs and mega descriptions. As long as you create high-quality content that the Internet can consume, you should be able to get good organic traffic from Google.
Shopify has some advantages over WooCommerce when it comes to SEO. Shopify is known for its natural linking structure and clean code. This will ensure a smooth user experience, and improve search rankings.
When it comes to ranking high on Google, speed is an important factor. Shopify is clearly ahead of WooCommerce in this area. Shopify is a hosted solution built on huge infrastructure. It is lightning fast. You will also reduce bounce rates by increasing your speed.
WooCommerce:
Shopify offers many advantages, but WooCommerce is still the best when it comes SEO. Wordpress is optimized for content SEO. WooCommerce offers a variety of tools such as Yoast, which can be used to add or modify meta information and content, so that your content ranks for specific keywords.
WooCommerce’s slow speed can adversely affect SEO rankings. However, you can overcome this problem by choosing good hosting.
Sum up:
WooCommerce has more options for SEO than Shopify, but it is much easier to optimize Shopify. WooCommerce is better than Shopify if you dropshipping business depends heavily on organic traffic.
Comparison of fees and payments
Both platforms provide tools that will make your dropshipping business run more smoothly, but they have different fees and payments. It is important to know the fees and charges of each platform so you can calculate your costs. This is especially important if you are price sensitive.
Shopify:
Shopify Payments. Shopify integrates many third-party payment systems into its platform, so that you don’t need to create them yourself. Shopify used to have no payment processors, so it had to rely on third parties. Shopify realized it couldn’t let third-parties handle the most important part of eCommerce business and launched its own payment processor, Shopify payments.
Shopify Payments will be your default payment processor when you first get started with Shopify. Although it appears that Shopify handles transactions using its payment processor, Stripe is actually doing the real work. Stripe has been around for about a decade and is a dominant force in the card processing industry.
Shopify Payments is made possible by Stripe because it can process a wide variety of cards, both debit and credit, without any difficulties. Simply connect Shopify Payments with your bank account to begin transactions.
Security is also not something you should be concerned about. Shopify has been awarded a Level 1 PCI DSS certificate. This means that it is 100% secure and can prevent any cyber fraud.
Shopify Payments is available online and offline. If you own a brick-and mortar store, you can also use it. Shopify Payments can be installed on your smartphone to turn it into a mobile cash processor. It’s compatible with all countries (USA, UK, Singapore, Spain and New Zealand as well as Canada, Japan, Hong Kong, Japan and Canada).
Third-party payments processors. Shopify Payments does not offer Shopify as an option processor. You have many other options (PayPal and Amazon Pay, Authorize.net and WorldPay), If you do not want to use Shopify payments,
If you do decide to use third party payment processors, here are some things to remember. Transaction fees are the main concern. Shopify doesn’t charge transaction fees if Shopify Payments is used. However, Shopify will charge a fee if Shopify uses third-party processors. This small fee can quickly add up over time to be a significant amount.
You will be charged a transaction charge of 2.0% if you are on the Basic Shopify Plan. The transaction fee is 1% for Shopify and 0.5$ for Advanced Shopify plans.
Shopify transaction fees should be included in your cost calculation. They can add up quickly.
WooCommerce:
WooCommerce doesn’t have a WooCommerce payment processing processor. However, it does offer very secure options from third-party partners. WooCommerce has two payment options: Stripe and Paypal. These are add-ons you can integrate with your online shop. This will allow you to process transactions without having to redirect your customers to third-party checkout pages. You don’t need to worry about cyber thieves as Paypal and Stripe both offer secure and reliable payment processing. WooCommerce offers many payment options beyond Stripe and Paypal. Plugins allow you to add additional payment options. WooCommerce is superior to Shopify because it doesn’t charge transaction fees. Instead, the third-party processor charges a fee. Shopify also charges this fee if you use third party processors.
Sum up:
While both platforms allow you to use any payment processor you wish, WooCommerce is more popular because it doesn’t charge transaction fees. Shopify Payments is the better option if you use WooCommerce.
Security comparison
WooCommerce:
WooCommerce does not offer security. Wordpress is an open-source platform. You are responsible for your website’s security. Your hosting provider will need to issue you an SSL certificate. You also have to ensure that you select a reliable, secure host provider. To secure your website, you will need plugins to enable login security and two-factor authentication.
Shopify:
Shopify handles all security aspects for you. Shopify handles all security for you, so you don’t need to worry about it. Shopify comes with SSL certificates. You don’t need to obtain it from third-party providers. To log in to your shop, make sure you have a strong password
Sum up:
WooCommerce is a great choice if you are not an expert in cyber security. Shopify will take care of all security concerns.
What is the time it takes to build a store.
WooCommerce:
These are the steps you should take to create a WooCommerce website that works.
Step 1 – You can’t have WordPress sites without a hosting provider. After you get a hosting, install the WooCommerce plugin.
Many hosting companies will offer a cPanel account that includes a WordPress installer. This option allows you to launch a WordPress website in just one click.
Step 2 – Run the installer app, and the system will take care of the rest. It will only take a few seconds for WordPress to be launched on your domain.
Step 3 After the installation is complete, log in to your WordPress account and then install the WooCommerce plugin under the tab of your dashboard. WooCommerce will automatically launch a wizard to help you with the setup process. Next, you can set up your store’s pages, products pages, and payment methods.
Your store is now ready to go. To make your website functional and secure, you will need to install additional plugins. The installation of all the required functions will take approximately a day.
Although it doesn’t seem to take much time, it is significantly longer than setting up Shopify stores.
Shopify:
It is much simpler to create a Shopify store entirely from scratch.
Step 1 Register to open a store on Shopify.
Step 2 : Upgrade to a Paid Plan
Step 3 : Purchase a domain
Step 4 – Buy a theme in Shopify’s theme store.
That’s it. This is how Shopify lets you create an online store. There is no need to find a hosting provider or deal with security issues. You can now add products and create content to start selling. This entire process takes approximately 15 minutes.
Sum up:
Shopify’s store setup is much faster and easier than WooCommerce.
Last words
Isn’t this a thorough review? It should have given you an understanding of the differences between Shopify dropshipping. This is where you will be able to decide which platform is right for you. Please leave a comment below if you have any questions about these platforms. 🙂
