How to preview a market that is for another country

[Emc2020]

Hi there,

I am based in Australia but I have set up a market for New Zealand that I would really like to test and preview the ordering process to make sure it pulls into my postage fulfillment app and how it appears etc.

How do I go about this? Without it yet being active?

[Victor · Accepted solution]

Hi @Emc2020,

Thank you for getting in touch and it's great to hear that you're expanding your business beyond your domestic market.

I presume your store is currently live and online if you're already selling to Australian customers, but if not you can use a bogus gateway to simulate an order in test mode. This would involve disabling real payments through your primary gateway while you do this, so I would recommend against this method unless you do so at a time where you do not regularly receive traffic and orders from customers.

If you're wanting to preview how the app works with a real order, I'd recommend creating a shipping zone for New Zealand and adding your rates. You can then place an order using your own card details and a New Zealand shipping address and check out as normal. Please bear in mind that even if you cancel and refund the order after doing this you may still be subject to processing and transaction fees, so if possible I'd advise you only purchase a relatively cheap product (or create a test product with a low price which you can delete and/ or take offline later).

This whole process should only take a few minutes and you can remove the New Zealand shipping rates after you have tested things if you do not want customers there to be able to buy from you yet. This may not be a perfect process but checking out as a real customer would is the best way for you to see how the checkout process works and you can then get hands-on experience with your fulfillment app and a real order.

I hope this helps but please let me know if you have more questions. As you're looking to sell to other countries, I'd also recommend checking out our ultimate guide to international commerce to learn more about expanding your business across borders with success.