I have been selling with Amazon for three years, and I am disenchanted with the way Amazon treats sellers, so I’m looking at Shopify as an alternative. From what I can tell, Shopify allows sellers to set up a storefront on their own website, kind of like a separate page on their website. So if I have a website foo.com, I would create my storefront as foo.com/shopifystore, or something like that.
Then there is the question of how this store would be found by customers. On Amazon, the shopper would go to Amazon.com and type in what they are searching for, such as widget. How does the customer find products on Shopify?
Finally, there is the question of fulfillment. The major benefit of Amazon was their very low fulfillment, or FBA rates. Our product weighs 15 pounds, and Amazon would pack and ship it anywhere for $10. I see that Shopify now has a fulfillment network, but no pricing information. How do the rates compare to Amazon’s?
Sorry for the basic questions. Shopify customer support couldn’t answer these questions, and I couldn’t find the answers in the help pages or videos either.
Shopify is an eCommerce platform, whereas Amazon is largely a Marketplace. When it comes to the customers discovering your Shopify store (the website), you can do paid ads, SEO, social media marketing, etc.
2 Shipping, handling, and storage costs vary depending on the business needs, thus it’s best to reach out to Shopify support and let them forward your inquiry to the team that deals with Shopify Fulfillment Network.
Contact page link: https://help.shopify.com/en/questions#/contact/
Shopify is an eCommerce platform, whereas Amazon is largely a Marketplace.
I’m not sure what the difference is. Amazon is definitely an eCommerce company, too. You can search for products on Amazon.com. For instance, if you are looking for a widget, you would surf to Amazon.com and type in widget. Then a bunch of widgets would come up. If a widget manufacturer has paid Amazon for ads, their product might be listed higher. If the customer buys it, then Amazon will ship the product to the customer from their warehouses at very attractive rates and take a commission too.
In contrast, I don’t know what Shopify is, where the products are shown, how the customer would find the products (I don’t see any advertising options sold by Shopify), or who fulfills the order, or what the prices for fulfillment are. I did reach out to Shopify support, but didn’t get the answers to these questions.
As near as I can tell, Shopify is kind of like a Wordpress addon like WooCommerce.
Switching from Amazon to Shopify has its own Pros and cons.
Marketing Solution with Shopify:
Shopify has a bunch of paid marketing services that help you in several ways:
Generate discount codes
Add keywords on store pages and product descriptions for better ranking and visibility
Beautiful and attractive store themes to choose from.
Accelerated Mobile Page services to help your website page load and be visible to mobile users etc.
You can start with basic marketing strategies initially but in order to be more visible to the audience, you will have to choose Marketing Plans as per your business needs.
Prospective customers get to see your store and products based on your ranking on the Google algorithm. Also, you can plan out a social promotion campaign to spread awareness about your store and your vision.
Fulfillment solution by Shopify: Shopify has a fulfillment service of its own called Shopify Fulfillment Network. To know everything about the fee and pricing plans you can this link Prices and fees. Also, there are some essential pointers to consider as far as Shopify Fulfillment Network is concerned:
Shopify Fulfillment Network outsources fulfillment to different 3PLs and uses each 3PL’s Warehouse Management Systems.
Works with brands that ship between 3 and 200 orders per day. Additionally, only works with brands with under 200 SKUs.
Doesn’t work with any perishable products, the total package that weight is over 35 pounds or longer than 18 inches in any single dimension, prohibited items, and restricted items.
You have a separate fee for picking and packing, packing supplies, and shipping for each order fulfilled; monthly billing for storage; and inbound receiving.
Only for businesses that sell in the United States and has fulfillment centers in the US and Canada
You have to apply and get accepted to move forward (no clear timeline listed on their site) Also, Shopify allows you to from fulfillment options as mentioned below: – In house fulfillment – Dropshipping – 3rd Party Logistics
Depending upon your business needs and based on where your customers are (national or international) you can choose a 3rd party Logistics partner.
Switching from Amazon to Shopify involves trade-offs. Shopify offers greater control over your storefront and branding, but requires more effort in customer acquisition and might have slightly higher fulfillment costs for your 15-pound product. Given your disenchantment with Amazon, Shopify could be a viable alternative, especially if branding and independence are priorities. For fulfillment, use the rate calculator to get precise SFN costs and compare them with your current FBA rates.