How to create an ecommerce website on WordPress with WooCommerce?

“WordPress only allows you to create blogs”This is one of the misconceptions – completely false – that clings to WordPress.

With this tool, you can design any type of website, including state-of-the-art and professional online stores.

Indeed, it is possible to transform your WordPress installation into an ecommerce website thanks to the popular WooCommerce extension. Wondering how to do it?

By the end of this article, you will know exactly how to proceed thanks to a detailed 8-step instruction manual, interspersed with many practical tips. 

What is WooCommerce?

WooCommerce is a free plugin that transforms your WordPress site into an online store. It allows you to sell all kinds of products and/or services: physical products, digital products (ebooks, software), reservations, subscriptions, etc.

Launched in 2011 by WooThemes, WooCommerce was acquired by Automattic in 2015, the company behind WordPress.

Automattic continues to develop and improve WooCommerce over the years and has made it the most used e-commerce solution on a million websites which receive the most traffic in the world, ahead of Shopify.

Within the WordPress ecosystem, WooCommerce crushes the competition. With over 5 million active installationsIt is among the 10 most popular extensions in the official directory, which contains more than 60,000.

This puts it far ahead of some competing extensions such as Easy Digital Downloads (EDD), Ecwid, EasyCart Shopping Cart, BigCommerce or Wpshop.

Several reasons can explain WooCommerce's success with users: 

• The plugin is free and open-source (its code is modifiable). The only expenses you need to incur are related to web hosting and the domain name of your WordPress site (and possibly some WooCommerce plugins you might want to activate).
  As for the rest, using the Automattic ecommerce extension does not involve any expense, if you wish.
• He's flexible and highly customizableThanks to it, you can sell anything you want.
• He's suitable for beginnersYou can configure your online store settings in a couple of hours.
• It makes it possible design any type of online store, whether it is a shop with a few products, or a large ecommerce site listing thousands of references (with or without a blog). 
• It allows you to keep control over all your data and your contentThis is not the case for SaaS solutions (Software as a Service) such as Shopify, Wix, WordPress.com or Squarespace.
  These solutions retain ownership of your e-commerce website, and their code is not modifiable (or is extremely difficult to modify, if possible at all). Furthermore, the proprietary solutions mentioned above are subject to a monthly fee. 

Tips We just mentioned the WordPress.com platform before we go on. It's important to know that there is "Two" very different WordPressesOn one hand, you have WordPress.org. This is the free software that you download and install on a hosting server. This is the WordPress version we will be discussing throughout this article.
On the other hand, there is WordPress.com, the hosting platform from the company Automattic. It also allows you to design a WordPress website, but without having to install it on a hosting server.
However, it is much more limited than WordPress.org in terms of customization and you will have to pay if you want to take advantage of its most advanced features.

If you are migrating from another e-commerce platform to WooCommerce, a WordPress audit The preliminary work will help you assess your current infrastructure and plan a successful migration.

8 steps to create an ecommerce website on WordPress with WooCommerce

Find a domain name and a web host

How to choose a domain name for your WordPress ecommerce site?

Before you even consider installing WooCommerce, you need to have two key things: 

• a domain name;
• a hosting provider.

The domain name is the address of your future WooCommerce website. It consists of a name and an extension.

For example, the domain name for WP Maintenance is maintenance-wp.fr: 

• maintenance-wp corresponds to the name;
• .fr represents the extension.

Here are some tips for choosing your domain name: 

• Choose a short nameYour domain name should be easy to remember and represent your brand and/or company. It should be easy to pronounce and remember. 
• Opt for a “classic” extensionThe .fr domain will be perfect if you're targeting a French audience. The .com domain can also work, especially if you want to sell both in France and abroad.
• Avoid numbers and accents. 
• Be careful of two-way streets and to words in another foreign language, which may have a meaning very different from what one thinks.
  If you plan to use a word in a foreign language in your domain name, check its meaning on Google Translate.
• To get some ideas, use a domain name generator as nameboy ou Bust a name.

Check if the domain name you have chosen is not already in use using AFNIC's availability search toolAlso perform this check on social media using Namech_k.

Once you have made your choice, buy your domain name from a registrarthat is to say, an approved registration office.

Most hosting providers (OVH, Ionos, o2switch, Kinsta etc.) are registrars and will offer you the option of obtaining your domain name coupled with a hosting space.

However, there are also services dedicated solely to the purchase of domain names, such as Gandi, for example.

Which web hosting provider should I choose?

So, what exactly is a web host? It's a company that rents you storage space so that your website can be viewed and accessed online. 

There are different types ofWordPress hosting (shared, VPS, dedicated, specialized etc.) adapted to different needs and at more or less high prices.

For example, shared hosting (where you share server resources with other sites) will be cheaper than dedicated hosting, but also less efficient if you have a shop with a very large number of products. 

In practice, we recommend that you follow these tips to find a good web host: 

• Its servers must be efficient and secure. ; 
• Its customer service must be responsive and available 24/7.
• It must be well integrated into the circuit and possessexcellent user feedbackTo do this, check customer reviews on Google. 
• He must not charge exorbitant prices.On average, expect to pay between €50 and €100 per year for quality shared hosting, for example.
• The presence of an easy-to-use, customizable interface is a real plus. to perform basic actions on your hosting space (creating email addresses, redirects, creating a database, changing the PHP version, etc.).

Based on experience, we advise you Kinsta as a hosting provider. Their managed service is state-of-the-art and the level of support is high.

Once this first step is completed (choosing the domain name + hosting), move on to step #2 to create an ecommerce site with WordPress. 

Install WordPress and WooCommerce

How do I install WordPress?

Remember: WooCommerce is an e-commerce plugin for WordPress. Beforehand, Therefore, WordPress must be installed on your hosting space in order to activate WooCommerce..

But before that, please read the insert below carefully.

Tips Before installing WordPress, activate an SSL certificate on your web hosting account. SSL secures the connection to your website and will allow it to switch to HTTPSThis is essential to protect your site and build trust with your future customers.
When HTTPS is enabled on your site, a small padlock will appear in your web browser, next to your domain name. Most hosting providers offer to activate an SSL certificate for free.

Let's get back to installing WordPress. In short, you have two methods to choose from to install the most popular CMS (Content Management System) on the market:

• Automatic installationAdd a site with just one click. Many hosting providers offer this option. To take advantage of it with Kinsta, click on “Add a site” in your hosting dashboard.

• Manual installationIn this case, the procedure is a little longer. In summary, you must download WordPress, add your files to your hosting space, and create a database on your server.
  Finally, start the installation script by going to the URL where you just installed your copy of WordPress in your web browser. Follow the on-screen instructions, and you're done. If you'd like to try it yourself, Consult the user guide provided by WordPress.org.. 

How to install WooCommerce?

Now, let's install WooCommerce on your administration interface (back office) WordPress. 

In Extensions > Add New, type “WooCommerce” in the search bar. Click the “Install Now” button, and then remember to activate the plugin immediately afterward.

A setup wizard will then appear in full screen:

You will be asked to enter several types of information: 

• Details about your shop Country, address, postal code, city, email.
• The business sector associated with your shop : fashion, health and beauty, electronics and computers, food and drinks, home, furniture and garden, education and learning, other.
• The type(s) of product(s) for sale : physical products, digital products such as downloads, subscriptions, memberships, reservations, etc.
• Details relating to your activity, such as the number of products you wish to sell.
• The WordPress ecommerce theme for your online storeFor now, choose to continue with your current theme. We'll explain how to choose a WooCommerce theme in the next section, along with our recommendations.

Try to fill in the requested information as completely as possible, but don't panic if you don't have all the answers yet! You can modify or add everything later in the settings provided by WooCommerce. 

Choosing a WordPress ecommerce theme

Now for the 3rd step in creating your WordPress ecommerce site: choosing a theme for your online store on the web.

A WordPress e-commerce theme comprises a set of files that define the design of your WordPress site. It controls the appearance of your content.

When you install WordPress, the CMS activates one of these native themes by default. In our case, it's Twenty Twenty Three.

You can find out which theme is installed on your site by going to Appearance > Themes.

The problem with Twenty Twenty Three is that it's not designed for e-commerce, but rather for creating a blog (among other things). Therefore, you absolutely must find a WordPress theme specifically designed for e-commerce (and compatible with WooCommerce).

Here are several tips and tricks for choosing a good e-commerce theme:

• Choose a high-performing and fast themeIts code must be as lightweight as possible to avoid impacting loading time. On average, a study has demonstrated that website conversion rates decrease by 4,42% for every additional second of load time (between 0 and 5 seconds).
• Check that the theme is compatible with WooCommerceIf that's the case, developers don't hesitate to mention it in their theme's description.
• The design must be successful and the navigation clear., although you can remedy this by customizing it.
• Choose a theme with good user reviews. and frequent updates.
• Check the responsiveness of the theme It must be readable on any type of device: computer, smartphone, and tablet. To do this, use the Google Mobile Optimization Test (free).

You can find a WooCommerce-compatible theme in various places:

• On a premium theme sales platform like ThemeForest; 
• On shops specializing in the sale of WordPress ecommerce themes; 
• On the official WordPress directory, of course.

You should know that WooCommerce offers a free, custom e-commerce theme called Storefront.

It can do the job, but its design remains very classic. If you want something a little different, you'll probably need to get one of its paid child themes.

Instead of Storefront, we recommend using one of the following freemium themes: 

• Astra.
• cadence.
• Neve.
• Blocky.
• GeneratePress.

Each of these tools offers, in particular, ecommerce website templates for WordPress, with ready-to-use pages.

It's very practical for starting with a clean and well-designed template, which you then simply adapt to your brand guidelines. It also saves you time.

To install one, go to Appearance > Themes > Add New. Then enter its name in the search bar, just as you did previously with the WooCommerce plugin.

Without further ado, let's now move on to setting up your brand new eshop.

Configure the WooCommerce store

Introduction to WooCommerce settings menus

As soon as WooCommerce is running on your WordPress installation, it adds 4 new Custom Post Types (Custom content types) in the sidebar of your administration interface: 

1. WooCommerceHere you will find information about your orders, customers, and promo codes. This menu also provides access to settings for products, shipping, payments, and the emails WooCommerce sends after an order, for example.
2. Productsto add and customize your products.
3. Statistics It offers analytical data in the form of graphs and tables. You can get a clear view of your sales, their amounts, or orders placed, sorting everything by date if needed.
4. Marketing It primarily offers tips to improve your sales and grow your customer base, as well as direct access to manage your promo codes.

To help you get started and sell quickly, we will focus primarily on 4 major actions to implement.

How do I add products to my online store?

To add a new product, go to Products > Add. Start by giving your product a name and description:

On the right, you can:

• He assign a category.
• Define a product imagethat is, the one that will be displayed on your Shop page.
• Add images in the form of a galleryto suggest other photos of your product.

Next, focus on the section called “Product Data”. Specifically, you should: 

• Choose a product typeIt can be simple (being virtual or downloadable), bundled (some of its features can be purchased separately), external (if you're doing affiliate marketing), or variable (with multiple features). For example, a corkscrew is a simple product. A t-shirt offered in several colors (red, green, yellow) is a variable product.
• Enter the SKU, that is, your product identifier.
• Define the stock status.
• Put a price on your product.
• Specify the weight and dimensions.

When you're finished, click the "Publish" button. Your products will then be listed under Products > All products.

How do I configure payments?

Next, choose which payment options you want to offer your customers. To do this, go to the WooCommerce menu > Settings > Payments.

By default, WooCommerce offers 4 payment methods: 

1. WooCommerce PaymentsThe payment gateway offered by Automattic is very comprehensive, accepting payments by credit card, Google Pay, Apple Pay, and more, in over 100 different currencies. However, it requires a WordPress.com account, an SSL certificate, and the Jetpack plugin to be active on your online store.
2. Bank transfer .
3. Payments by check.
4. Cash on delivery.

You can configure your preferred payment method either by installing it or by activating it by clicking the associated button.

Furthermore, WooCommerce integrates with many payment gateways such as Stripe, PayPal, Square, Mollie, Klarna, etc.

How do I activate VAT?

If you charge VAT, you need to configure this on your online store. WooCommerce can initially handle this automatically for you via the WooCommerce menu > Home > Add tax rates.

You have a choice between two solutions, which will notably calculate your taxes in real time: 

• WooCommerce Tax (100% free).
• avalara (free for 30 days).

But you can also configure the taxes manually by clicking on the associated link:

In this case, you will be redirected to the WooCommerce menu > Settings > VAT. You will be able to configure your VAT options, as well as their rates (standard, reduced, zero).

How do I configure delivery on my WordPress ecommerce site?

Once the first orders are placed, you will need to handle their delivery. To do this, a few basic settings must be configured in WooCommerce > Settings > Shipping.

You must add a delivery zone (e.g., France) and have a choice of 3 features, called delivery zones:

1. Flat rate : you set a price for delivery.
2. Free Shipping.
3. Location : for in-store pickup.

The major configuration elements of your WordPress ecommerce store are now in place. Let's now focus on the content of your shop, specifically its pages.

Add key pages to your shop

By default, upon activation, WooCommerce adds 4 pages to your online store:

• "Boutique" presents all your products or services.
• “My Account” List your customer information: orders placed, delivery and billing address, etc.
• "Basket" (‘Cart’) contains all the products added by your customers before they proceed to payment.
• “Order confirmation” : the Payment page. 

The required pages for online commerce

This is a necessary minimum, but you will almost certainly need to add extra pages to offer a more professional and attractive site.

To begin with, certain rules must be followed when doing business online. As a reminder the official administrative information website for businesses, General terms and conditions of sale (GTC) must be included on your website if you are targeting private individuals.. 

You can include them on a dedicated page, displayed in the footer of your WooCommerce site. You will find a list of key information to add there on this resource. 

However, the wisest course of action is to consult a legal professional or lawyer to help you draft your Terms and Conditions. Your Terms and Conditions page can also include your legal notices, some of which are mandatory.

Furthermore, you have an obligation to protect your users' personal data, in order to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). 

It is necessary to add a Privacy Policy page that informs the user about the collection of their data.

By default, WordPress creates it upon installation, accessible via Settings > Privacy. But you must complete it and adapt it to your own situation (don't add this to a blog post).

Here again, we recommend that you consult a legal specialist. And still regarding the GDPR, you will need to obtain the consent of your website users, particularly concerning cookies and subscription to any newsletter (More information is available on the CNIL website.).

The more “classic” pages

As for the rest, feel free to add extra pages. Here are a few tips. We recommend including at least the following pages: 

• Contact UsThis allows people to contact you by phone or email. You can also provide practical information such as your address, especially if you have a physical store.
• About UsThis allows you to showcase your brand's origins, your expertise, and your team members. It's a great way to inspire trust and make you seem more human. Before making a purchase, online shoppers also need to feel reassured.

Furthermore, the pages below can provide you with real added value: 

• A Blog Page can help you create articles with educational and informative content (tips, advice, guides) on keywords related to your business. A blog is an excellent way to generate additional traffic to try and improve your conversions. Furthermore, with a blog, you can take advantage of optimize your organic search engine ranking and enhance your expertise.
• A FAQ This can be very useful for answering the most frequently asked questions from your prospects and customers. It's a good way to ease the burden on your customer service department and to clarify certain features of your product or service, for example.
• You can also create a custom homepage, which may not necessarily be your Shop page. 

Adapt the design to your brand identity

While it's important to offer excellent content on your WordPress ecommerce store pages, you'll need to pair it with a design that aligns with your brand identity. That's the next step in your plan.

To customize your different pages, everything depends on how the theme you have chosen works. 

For example, if you use Storefront, you can modify certain aspects of your pages using the Customizer (Customizer) of WordPress, in Appearance > Customize. 

For example, you will have control over features such as: 

• The choice of colors typography, background, buttons, header and footer.
• Display on your Store.
• The number of products displayed per line.
• Adding options to your order confirmation page (displaying optional or required fields, for example).

If you don't know how to code, you will quickly be limited in terms of customization with Storefront.

With a multi-purpose theme like Astra, for example, you can activate a ready-made ecommerce site template (with all its pages) and have additional options on the Customizer Tool.

Furthermore, many of its templates can be modified with a page builder like Elementor. 

With the pro version of this builder, you can, for example, customize key WooCommerce pages (Cart, Shop, My Account, Checkout) in every detail without touching a single line of code. It will also, of course, be possible to maintain a blog.

However, note that Elementor requires a learning curve to master all of its features properly.

Install essential extensions on your WordPress ecommerce store

Among WooCommerce's many advantages is its flexibility. Because it's built on the WordPress ecosystem, it's very easy to adapt it to your needs using dedicated extensions. 

You might be wondering where to find these famous extensions? To begin with, WooCommerce offers its own directory of extensions (nearly 800 extensions at the time of writing this article).

Filters allow you to filter extensions by price or category (payment, delivery, personalization, marketing, etc.):

Another option for finding WooCommerce plugins? The official WordPress plugin directory. There you'll find plugins developed by Automattic, of course, but also very useful third-party plugins.

Which WordPress ecommerce extensions should I activate?

In this regard, here are some recommendations for e-commerce plugins for WordPress that might be useful to you: 

• WooCommerce Stripe Payment Gatewayto accept payments directly on your WooCommerce store via the Stripe API.
• PDF Invoices & Packing Slips for WooCommerceto add a PDF invoice with each customer order.
• Variation Swatches for WooCommerce, to add variations of colors, images and buttons for your product attributes.
• WooCommerce Subscriptions, to offer subscriptions to your customers.
• WooCommerce Memberships, to offer exclusive products and discounts only to your members.
• WooCommerce Bookings, to allow online bookings.
• Kadence WooCommerce Email Designer, to customize the default WooCommerce emails.

Which general-purpose extensions should I choose?

Beyond these e-commerce-specific extensions, we recommend activating certain plugins to optimize the performance of your online store: 

• SEOPressRank Math or Yoast SEO are essential for optimizing your pages and articles. They are indispensable for improving your organic search engine ranking.
• WordFence Security SecuPress offers tools to protect your site against bot and malware attacks.
• WP Rocket to activate a caching system and improve the loading speed of your pages.
• Imagify to reduce the file size of your product images.
• Akismet to combat spam. 
• UpdraftPlus to back up your site (files + database).
• Polylangto make your WordPress ecommerce site multilingual.
• GO Google Analytics, to link Google Analytics to WordPress.
• WPFormsto easily create contact forms.

Optimizing your WooCommerce online store

Finally, let's move on to the last step of this guide to creating an ecommerce site with WordPress: optimizing your online store with a final round of tips and tools. 

Over time – or from the start, who knows – you may want to step things up a notch to attract as many people as possible to your pages and increase your revenue. 

To do this, you can rely on at least two strategies. First, an SEO (search engine optimization) strategy to increase traffic to your site.

To do this, you can create specific pages optimized for keywords related to your business, optimize your product pages and/or create a blog.

Also consider developing a broader marketing strategy (SEO is part of marketing, after all). For example, this could include... setting up a newsletter to keep in touch with your prospects and customers and share with them the launch of new products or promotions.

A plugin like MailPoet allows design forms to capture your visitors' email addresses via a marketing subscription form, then send your newsletters directly from the WordPress interface. 

Also think about combating shopping cart abandonment with an extension like YITH WooCommerce Recover Abandoned Cart.

In parallel, do not neglect customer relationship managementA CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system can be useful for tracking your sales statistics and optimizing your online sales process. Several extensions allow you to do this, such as the HubSpot extensionwhich integrates directly into your WordPress dashboard. 

To finish, Don't forget the importance of maintenance for your WooCommerce store.In order to be effective and functional, it must be constantly updated, efficient and secure. 

In this regard, the team of experts at Maintenance WP is able to offer you a customized solution to create your WooCommerce store and/or manage it. 

Available 7 days a week, our WooCommerce agency We can meet your needs quickly, professionally, and efficiently. Contact us to find out more.