Are you looking to build an online business? It’s better to build an eCommerce website with WordPress.
You can build an online store and start selling products online in less than an hour. I assume you might think is it possible to build an online store quickly?
Yes, of course, it’s possible and pretty simple also easy, to build an eCommerce store quickly with WordPress.
Basic requirements to build an eCommerce website with WordPress?
- A domain name (Your online name)
- A good and fast loading Hosting plan (It’s better to buy a managed WordPress hosting or managed Woocommerce hosting plan) (Hostinger has a reliable managed WordPress hosting plan check it here)
- Installing WordPress and WordPress Theme. We recommend the Astra theme because it has a blazing-speed environment.
- Install an Astra theme for easy customize of your eCommerce online store.
- You can Install pre-made online store temples (Plant Shop (free template) Electric Scooter Inessa Perfume eGrow Plants or start from scratch with the Astra theme.
- Install the Woocommerce (Store Builder WordPress Plugin) WordPress plugin and other needed plugins (Check here) for better functionality of your e-commerce website.
Benefits of an eCommerce website with WordPress (Online Store)
A large number of benefits you can get by building an eCommerce website with WordPress
- WordPress platform and Woocommerce WordPress plugin had the built-in environment to build an online shop.
- it’s enough to follow their screen instructions to build an eCommerce website from scratch even if you are a starter or an entrepreneur and also a non-techie.
- There are thousands of WordPress themes, Templates, and Plugins available on the internet both free and paid for building a good eCommerce website with WordPress (Online Store).
- You can easily upload your offline store to the internet and enlarge your business to a global environment.
Start to build an eCommerce website with WordPress (Online Store)
In order to start the online shop building process I mentioned above, first, purchase a domain and well-managed WordPress hosting or Woocommerce hosting.
After purchasing both domain and hosting, install WordPress on your server.
Learn here how to install WordPress to your server
Learn here how to install the WordPress plugin
Log into your WordPress admin dashboard and click on the add new button in the sidebar menu under Plugins after installing WordPress on your server. Enter Woocommerce in the search box and click the install button after searching.
Furthermore, once the plugin has been installed, click the “activate” button.
After activation of the Woocommerce plugin, it will take you to the WooCommerce setup page. Here enter your online store details such as Country, Address, Pincode, City, and Email.
After entering the proper details click continue. In the next window select your preferred industry type of store, you can choose multiple types of store industries.
Click continue after selecting the type of store. Now in the next window choose the types of products, here you can choose Physical products, Downloads, Subscriptions, Memberships, Bookings, Bundles, and Bundles.
After selecting of product type click continue to the next window, Here it will ask you to tell about your business.
In addition, WooCommerce has built-in free features. It provides you some great plugins it’s very useful to your e-commerce website.
The plugins are such as
- Jetpack: Very useful for Enhance speed and security
- MailPoet: Level up your email marketing with MailPoet. You can do email marketing inside your WordPress dashboard without going to a third-party service.
- Google Listings and Ads: This plugin helps you to drive more sales
- List products and create ads on Facebook and Instagram with Facebook for WooCommerce.
Keep in mind these plugins are very useful to your online shop business, so we recommend it’s better to install them. You can install these plugins with one click. For this just click on continue, and all mentioned plugins are installed and activated automatically.
After clicking continue, you’ll see a list of recommended themes, indicating that you’ve already installed the Astra theme. So, here, click “Continue with my active theme.”
You’ve now added your store details successfully.
On the other hand, if the Astra theme is not currently installed on your new WordPress e-commerce website, please follow the instructions below.
In order to install Astra WordPress Theme on your WordPress eCommerce site, go to Themes under the appearance on the sidebar menu. Then click on Add new button
The installation is similar to plugin installation. Upon searching for Astra theme, click the install button. Once installed, click the activate button.
Add products to your Store
WooCommerce indicates all required steps on the screen; click on that link at the top of your screen to see all required steps.
It’s now time to start an online store by adding products to your store. On the sidebar menu, click the add new button under products.
Under products, click add new and give your product a name and a detailed description. After that, upload an image of the product.
You may add all of your product’s information, including the price, delivery, attributes, and variations, under the product data tab.
Select simple product from the product data menu if you want to add a basic product. then type both the regular and sales prices.
On the other hand, if you have varietions on your price, select the variable product on the product data.
Variable products mean, the price of a product can vary depending on its size, color, and brand.
Before adding variations here on the product page, you must add all required variations on attributes which is on the sidebar menu under products.
To add a new attribute, click add new, then enter a name and description for your new attribute before clicking save.
Then, click on the newly added attribute and fill in the values for the newly added attributes. For example, if you have a variety of colors, add a new attribute first, then click on added attribute and add your color name, and click save after each color is added.
Now your new attribution has appeared on the product page. On the attributes, tab select your newly added attributes from the drop-down then click add.
In addition, click on the color tab, then click on a value(s) where you see the all colors you have added to attributes before in the previous step. or you can add all colors by clicking on the select all button.
On the variations tab, to add different prices on the color range, click on the ‘go’ button in front of add variation now all variations come to space now select one by one to add price. This process is also slightly similar to adding attributes to products, but here in variations, only variations come to place when you click on the ‘go’ button.
Once all variations have been placed, keep the necessary variations and remove the undesirable variations.
Fatherly now enters the price for each variation by expanding the tab. Also, you can add separate images to each variation.
Set up payments to collect payments from your e-commerce website with WordPress
WooCommerce recommends accepting payments through the Stripe payment gateway. In addition, you can use other payment gateways such as Razorpay, PayU for WooCommerce, offline payment methods, and third-party plugins such as the Instamojo payment gateway.
To set up a payment gateway, I will go with Instamojo for WooCommerce. First, install and activate this plugin.
After activating the Instamojo for WooCommerce payment Gateway WordPress plugin.
To configure payment methods, navigate to the payments tab in Woocommerce settings.
You will be asked to input your client id and client secret when you select the Manage button on Pay with Instamojo.
Create a free Instamojo account here if you don’t already have one. Click save changes after adding the client id and client secret.
Now you successfully collect payments from an e-commerce website with WordPress.
Tax Settings of your ecommerce website
Woocommerce includes a powerful tax calculation system called Avalara. Avalara has these features.
- Powerful all-in-one tax tool
- Real-time sales tax calculation
- Multi-economic nexus compliance
- Cross-border and multi-channel compliance
- Automate filing & remittance
- Return-ready, jurisdiction-level reporting.
To setup, click on “Enable & set up”, then create an account on Avalara which is free for 30 day’s.
Avalara has a Woocommerce extension which is totally free, for a right configuration you should to install this plugin. After creating the account and buy the free avalara extension you can see the “Add to Site” button on thank you page
Enter your ecommerce URL in the next page, then click add to site.
In the next step it will ask you for the authorized connection, so, click on connect store button.
Now the page is redirecting to your eCommerce website. But don’t forget to enable the tax checkbox on the Woocommerce settings page. Also, connect your Woocommerce to AvaTax on the tax tab in settings.
To connect click on Ava Tax on tax options under the tax tab and enter your account number and license key, then click save changes. Now your tax settings are perfect.
At checkout, Avalara will automatically determine the appropriate sales tax rate for WooCommerce orders based on the customer’s location (city, nation, or state).
Shipping Setting for your online shop
Finally, you must incorporate shipping zones into your online store. This will help visitors to find whether or not your products will be delivered to their locations.
In order to add a shipping zone, click on add shipping zone under shipping on settings.
Then enter the shipping zone name, and select your zone regions.
Also next in the shipping method settings add your prepared shipping method.
To add a shipping method, click on add shipping method button, then select on method from the dropdown on the pop-up, then click “add shipping method” button. Then click save changes.
Conclusion
Everything is now in place. Your WordPress e-commerce website is now ready to sell products online. WordPress and Woocommerce are excellent choices for launching an online store. Furthermore, creating an e-commerce website with WordPress is much easier than you might think. In less than an hour, you can create an e-commerce store.
The whole process is in only six steps
- Buy a domain and a hosting
- Install WordPress thems and proper plugins
- Add products to store
- Add price to your products
- Add a tax system to your store
- Add a shipping method to deliver the products
