When setting up your store you need to put some thought into shipping. It is important to know how to manage shipping on Shopify in order to succeed. You need to think about how to ship products to your customers, how quickly you can do it and how much it should cost. Should you include product weight, the actual packaging and its labels. It is also advised to decide if you will be selling in only one country or worldwide. Also, it is important to determine should you ship natively through Shopify or use some sort of Shopify shipping integration on a third-party platform.
Shipping rates
You must be clear with the customer and tell them in advance if they will have to pay additional shipping fees. Unexpected fees are one of the main reasons why customers abandon their carts. To avoid that, consider these shipping options:
- Exact shipping costs. In this case you will charge customers exactly the same amount as your carrier is charging you. For example, if you are using USPS to handle your deliveries and they charge $4 for a small package, then you also charge $4.
- Flat rate shipping. With this option chosen you will set fixed rates and you can base them on order value or location. For example, you mainly sell in USA and you charge $5 to ship anywhere in USA. You can also choose a region, like anywhere in Europe.
- Free shipping. This option is getting more popular every day because of changing customer habits and views. In this case you have two options:
- First one is to just have free shipping and increase the product price by as much as you would like to receive for shipping. The customer will see the final price with no added fees from the beginning and will avoid unnecessary frustration.
- The second option is to combine free shipping with exact shipping cost or flat rate. For example, if you sell a product for $20 – customer needs to pay shipping. But if a customer buys something valued above $100 then the shipping is free. As you probably already understand, here you just set a certain purchase price from which the shipping becomes free. Sometimes it can be an incentive for customers to buy more.
Initial shipping setup
When you have made all the necessary decisions it is time to set and manage shipping on Shopify. Here are the easy steps to complete:
- Log on to your Shopify admin page.
- Go to Settings → Shipping.
There you will need to choose a shipping origin, which can be your own store or a supplier. Also, if you are shipping from a different location than your store, make sure you set that address because all the shipping costs are calculated according to your address. After that you need to pick a package size that is suitable for you. It can be an envelope, a box or a soft package. You also set the size and weight there.
Shipping zones
When you finish adding package types and shipping origins you need to choose a shipping zone. In this part you need to decide on the product shipping charges that the customer will need to pay. For example, if you sell from UK, you can set zone 1 to be UK and customers from UK will get their package for free or at a certain cost like $5.
Then you can choose zone 2 – the rest of the world and charge it extra for the shipping. There is a possibility to choose large regions like Europe, Asia and Worldwide, but if needed you can always unselect the particular countries to which you do not want to ship.
Shipping labels
A crucial thing in shipping is shipping labels. If you get it wrong, no customer will receive the parcel and you will have a lot of complaints. To help you out Shopify created Shopify shipping, which allows you to buy and print labels easier. However, it is only available when shipping from the United States and Canada. So if your fulfillment location is outside these areas, there is no use from Shopify shipping.
Shopify shipping integration
The best way to manage all the aspects of shipping, especially if you own more than one store, is to use the Shopify shipping integration from Multiorders shipping management software. Your stores can be either on Shopify only or on different platforms and this software will make your life a lot easier.
Our Shopify shipping integration will merge your orders together and will print labels in bulk. You can create unlimited carrier accounts and generate shipping labels in a few clicks.
Even more, you automatically get USPS Commercial Plus Pricing along with the best rates that are available at that time. With Multiorders you will be able to use the Shopify shipping integration and manage your shipping like a pro with minimal effort.
