Matt Pyke

10 Benefits of Using WooCommerce to Power Your Ecommerce Store

April 16, 2021

Asking yourself – “why should I use Woocommerce?”

Don’t worry – you’re in good company.

Online sellers around the world are thinking about using Woocommerce. Aside from Shopify, it’s the biggest ecommerce solution around. In fact, it powers 25% of the top 1 million ecommerce sites in the world.

In this article, we’re gonna look at the benefits of using Woocommerce.

What is Woocommerce?

WooCommerce helps you build an online store using WordPress.

Let’s break that down a bit further –

WordPress is the world’s most popular website builder. They reckon that 40% of the web is built on WordPress. It’s used by everyone, from the smallest bloggers to the biggest companies in the world. However, you can’t just start selling products online with WordPress. For that you need Woocommerce.

Woocommerce is a WordPress ecommerce plugin. It helps you set up an ecommerce store so you can sell whatever you like.

Here are some of the benefits of using Woocommerce:

#1 WooCommerce is free

WooCommerce is free, open-source software. That means anyone can sign up and start designing a store. For many new business owners, this is a huge benefit because it allows you to keep up-front costs to a minimum.

However – nothing in life is completely free.

When we say that WooCommerce is free, we mean that it’s free to start using. However, there are some costs when you set up an ecommerce store. For example, you’ll need a WordPress store that allows plugins. Plus, you’ll need to pay hosting and domain fees.

Then, there are a bunch of optional costs. For example, you can choose one of WooCommerce’s free themes or choose from a paid one.

#2 It’s super easy to build a storefront

You don’t need to be a computer nerd to build a WooCommerce store. In fact, pretty much anyone can do it.

When you install WooCommerce, you’ll be guided by a setup wizard. This will take you through some basic steps like choosing your currency, selecting physical or digital products, etc.

It’s even easier than setting up a WordPress website.

#3 There are plenty of themes to choose from

We’ve already touched on this. But it’s worth hammering home the point. WooCommerce has a great selection of themes to choose from.

It’s great if you want to differentiate your ecommerce store from your competitors. Like WordPress, WooCommerce has a pool of developers that create custom themes.

You can even pick themes that are related to your business. They’ve got all of the themes you’d expect – like clothing, pets, books, toys, etc.

#4 It’s fully customisable

The customisation of a WooCommerce website is one of the best features.

Once your ecommerce store is live, you can easily make changes. We’re not just talking about adding products and changing prices (although you can do that!). We’re talking about making changes to the overall appearance of the store. You can swap between themes, change fonts and colours – you name it.

If you’ve ever tried to make changes to a custom website, you’ll know how difficult it is. WooCommerce makes it easy. You can play around until you’re happy with the design.

#5 You can run it using the WooCommerce mobile app

Some people think you need to be tethered to a computer all day to run an online store.

Not with WooCommerce.

With the WooCommerce Mobile App, you can run your business from anywhere. It allows you to create products, process orders and keep an eye on your analytics. You could be hanging out with your friends and running a business at the same time. That’s living the dream.

#6 Loads of extensions

Like we said before, WooCommerce is super customisable. On top of the themes, it has over 400 official extensions, covering everything from analytics to shipping.

There are both free and paid third-party extensions. It’s worth browsing through them before you set up your store but also check back when you’re up and running. Third-party extensions are a great way of streamlining your business.

#7 Useful analytics

When you’re running an online business, analytics are crucial. They tell you everything about your business – who your customers are, how much you are selling, how people are finding you, etc.

WooCommerce offers built-in analytics. It’s an intuitive system that anyone can understand, providing information like sales by date, most wanted products and customer information.

Plus, if you want more detailed and advanced analytics, you can integrate Google Analytics into your WooCommerce store.

#8 It keeps your data secure

Online businesses can be prone to cyber-attacks. Fortunately, WooCommerce is one of the most secure ecommerce platforms available. They team up with security experts to provide a safe ecommerce experience. Just make sure you check the WooCommerce platform regularly for the latest security updates and keep an eye on the latest WordPress updates too. You can also use plugins such as Wordfence and iThemes Security to add an extra layer of reassurance.

#9 It has an impressive developer community

WooCommerce is always being improved. Like WordPress, it’s an open-source platform. That means developers can create new key features, develop new extensions and create themes. If you find a problem with your ecommerce store, you can bet that a developer has had the same problem and created a way to fix it. And if they haven’t, you can fix it yourself.

WooCommerce even have an official YouTube channel full of tutorials on how to get the most out of the plugin and other add extensions.

#10 We have a dedicated WooCommerce SEO service

WooCommerce is SEO friendly. That means the developers designed it so that search engines can pick it up easily. But that doesn’t mean your WooCommerce store is going to rank #1 on Google automatically. Far from it actually.

To rank highly on Google, you need an SEO strategy that involves technical SEO, content marketing and site structure.

Feeling lost? Don’t worry, we have a dedicated Woocommerce SEO service.

We can develop a custom WooCommerce SEO strategy for your business – from defining your keyword targets to optimising your store and measuring success. The idea is to get your ecommerce store ranking highly on Google so customers can find it easily.

We can also create a PPC (Pay-Per-Click) campaign that sends targeted customers to your store. That just leaves you to sit back and reap the rewards.