1 - Shopify Affiliate Program (Affiliate Marketing)
You can make a commission for each person that clicks on your affiliate link and then joins Shopify. This is a great way and one of the easiest ways to make money with Shopify.
No need to worry about inventory or having someone buy your actual products, just get others to start their online business with your affiliate link.
Here is how you sign up:
Step 1 - Go to https://www.shopify.com/affiliates
Step 2 - Click on Apply now
Step 3 - Fill out your information and click Sign Up
Then you will need to wait for the approval. After approval, you can start sharing your affiliate link.
Affiliate marketing is an easier business model to start because you don't need your own product or software to make money.
2 - Shopify is an eCommerce platform: Use it for what it was intended to do, sell physical products online.
Being successful in eCommerce requires a lot of skills.
Here are the most important elements of a successful Shopify store:
Unique brand position
Great offer (this includes the product, perceived value, and overall impulse factor)
Amazing products (A truly high-quality product that customers will show off to their friends)
Direct response copywriting (Does your copy create excitement and most importantly action)
User-generated content
Authentic product reviews
Using email to build your brand through a 2-way ongoing conversation
Customer service that truly goes above and beyond
A hungry audience that isn't being served
Great product photos that stand out against competitors
Product videos using your own products
A trustworthy website (a basic theme can do this if the correct elements are shown from the list above)
Shopify just makes it easier to do all those things well.
3- Become a Shopify expert and offer services to Shopify store owners
The best thing about Shopify is how many customers actually use it. Since so many business owners use Shopify, you have a large audience to offer your services to.
Here are 14 Shopify Services that have healthy profit margins.
Facebook ads for Shopify
Google ads for Shopify
Email marketing for Shopify (My favorite)
SMS Marketing for Shopify
Search Engine Optimization
Conversion Rate Optimization
Outsourced Customer Support
3PL (Help store owners ship their products)
Ecommerce coach
Inventory Management (Arguably the most important thing to get right!)
Website Design
Shopify App Development
Blog Posts Writing
Book Keeping
The easiest way to offer services to Shopify store owners is to increase revenue, save them time, or reduce their costs.
No inventory is needed and can be great for cash flow.
4 - Dropshipping (Great way to learn)
It is much easier to sell physical products that you don't need to stock or ship.
Dropshipping makes selling products online feasible for those that don't have the capital to stock inventory. Plus you don't need to ship the products!
What is the catch?
Margins are typically tight
Product quality could be a concern
Shipping and handling times could be too long depending on the location
Potential Trademarks and Copyright disputes
Overall, I don't believe in dropshipping as a legit way to build an eCommerce brand. I do think it is an effective way to learn how to drive online sales.
The best way to learn anything new is to do it, this lowers the barrier to entry and makes it possible for a lot of people.
You don't need to be a Shopify expert to make money with Shopify (Document and Ask Method)
Whenever I am launching something new I like to use a document and ask system. This system can be powerful for really any business model.
I simply document what I am doing in the business before my product is ready to hit the market. I survey and ask my potential customers via social media and email.
I ask them authentic questions I want to know the answer to.
By having real conversations with my potential customers, I am building an audience. This audience is a part of my brand now and along for the ride as we bring our first product to market.
Here are the basic steps I would take to launch a new Shopify store today
Marketing Strategy: The goal is to start gathering emails from any traffic I get far in advance of having something to sell.
Most new online store owners try to sell products first with no audience and email list. I want to flip the script and build my list and audience first.
The money is in the email list and the hype not just the physical products themselves.
7 Steps to launching your Shopify store
Step 1 -Sign up for a Shopify account
Step 2 - Launch your Shopify store (Basic plan)
Pro tip: Don't spend too much time designing your own eCommerce store
During my first couple of years in business, I obsessed over all the wrong elements. Button colors, font types, and overall look and feel of the website.
I even had a developer on contract. This was NOT necessary but made me feel busy.
Luckily, the out-of-box themes on Shopify and some basic graphic design can get you up and running asap and focused on bigger lever money makers.
Step 3 - Install a pop-up using Privy or another pop-up tool in the App Store
Step 4 - Write copy for your pop-up.
Here is an example from our recent product launch that sold $238,740 in 24 hours.
Step 5 - Document on your social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok)
Step 6 - Ask your audience on social what they are interested in and what would make your product perfect
Step 7 - Use my product launch method detailed here
Step 8 - Once your first product is ready, send it to various content creators (this will build credibility, drive traffic, and organic search)
This method will help you build an audience even before you built a product. Bringing them along for the ride will provide you with great ideas as you slowly built up your online presence.
Youtube channel reviews can be powerful
Facebook ads will be a key piece of growing your front-end traffic. But, I like to get YouTube video reviews from other channels before I start spending money on ads.
Typically this will start creating buzz around your brand.
Plus, if you have a relationship with them you can ask to use their videos in your Facebook ads. This may work far better than making your own in-house videos.
To continue building it for long-term growth: Write one blog post a week or MORE
Writing one blog post a week around your target keywords will help search engines recognize your website before you launch. Doing this as early as possible will help build up your authority in the long run.
It isn't as exciting as doing a big product launch fueled by paid traffic. But it is a good idea to get your domain ranking and authority higher from the start.
I don't want to waste time just writing blog posts that won't rank. I like to target long tail and low competition keywords with commercial intent when writing blog posts.
There is no guarantee of traffic, but writing high-quality and SEO-friendly content will boost your domain rank and organic traffic.
How do you plan to make money with Shopify?
Let me know in the comments below and good luck on your journey!