WooCommerce is by far the most popular ecommerce plugin for WordPress. It has over 4 million active instals on WordPress.org, a 4.6 user rating, and an army of delighted, devoted digital store owners.
WooCommerce is a basic and uncomplicated free plugin. In a nutshell, it's the most effective method for converting your WordPress site into a fully functional eCommerce store. This is why:
It's open-source and free, exactly like WordPress.
It's the most popular WordPress eCommerce plugin.
It is up to you to set it up and configure it. It's quite easy to set up. It takes less than an hour in most circumstances. It works with any design or theme you presently have on your WordPress site, so you don't have to change it.
Is it possible to use WooCommerce for free?
WooCommerce is an open source shopping cart plugin for WordPress that is free to download and use. Running an online store, on the other hand, isn't free, as there will be costs for hosting and domain registration, as well as adaptations, design, branding, marketing, and advertising. WooCommerce is the most widely used eCommerce platform on the planet. It's extremely adaptable, cost-effective, and simple to use, even for beginners.
Installing and Configuring WooCommerce
Selecting a Host
You'll need two items in order to launch an online store or any other form of website: A domain name is your online store's unique address. Web hosting is a term that refers to a remote computer that saves your website and then serves it to anyone who visits it. We've teamed up with a few hosting companies to provide pre-installed WordPress. To keep your store safe and secure, use WooCommerce, our Storefront theme, and ecommerce-specific features like a dedicated IP and SSL certificate. ### WordPress should be installed. You now have a blank canvas on which to develop your website. Use the free WordPress software platform to construct a foundation. The next step marks the formal start of your WordPress journey: you'll instal WordPress on your hosting account. ### Activate the WooCommerce plugin. The first step is to set up WooCommerce on your website. You may get it from the WordPress repository for free and then instal it on your site. You may even instal it directly from your WordPress dashboard. ### Go to the Setup Wizard. You'll be prompted to complete a setup wizard after installing WooCommerce. It's not required, however we recommend reading through it to configure certain important settings. ### Selecting Payment Processors Before we begin adding products to our online store, we'll first go over all of the financial details. You can select which methods of payments your online store will accept on the next page. Stripe and/or PayPal, as well as offline payments such as checks and cash, are available by default. ### Set Your Shipping Preferences You can set the amount clients will be charged for shipping here. You can charge one fee for clients in your preferred zone and another for customers in other areas. You can even provide one or both groups free delivery if you choose.
Examine the Add-Ons that are available.
At this point, you've laid the groundwork for your online WooCommerce store. On the next page, the setup process offers you a few optional add-ons: Although none of these tools are essential to manage your online store, they might be useful. We urge that you take a look at Storefront at the very least. This is a WooCommerce-specific WordPress theme that can assist you in swiftly and efficiently setting up your store.
Finish the setup procedure.
A lot of important links can be found here.You can now import products into your store, return to your WordPress dashboard, or modify the settings you just created.
Create a Store
It's now time to get your hands dirty and start constructing your internet store. WooCommerce: Adding and Managing New Products
You'll notice two new tabs on the side menu of your dashboard after installing WooCommerce. WooCommerce (your general settings area) and Products are the two (your products settings area).
You may either go to Products > Add New or follow the link at the end of the setup procedure to begin setting up your online store. In any case, using the same WordPress editor, you'll be able to add your first product:
Let's go over what you need to fill out one by one:
Name of the product.
The major description of the product. You can fill in as much information about the product as you want in this huge field. Because this is WordPress, you may include photos, columns, headings, videos, and other material in addition to simple text. Essentially, you are free to do whatever you choose. The main data section for the product. This is where you specify the type of product you're introducing, as well as whether it'll be physical, digital, or virtual (services are considered virtual products too). You'll also find tabs for other product attributes in this centre section: ### General This is where you may specify the prices and taxes for your products. ### Inventory You can control stock levels with WooCommerce. ### Shipping Set the shipping weight, dimensions, and cost. ### Products that are linked together Great for upsells, cross-sells, and other cross-selling opportunities (think: "Customers who bought this also bought that.") ### Attributes Make your own product qualities. If you're selling shirts, for example, you can specify alternate colours here. ### Advanced Optional features. It is not required. A brief description This is the text that appears beneath the name on the product page. It's best used as a quick summary of the product.
Product classifications
Similar products should be grouped together. For example, “hoodies.” It functions in the same way as conventional WordPress categories do.
Tags for products
Another tool to aid in the organisation of your product database. It functions similarly to the conventional WordPress tags.
Image of the product
The main image of the product.
Product Showcase
Additional photographs of the product to show off its awesomeness. Once you've completed all of the above, click the huge "Publish" button to see your first product appear!
WooCommerce Product Management
You'll undoubtedly have a lot of things in your WooCommerce store, so you'll need a simple way to keep track of them. Fortunately, you may do so via your dashboard's Products area.
How to Make Your WooCommerce Store Unique
You set up a few basic settings for your online business earlier in our WooCommerce course. However, the new WooCommerce tab contains a plethora of additional choices to experiment with. ### Orders The Orders tab, for starters, shows a list of recent purchases made in your store. ### Coupons When it comes to introducing new coupons to your ecommerce site, WooCommerce has a number of beneficial choices. To enter the editing screen, go to the Coupon tab and select Create your first coupon. ### Settings This is where WooCommerce shines the brightest. You may change almost every aspect of your ecommerce site from the Settings screen. The positioning of your 'thousands' separator, the entire checkout procedure, email choices, and much more may all be customised to match your requirements. ### Making Changes to WooCommerce Templates You have a lot of control over how your shop runs because of WooCommerce's built-in options and the numerous extensions and plugins available. If you're a more sophisticated user who wants to make your own changes, changing WooCommerce's template files is a fantastic place to start. This will allow you to change how essential elements, such as consumer carts and the checkout process, work. Please keep in mind that this is a dangerous procedure, especially if you're unfamiliar with working directly with theme and plugin files. Before you begin, make a backup of your website in case any modifications are made accidentally. Here's how to delete a theme safely. ### Extensions Installation Extensions and plugins, as previously said in this WooCommerce lesson, are what make WooCommerce such a powerful eCommerce tool. On top of the WooCommerce core, you can add a slew of valuable features. Enhancements to the user experience, new languages, currency options, dedicated analytics, and more are all included.
What Are the Benefits of Using WooCommerce?
WooCommerce in WordPress is considered to be at the top of the list of the many free eCommerce plugins available. This is why: Designed to work with WordPres. It integrates seamlessly with WordPress and connects you to millions of other WordPress users. Your needs can be scaled up or down WooCommerce can ride the wave with you, whether you're a little or large business with a few or many customers.
Ensure safety.
WooCommerce ensures that your information does not go into the hands of a third-party platform. It also protects the transactions between you and your customers. Sucuri conducted an audit. This guarantees that WooCommerce adheres to WordPress's code standards and best practises. A huge and ever-expanding international community To present, there are over 350 contributors and over 5 million WooCommerce installations. Well-documented WooCommerce offers extensive documentation and guidance on a variety of topics, including setup, SSL, theming, snippets, and more. Extensions are available for both free and paid use. The enormous number of free and paid plugins is WooCommerce's greatest distinguishing feature. They give you the ability to personalise WooCommerce with a variety of features and integrations.