Introduction

I’m excited for you to try out WooCommerce!  I have two stores on WooCommerce – one for my music ed store and one for my graphics store!

I have learned a lot over the past few years and I look forward to sharing that knowledge with you!

Grab a notebook and a pen. You might want to take notes about some decisions you will need to make.  These don’t have to be permanent decisions – you can always come back and add stuff or change things, but if we can do it right from the start it will be a win for all!

Note that through this informational series, you will see a variety of stores and styles.  Every woo store will look a little different and can be customized to your liking!

Delivering Files to Customers

Let’s discuss how your customers will receive their products.

When customers purchase from your Woocommerce store, they will be sent a link via email to download.  In addition, there will be buttons on their “my account” page to download items.

Do NOT use Google Drive for downloads for woo products.  The technology really does not work well with WooCommerce.  Links break and they never quite download correctly.

DIRECTLY ON YOUR SERVER
Some people choose to store their files directly on their website.  Though this doesn’t cause any direct issues, I generally do not recommend this for a couple of reasons.

1. It makes it harder to update products.  Every time you update you will have to come back and re-set the download link.  Time-consuming!
2. Having all these large files on the website server can really drag your site down over time.  Most people forget to delete the old file when uploading the new.
3. You will have to pay your host for the server space for all these files. (This can be hundreds a month!)

Instead, I recommend using cloud storage, specifically Dropbox  or Amazon S3.

DROPBOX

You will need to upgrade to Dropbox Pro as the free Dropbox sometimes will restrict the number of times a customer can download a product.  Not good!  Some features Dropbox offers:

1. You can do selective sync on your computer.  This means your files can live in the cloud.  You don’t HAVE to use up space on your computer.
2. You can set the Dropbox link to automatically download for the customer.  Customers get confused when they click “download” and a new browser window opens.
3. You can link to a Dropbox folder.  At any time you can change the contents of the folder and the link contents will automatically update.  You will still want to let your customer know you updated the information, but you will not have to re-do the link in Woocommerce.

Here is my take on Dropbox:

Here is some information about using Amazon S3:

Payment Methods

Let’s discuss which payment methods you will take.

On my website, I take Paypal, Stripe, and Purchase Orders.  I traditionally get equal purchases with Paypal and Stripe.  Paypal payments are sent to your Paypal account.  I highly recommend you have separate business and personal Paypal accounts.

Stripe takes credit cards directly and then deposits your money directly into your checking account.  Again, I recommend you have a separate business checking account.

Both payment gateways take about 3% commission.  

Why do you need both? 

Some people do not realize you don’t have to have Paypal to checkout with a credit card.  It is easier to offer a non-Paypal option than to answer question after question about payments.  

What about Purchase Orders?

I take purchase orders via email AND via direct upload with WooCommerce! 

I currently use two paid plugins to do Purchase Orders – One for the purchase order part and another for custom order statuses to track Purchase Orders.  PO plugins can be added later.

Note: This is what works for me.  Should you desire additional payment methods such as Google Pay, Android Pay, Venmo, etc.  feel free to contact me.

COSTS : Square and Paypal are free to use but require a 3% commission on sales.

The Purchase Order gateway plugin is about $100 (one-time fee).  The Custom Order Status plugin is about $50/year.

Sales Tax, GST, VAT

Let’s talk for just a minute about the dreaded Sales Tax issue.   First, let me give the usual disclaimer that I am not a tax professional and this should not be taken as legal or accounting advice.  I also live in Georgia (USA) – your state or country may have different rules!  In addition, the courts are currently changing laws on taxation of digital downloads.  This is my interpretation of the law as it stands.

General Information

• You will need to research every country to find out about taxes that need to be paid for that country.

Country-Specific (Note: Subject to change at any time and my interpretation of the law).

• EU
  • Every person is supposed to pay VAT (sales tax) on everything sold to the European Union.  For that reason, I do not currently sell directly to the European Union.

• Japan
  • Consumption Tax (Sales Tax) must be paid when your shipped hard goods pass through customs in Japan unless their value is under 10,000 Yen (approximately $90).  Import Duties are paid at floating rates depending on your shipped items.
  • No digital items or consumption tax is owed if 12-month sales are less than $90,000 to Japan.

• Australia
  • Generally, there is no requirement to pay duty and Goods and Services Tax (GST) on imported goods valued at or below $750, except for alcohol and/or tobacco products.
  • No GST on Digital Goods is charged as long as your annual sales remain under $54,600/year.

• Canada
  • Under the provisions of the Postal Imports Remission Order, if someone mails you an item worth CAN$20 or less, there is no duty or tax payable. If the item is worth more than CAN$20, you must pay the applicable duty, the GST or HST, and any PST on the item’s full value.
  • Canadian business owners with gross revenue of less than $30,000 CAD per year don’t have to register to collect and remit GST or HST. The same small supplier exception applies to U.S. sellers who ship less than $30,000 of orders into Canada.
  • If your business will collect over $30,000 in revenue a year in Canada, you’ll be required to charge and remit GST/HST.  Until then, you do not have to collect taxes for Canada.

  The United States

• You must pay sales tax for the states you have a current “Sales Tax Nexus.”  Each state defines this differently, but as a quick definition – basically, the state you live in, any state you have a physical store in, any state you do significant sales in (Economic Nexus), and any state you keep inventory in.
• Read more about the Economic Nexus here.   In short, if you do significant sales in a single state (lowest threshold was $10,000 or 200 transactions), you have an economic nexus in that state. 

CHARGING SALES TAX:

WooCommerce very easily sets you up to charge sales tax for FREE in one state (the state you live in).  You are in charge of remitting the taxes, but Woo Services will take care of sales tax for one state.

If you need to charge multiple states you will need to sign up for a service like Avalara or TaxJar (what I currently use).  In some cases you can also pay for them to remit the tax for you. 

Though I am happy to help connect Avalara or TaxJar, I do not do any work as far as working ON Avalara.com or TaxJar.com.  

You can contact your account (or use mine – https://allaboutacctg.com/ – Emily is very familiar with TpT)

COSTS: Avalara and TaxJar are both paid services.  WooCommerce Tax is free for one state, but you are in charge of remitting taxes to the state.   If you are remitting to multiple states, you will need to upgrade to Avalara or TaxJar

Sidebars

Sidebars on your shop page are primarily used for Filter and Search and often are combined with adding custom taxonomies in order to filter products further.

CUSTOM TAXONOMIES
First, watch this video on custom taxonomies:

__________________

SEARCH AND FILTER

Now watch an overview of filter and search: 

__________________

FILTERS
A. FacetWP – My plugin of choice for filters at the moment (works with almost all themes) is facetwp.  It is $99/year and can handle many, many products.

It also directly integrates with my search plugin of choice (Searchwp – can be added later).

B. (Elementor only) Jetsmart filters  If you are a maintenance client, they are free. If you are not, it is $45/year

What’s the difference?  FacetWP is slightly faster in my tests.  I am always on the hunt for new filter plugins so my recommendations may change.  In addition, FacetWP integrates directly with SearchWP.

Finally, if you are wanting to create different lists of categories as filters (two different filters, both targeting categories), you will need to use FacetWP.
___________________
SEARCH

Search – your options here are free WordPress Search (included with wordpress) and SearchWP. 

The difference is SearchWP allows you to specify things like synonyms, etc. It also integrates directly with FacetWP discussed above.  At this time it does not integrate with many other filter plugins. SearchWP is $200/year

COSTS: The cost depends on the filter plugin chosen and whether a custom search plugin is used.  Installation is already included in the base quote.

Custom Tabs

WooCommerce displays product information in tabs, like a file folder system.  The information you can put in these tabs is limited unless you install a custom plugin.

I use a plugin to provide a space to put my FAQs, Reward Points, and Preview (the most important part!).

Watch the video to learn more.

Note: I mention the plugin is paid in the video but the one I use now is Free!

COSTS: Custom tabs plugin is free! In the video I said tabs was a paid plugin, but the initial version you need is free. The Preview, FAQs, Reward Points will be covered in a later section.

Reward Points

Reward Points are a great way to 1) make a sale and 2) bring people back after purchasing!  I set up a simple 5% rewards system for my buyers to have.  I can also manually  (and sometimes automatically) give reward points for customer service, great feedback, social sharing, etc.

I use Sumo Reward Points (About $55/lifetime). 

WooCommerce has an official plugin here that is $129/year.

COSTS: The plugins cost between $55 (one time) and $130 (yearly).

Wishlists

I LOVE creating wishlists on websites! And I do come back to buy! (I’m looking at you, Amazon Wishlist!). 

I highly suggest having a wishlist plugin on your e-commerce site. 

I usually suggest a free plugin (which changes from time to time based on the current trends) and the official WooCommerce plugin (which is $89/year).

The paid plugin gets you some deeper integration with some automations and other woo plugins and the ability for the customer to save multiple lists.

Take a look at the video for more information: (note: the plugin is FREE, not paid).      

COSTS: The plugin is free for basic features.  Premium features are paid.

Previews

There are two common ways of displaying previews for your products. You can do one or the other, or both. 

Custom Tab
We install a free plugin called Embed Any PDF and use that with a free custom tabs plugin to add the Preview as a custom tab.

Here are some examples of ways to host your PDF.

Custom Button

We install a custom field on the back of your products that you can paste a public PDF link to a preview.  When the customer clicks the button it will open the PDF in a new window (free) or open it in a lightbox (Paid Plugin – Wonder Lightbox).

Wonder Lightbox is $129 one time fee.  The lightbox can be added to the custom button later.

FAQs

If you are looking for a full knowledgebase, this is not what you are looking for and you can reach out to me about those options.  They are more costly to setup and most teacherpreneurs just need a simple FAQ.

I use WooCommerce Product FAQ Manager (about $45/lifetime). Store questions can drive me nuts sometimes!  Often it is in the description itself, but people skim.  Fact of life. If you can go ahead and add a FAQ section on each product, then perhaps it will save you time in the long run. 

I also put a place directly on the product for people to ask questions.  This is tied into my FAQ section so if it is a question that would apply to all, I can add it to the product very easily. Watch the video for more information.    

COSTS: The cost is about $45 for the plugin.  The video says both plugins, but the plugins have been combined into one plugin since the time of this recording.

Some people want to give customers the option to buy on TpT.  

We add a custom field for each product and a custom button to the template.  There may be a paid plugin required to edit the template, but it is very site specific. 

Bundles

I don’t know about you, but I can’t resist a discounted up-sell! 

Buy shirts AND shorts for $10 instead of each for $8 and I’m sold! 

The same works for digital products.  The plugin, WooCommerce Bundles, ($59/year) makes this possible.  Plus, you don’t have to update the Bundle separately!

I do not recommend any other bundling tool because of compatibility issues.

Watch the video for more information:

COSTS:  The bundle plugin is $50/year.

Dynamic Pricing

I don’t know about you, but I can’t resist a discounted up-sell! 

Buy 3 shirts for $15 instead of 2 for $12 and I’m sold!  Same works for digital products. 

The plugin, WooCommerce Dynamic Pricing with Discount Rules ($79/lifetime) makes this possible. 

There is also an official WooCommerce plugin available ($130/year).

Check out the video for more information (Note: the plugin in the video is different than the one now recommended but the function is basically the same. From time to time, I adjust my plugin recommendation based on abandoning of plugins, problems with code, etc.

COSTS: The plugins are about $79/lifetime to $130/year.

Abandoned Cart Emails

Have you ever shopped somewhere, added something to your cart, but then you were distracted and never checked out?  Then maybe a day later the company emails you about what is in your cart.  This is called abandoned cart marketing. 

The idea is people who have added something to the cart are pretty hot leads and might just need a push to come back and buy your product!

Check out the video for more information: 

COSTS: $100/year for the Automate Woo plugin.

Shipping

If you do not have hard goods and do not plan on shipping anything, you can completely skip this part.

The following advice is for people shipping from the US. Let me know if you shipping from another country.

Shipping goods can be complicated. There are many different options on which service to go with and how to charge it. If you have a different situation than outlined below, note it and we can discuss the best way to achieve your goal.

Shipping is basically broken down to:

1. How much and how to charge your customer.
2. Packaging for your items.
3. Which carrier are you shipping with?
4. Buying Labels.
5. Printing Labels.
6. Tracking Shipping.

1. How much to charge your customer.

You can do a variety of options but the ones most used are:

1. Flat rate – charge one flat fee per order or per item. This flat fee could differ for the continental US, HI/AK, and international. I recommend flat rate shipping for one or two products for ease of use. Flat rate shipping is set up with either 1) a base rate, 2) per item price (plus base rate if desired), or 3) percentage of order amount (plus base rate if desired).
2. Table rate shipping – This is a way to specify if x condition exists, charge y amount. You can have an unlimited number of conditions. This is useful for when you have thresholds that would bump your shipping costs (i.e. buy 5 of one item and charge one price, buy 6 or more and charge another). This is a stepping stone between options A and C. This is a good option if you want to charge by item weight. (There are free (https://wordpress.org/plugins/woocommerce-easy-table-rate-shipping/) and paid options (here: https://codecanyon.net/item/table-rate-shipping-for-woocommerce/3796656 and https://woocommerce.com/products/table-rate-shipping/)).
3. Live shipping calculation – you tell WooCommerce the weight of your products and connect to a shipping service. When someone adds items to the cart, it automatically calculates the price by connecting to the live service. You would tell WooCommerce the weight and dimensions of your product and the service uses this information to calculate rates. This is the most accurate but also the most costly (as far as plugins.)
4. Free shipping – this one is easiest to implement. Offer (and advertise!) free shipping to your customers, but roll the cost of shipping into your items’ price(s).

2. Packaging for your items.

If you have one item I suggest choosing an envelope or box and sticking to just using that particular packaging for ease in calculations. I found a set of packing envelopes from Amazon that I could buy reasonably in bulk. I pass that charge onto my customers (it comes out to about $.15/envelope). This is a situation where using leftover amazon packaging is not the best option.    

3. Which carrier are you shipping with

If you have one or two products, live in the US, and are shipping from home, I suggest using USPS. It is much easier to stick your item in the mailbox. If you would like to discuss other options, let me know. If you are an international (to me) client, let me know and I can help research the best option for your country.  

4. Buying labels

When I first began shipping items, I manually purchased labels. The customer bought my item, I then went to USPS.com and manually entered information and then hand wrote out the information and attached postage. I highly recommend you did NOT do this because I began to resent getting orders (and clearly getting orders is the goal of offering a product for sale!). Instead, we want to find a way to automate the purchase of labels  

5. Printing labels

Most paid shipping options offer an option to print a pre-filled shipping label. I combine this with labels such as this: https://amzn.to/2V1pJvi  in order to make it super easy peel n stick. As mentioned in item 4, I used to handwrite labels but now I have them automatically printed and it has saved me so much time. *** *** I actually also bought a completely separate printer for printing labels. This way I could just keep my custom labels in printer B and use printer A with regular paper. (I kept printing out visuals on my custom label paper – oops.)

6. Tracking Shipping

My goods are extremely lightweight so I ship first class (basically a stamp) so I do not track shipping.  However every now and then a shipment is lost and I have no way to prove it wasn’t my fault.  If you do tracking shipping that solves the problem.  

Video to watch:

SHIPPING QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER

1. What are you shipping?
2. What do you need to charge for shipping? (I can then help figure out what you need to charge and ship).
3. What carrier will you use?
4. Work on getting your package and item weight and dimensions.

COSTS: The cost depends on the various options you choose.

Funnels

This is the ability to add specialized checkouts, thank you pages, upsells, and order bumps. 

Installation includes a default checkout and thank you but no order bumps or funnels.  Those can be added on later.

Miscellaneous Items

• Embed Any Document – I use this to embed my pdf preview from dropbox.
• WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers FREE – Makes the order numbers sequential.  It just helps me keep the orders straight.  Otherwise, you will get order #139304AF494.
• WooCommerce PDF Invoices & Packing Slips – FREE – Create, print & email PDF invoices & packing slips for WooCommerce orders.  It automatically sends an invoice to your customer.

• WooCommerce – MailerLite – FREE – Official MailerLite integration for WooCommerce.  If you are using a different email provider let me know and I’ll look into connections for that provider.
• WooCommerce – Convertkit – FREE – Tags the people who purchase from your website.
• WooCommerce – Mailchimp – FREE – Tags the people who purchase from your website.
• Facebook for WooCommerce – FREE – Grow your business on Facebook! Use this official plugin to help sell more of your products using Facebook. It connects your products with Facebook.  Note that digital items are not currently allowed on Facebook.

Next Steps