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Thinking of moving to Shopify Plus? Here's everything you need to know
Moving to Shopify plus, either as an upgrade from other Shopify plans or migrating from a competitive eCommerce platform, is becoming a more and more enticing move for eCommerce brands regardless of the industry they find themselves in.
Many eCommerce businesses will have previously considered making the move to Shopify Plus but, due to being unsure of the requirements or not fully being sold on the benefits of moving to the platform, will have left the idea on the shelf.
Here, we want to look at the benefits of Shopify Plus, what’s required to move to the platform - either from Shopify or another eCommerce platform - and what the potential costs might include.
Shopify Plus is the highest tier of Shopify Plan available to eCommerce merchants. It offers all of the benefits of Shopify’s Basic, Standard, and advanced plans, but is better suited to businesses looking to expand and grow. This can include internationalisation, the introduction of a B2B arm of their business, retail stores, or simply expanding on their core eCommerce site through more complex additions to their site.
Due to Shopify Plus’s primary merchant base being made up of enterprise level businesses and those requiring more complex functionalities, Shopify positions Shopify Plus as a separate product from the other tiers of Shopify Plans.
Shopify Plus stands apart from the other three plans in several key ways. Designed for high-traffic, high-revenue stores, Shopify Plus provides greater flexibility and takes a smaller cut of transactions. While it comes at a significantly higher monthly fee, the reduction in transaction fees can make it a more cost-effective choice for some businesses.
Running your eCommerce business on Shopify Plus has a number of benefits - especially when compared to other eCommerce platforms.
Many of the same benefits of running your business on Shopify apply to Shopify Plus too, but are only further magnified. For example, Shopify is known for being the most flexible eCommerce platform available; capable of fitting in with any business vertical, and is especially suited for businesses who undergo frequent change. As an open source platform, Shopify Plus is even more flexible and can support the fast go to market of major business changes.
Designed for high-traffic stores, Shopify Plus offers faster load times, unlimited bandwidth, and the ability to handle thousands of transactions per minute without performance issues. Plus, like all other Shopify plans, Shopify Plus gives you access to the best converting checkout in eCommerce.
Shopify’s checkout converts up to 36% better than the checkout of any other eCommerce platform. With Shopify Plus, you get access to make changes to the checkout, meaning you can introduce new functions and features if you want to.
Finally, Shopify Plus offers a lower total cost of ownership than all comparable eCommerce platforms. Despite being the most expensive Shopify plan, compared to the enterprise offering of other eCommerce platforms, Shopify Plus’s range of built in features, hosting, and marketing tools ensures that merchants get the most bang for their buck from an eCommerce platform.
The benefits of an eCommerce business making the move to Shopify Plus can take many different forms depending on what eCommerce platform they are making the move from, the makeup of their business, and their intentions for making the move.
Businesses moving from similarly positioned enterprise-level eCommerce platforms such as Salesforce Commerce Cloud & Adobe Commerce (formerly known as Magento) will experience a significant reduction in the cost of running the business online.
Businesses making the move to Shopify Plus from the mid-market platforms such as BigCommerce & WooCommerce will see the benefit of less technical debt and the increased conversion rates from running their business with Shopify’s market-leading checkout.
Finally, businesses making the significantly less-common transition of moving from entry level eCommerce platforms such as Wix eCommerce, Squarespace, and Weebly will see improved conversion rates and have access to a much more industry-disrupting library of eCommerce features.
Depending on which platform you’re moving to the platform from, migrating to Shopify Plus could save you money in the long run, or be a long term investment in your business with a steep initial cost.
A Shopify Plus plan is initially priced at $2300 (~£1850) per month, with a more complex pricing structure available on a business by business basis.
Additionally there are the time costs associated with migrating to Shopify Plus, and the potential requirements of working with dedicated Shopify Plus Partners to handle the migration on your behalf. These costs can vary depending on the platform you are moving to Shopify plus from, the additional requirements your business has when it comes to making the move, and the Shopify Plus Agency in question as each will have their own rates.
Once you have actually decided to make the move, the actual process of migrating an eCommerce store to Shopify Plus will require a number of essential boxes being ticked.
It’s a case of rebuilding one’s site in Shopify Plus, ensuring that all functionalities are maintained, and that all data is protected in the move. The process can be time consuming, but should reap dividends for your eCommerce business in the long run.
Yes, it’s not a prerequisite to first have an account on Shopify’s basic, standard, or advanced plans before building your eCommerce store in Shopify Plus. Even if you don’t have an existing eCommerce site to migrate to Shopify Plus from, you can create your business’s eCommerce store from scratch if you wish.
Moving to Shopify Plus From Shopify advanced is the easiest migration to make.
The only thing you need to do is change your payment from the £259 monthly for Shopify advanced, to the £1850 monthly for Shopify Plus. It’s generally recommended that businesses only make the move to Shopify plus once the monthly payment represents 2-3% of their monthly revenue, or that they’ve reached the point of making £1-million in annual sales.
The onboarding process is simple. In fact, Shopify Plus has priority support to assist with the migration, helping guide you through each step of the process and connecting you with accredited Shopify Plus Partners if necessary. If you’re already on an existing Shopify Plan but are upgrading to Shopify Plus, it should take as little as 24 hours for your upgrade to complete. During this time, you’ll receive an invitation to join a merchant onboarding program, but you can always reach out to the Shopify Plus priority support team if need be.
The move to Shopify Plus from Magento has become such a common eCommerce migration that Shopify even made an effort to market the Shopify Plus platform as the go-to destination for businesses looking to move on from Magento.
Upon the purchase of Magento by Adobe, and the subsequent rebranding of the platform as Adobe Commerce, many eCommerce businesses have struggled with the cost and looked to move to a new platform.The specific process of migrating from Adobe Commerce to Shopify Plus requires more of a case by case analysis. Adobe Commerce was built to be flexible and allow merchants to build their store in whichever way best suited them. Whilst it’s still a flexible platform, Shopify Plus has a few more restrictions in place. A merchant will first have to figure out how any existing functionalities will work in Shopify, give their site structure a massive overhaul, and export all of the data crucial to their site’s maintenance.
Merchants will then need to set up a Shopify account, import their Magento data, rebuild their store in Shopify Plus, thoroughly test all functionalities, and launch their new site in Shopify.The benefits of Migrating from Magento to Shopify Plus include a reduced total cost of ownership, reduced technical debt, and the increased conversion rate of Shopify’s standard checkout.
In modern eCommerce, many consider BigCommerce and Shopify to be the two most similar eCommerce Platforms. The two have similar pricing structures for their four plans, offer similar features, and stores built on the two platforms often look very similar. However, BigCommerce does not offer nearly the same level of tools to grow your business internationally, customer support is significantly less robust, and it is slightly more difficult to manage as a platform. So, whilst users aren’t migrating from BigCommerce to Shopify Plus at the rate they are migrating from Adobe Commerce to Shopify Plus, there are still a number of reasons for a business to make the move.
The process of migrating from BigCommerce to Shopify Plus is similar to the migration from Adobe Commerce to Shopify Plus. Merchants will first need to assess whether the features of their eCommerce store can realistically be replicated in Shopify Plus and backup the data of their existing store. Merchants will have to create a Shopify Plus account and import all of their BigCommerce data into the new site via Shopify’s API tools.
Like Shopify, BigCommerce has its own URL structure, however the two are entirely different, which means that a migration from BigCommerce to Shopify Plus is heavily reliant on 301 redirects and SEO safeguarding. Once all new features have been tested and approved, the new Shopify plus store can go live and the migration is complete. Merchants will immediately benefit from the reduced total cost of ownership, a better converting checkout experience, and the growth opportunities of Shopify’s business scalability tools.
The Wordpress extension WooCommerce is a platform that’s favoured amongst web developers due to its open source nature, which allows for high levels of flexibility and customisation. However, few eCommerce businesses choose WooCommerce for their eCommerce store in the modern day, so most WooCommerce sites tend to be quite old, making a migration to Shopify Plus appealing.
The process of Migrating to Shopify Plus from WooCommerce is similar to the migration process for most other eCommerce platforms. An assessment and plan for the migration is essential, followed by a backing up of the existing WooCommerce store. A merchant will need to set up a Shopify account and import their WooCommerce data with Shopify’s API, set up any 301 redirects, thoroughly test, and, finally, launch.
WooCommerce merchants moving to Shopify Plus will immediately benefit from no longer having to find a hosting provider for their store as a part of the reduced total cost of ownership, the reduced technical debt, and the scalability opportunities of Shopify Plus.
Salesforce Commerce Cloud is a cloud based platform that allows merchants to run their eCommerce store, developed by cloud based technology company Salesforce. Many merchants who use Salesforce Commerce Cloud do so because they use other Salesforce products within their business too. However, Salesforce is not an eCommerce platform first and foremost, and so Salesforce Commerce Cloud pales in comparison to Shopify when it comes to conversion rate, scalability, and the raw number of features. Whilst Shopify Plus may not natively integrate with other Salesforce business tools, tools like Zapier can overcome this, giving merchants no hurdles to making a move to Shopify Plus. Equally, Salesforce Commerce cloud is priced at 1% (at minimum) of a store’s total revenue, whereas Shopify Plus is 0.5% +$2300, meaning that businesses will instantly save money by moving to Shopify Plus, even if only slightly.
The process requires merchants to assess how their store’s features will work in Shopify, back up their existing store, and create a Shopify account. From here, a merchant must back up their store, export all data from Salesforce Commerce Cloud, and import the data into Shopify Plus. Once the new site has been tested and approved within the organisation, it can go live.
Users will instantly benefit from Shopify’s rich database of features, scalability tools, reduced total cost of ownership, and a checkout that converts up to 36% better than that of Salesforce Commerce Cloud’s.
Sap Commerce, similar to Salesforce Commerce Cloud, is a cloud based eCommerce platform developed by cloud-based technology company SAP. Many merchants who use SAP Commerce Cloud do so because they use other SAP products within their business too. The only major difference between SAP commerce cloud and Salesforce Commerce Cloud is that Salesforce is an American company and SAP is a European one. So, despite both having global users, there is a skew towards business using the platform native to their region.
The migration process from SAP Commerce Cloud to Shopify Plus is identical to that of Salesforce Commerce Cloud. The process requires merchants to assess how their store’s features will work in Shopify, back up their existing store, and create a Shopify account. From here, a merchant must back up their store, export all data from SAP Commerce Cloud, and import the data into Shopify Plus. Once the new site has been tested and approved internally, it can go live.
Businesses who choose to migrate to Shopify Plus from a competitive eCommerce platform will immediately feel the benefits of the best converting checkout in eCommerce, the scalability and growth opportunities provided by the platform, and the costs saved by Shopify’s significantly reduced total cost of ownership.
It’s a complicated process, but one that reaps rewards. If you’d like to learn how we can help you make the move to Shopify, contact us!
