Running an eCommerce business is a multi-faceted adventure. While setting up your business, you have to wear different hats ranging from a business analyst, marketer, operations manager, and designer to a customer services representative.
With resources and growth, investing in valuable tools to automate your venture makes sense. The tools available today have functionality that can eliminate the burden of not only running single but multiple stores.
After testing the waters successfully, many eCommerce entrepreneurs enter different arenas. Running multiple eCommerce stores offers significant benefits like global reach, exploration of your many ambitions, access to other markets, and a chance to start an outlet. It is all possible because of the automation and efficiency SaaS tools offer.
This article explores why you should make multiple Shopify stores. We’ll also explore the challenges you are likely to meet while running multiple stores and the best tools as their solutions.
Why should you make multiple Shopify stores?
Running multiple Shopify stores can sound exhausting, but it’s not a problem with amazing tools available online. Furthermore, you get to enjoy the following benefits of making multiple Shopify stores.
1. Global Reach
If your current eCommerce business is flourishing, why not serve other markets? Expanding your business internationally is a different game. You have to adjust your messaging to target different customer personas.
Depending on the market you are entering, you must take a different approach to sell your products, marketing, advertising, and order management. Your store policies, currencies, and languages will also differ for other countries. Therefore, it makes sense to have a dedicated store per market.
Make multiple Shopify stores to maximize your target audience reach and diversify your revenue streams.
Top brands like BMW have different web storefronts for audiences in Japan and Italy. They have a separate product catalog, design collateral, and content on these stores.
2. Explore multiple niches
One of the alluring aspects of eCommerce is that you don’t have to limit yourself to a single niche. Having separate stores for different product lines can help you position your products based on the target audience. Your marketing message will be clear, and handling SEO will be relatively easier.
It will be obvious for your customer to identify with your brand. Your customers would know what you are selling and what they can expect to find in your store. It makes more sense to have different stores to sell newborn accessories, kids’ clothing, and furniture rather than bundling up everything at a single store unless you are a marketplace.
3. Diversify the Market and serve different Audiences
With eCommerce stores, you can target different audiences and markets like B2B and B2C. Sometimes it does not require multiple stores. But it’s more of a necessity in cases where you can’t address different audiences from different regions with a single store having varied product demand.
Also, the same prices don’t appeal to different socio-economic classes; therefore, you can create multiple stores to sell your products at discounted prices. For instance, Amazon uses a geotargeting marketing technique and has separate pages for US, German, and UK audiences. And the content of these sites is curated based on the region.
Challenges to run multiple Shopify stores effortlessly
Having multiple Shopify stores sounds like a great idea, but it comes with challenges. In short, what you previously had to do for one store, now needs to be done for multiple stores. Here is a list of common challenges.
- Order fulfillment can get more complicated with multiple stores. Managing orders from various locations on different sites can become a headache with a wide range of products.
- Inventory management can become strenuous with multiple stores. The risks of running out of stock and handling customer inquiries can worsen. The more stores you run, the more product data you have to handle
- Managing existing products and introducing new ones requires more effort with multiple stores. Also, handling product data can get even messier.
- Moreover, you would require integrations with other tools to avoid frustration and efficiently handle store functions.
- Customer queries also increase manifold. And the work associated with product information, marketing, SEO, payment, forecasting, and other operations takes more time and energy to implement.
- Here is our blog about what mistakes people make while managing multiple online store
5 Best Shopify Apps to run Multiple stores
Fortunately, technological growth has made running multiple stores not only possible but smooth. Below is a list of the five best Shopify apps that help run and manage multiple stores.
1. Syncerize – Multistore Management App
Syncerize is a multistore management tool that offers effortless inventory auto-updates, product synchronization, and order forwarding. Users can connect to multiple stores and enjoy real-time inventory updates.
You can import products instantly with all information like images, descriptions, prices, and more. You can also customize properties for product import according to your store needs. One of the key features of Syncerize is that it lets you set desired product pricing with profit margins based on your requirement. Whatever price margin you set is your profit.
Order fulfillment is easy with the Syncerize order push function. You can never lose track of your customer orders.
Pricing
- Syncerize is free to use for the source store. The destination store paid plans start at $9 / month.
- They also offer a free plan with basic business needs of up to 10 store connections. You can try their Business plan for $19 a month for unlimited store connections.
2. Gorgias – Customer Support App
Gorgias is an all-in-one customer support tool. It allows you to manage all customer interactions from a central dashboard on your Shopify store.
Gorgias can be used for multiple stores with various customer touchpoints. It provides complete information about a customer, including message history, order details, shipping information, etc. Gorgias operates based on a ticketing system to manage customer support.
It provides a powerful live chat tool and automation features. You can use the analytics provided by Gorgias to assess your customer support team performance.
Pricing
- Gorgias’s pricing plans are based on the number of tickets your business needs to handle per month.
- The Basic plan is $60 with 350 tickets per month, the Pro plan gives you 2000 tickets for $300, and the Advanced plan comes with 6000 tickets for $750.
3. SEO King – Bulk SEO Optimization App
SEO King offers an extensive set of tools for managing SEO. It bulk optimizes your online stores. Its advanced scan tool scans the entire website for 150+ metrics.
SEO King offers tools like alt text manager, advanced sitemap manager, photo editor, ads builder, auto-optimizer, and many more features to improve your SEO ranking. It provides real-time help to create SEO-optimized content to increase traffic organically. You can integrate it with Google Analytics and enjoy live chat support.
Pricing
- SEO King has a free plan with limited features. They also have paid plans for different shop sizes (small, medium, large) based on the number of products.
- Their paid plan for small shops costs $9.99 per month. And for large shops, paid plan starts at $14.99 per month.
4. Rewind Backups – Multistore Backup App
Rewind Backups offers daily automated backups of your Shopify store. Building multiple stores take time and effort. And nobody wants to face the struggle when something goes wrong with your store whilst you have to look after multiple stores.
Rewind Backups gives you peace of mind about the protection of your store. With Rewind added to your Shopify store, you won’t have to worry about mistakes that can happen while making store changes. You can always go back to your store at a previous point in time. You can undo a single step, multiple steps, or your entire account.
Rewind is completely secure and GDPR compliant. Rewind support team is available seven days a week to restore your store. It backs up store items like products, images, customers, orders, and pages, policies, menus, themes, and more.
Pricing
- Rewind has three paid plans, Pro, Plus, and Enterprise, based on the number of orders per month.
- The Pro plan is for $39 per month with up to 600 orders.
- The Enterprise plan offers up to 8000 orders per month for $299.
5. Putler- Multistore Monitoring App
Putler helps you monitor multiple Shopify stores from a single admin. It allows you to connect, manage and grow unlimited Shopify stores from one Putler account. You can view multiple reports related to sales, customers, website audience, subscriptions, and transactions.
You can manage access of different team members to Putler by assigning roles such as admin and support. Having a complete picture of your eCommerce business spanning multiple Shopify stores is possible with Putler. Moreover, you can view individual store data to measure their performance.
Pricing
- Putler Starter pack has all the basic features to track your business for $20 a month.
- For high volume business, Putler offers a Growth plan for $50 per month.
- You can customize a plan based on your needs by contacting their sales team.
Read more blogs : https://syncerize.com/multiple-shopify-stores-on-one-account/
