Shopify is a fantastic easy to use eCommerce platform, but the monthly fees can force many to look at moving to alternatives such as WooCommerce. WooCommerce is the most popular and free eCommerce solution for the WordPress platform. The flexibility of both WooCommerce and WordPress allow for virtually any eCommerce configuration, but does generally require more advanced setup.

Select a WordPress Theme

Since you can’t use your existing Shopify theme with WordPress, the first step is to find a new WordPress theme that will fit your brand and most importantly one that is built for WooCommerce. As WooCommerce is extremely popular there are thousands to choose from, and the best place to look is themeforest which is part of the envato market.

Set up WordPress & WooCommerce

Next, you will need to find a web hosting package so that you can set up your shop and point your existing domain to it. Shopify includes hosting as part of their monthly fee which is why you will now need to purchase your own. Depending on your shop’s traffic requirements, basic hosting can be found from as little as $5/month.

Once you purchase web hosting, you will now need to install WordPress, WooCommerce, and your chosen WordPress theme. This is the most complicated part of the process and can require more advanced skills as the platform can be tricky. If you are not familiar with WordPress or WooCommerce it would be best to find a developer to set up your new shop and help you familiarize yourself with it.

Transfer Products from Shopify

The last step is to add your products to your new shop. This can be done in one of two ways, either by exporting and re-importing via a CSV file in bulk, or by adding your products one-by-one in WooCommerce.

If you have a smaller product collection, I would highly recommend adding them individually into WooCommerce as you can more accurately update the product meta data, and configure each one.

If you have a large product collection, Shopify will allow you to export your product data in bulk as a CSV file. Even though WooCommerce does support bulk import VIA a CSV file, you cannot simply upload this file into WooCommerce without formatting it properly.

Shopify & WooCommerce CSV

• Shopify Product Export CSV Sample
• WooCommerce Product Import CSV Sample

Shopify utilizes a different CSV format with different headers and meta data then WooCommerce, but with the help of a program such as Excel you can re-arrange and format the data so that it is compatible with the WooCommerce import feature.

Simply use the WooCommerce Sample Import CSV above as a template, and copy over the related fields after downloading your Shopify Product CSV. Once completed, you can save and import the WooCommerce CSV to load your products.

Enjoy your WooCommerce Shop

Despite this seemingly complex process, moving your Shopify eCommerce store to WooCommerce is actually fairly straightforward and can save you money in the long run, especially if you are still working to build your brand.