Shopify is a leading eCommerce business platform for small and medium-size businesses that don’t have big budget to invest on eCommerce website designing. Shopify provides a cost-effective option for creating user-friendly online stores that not only attract buyers but do well on search engines as well.

Easy-to-use and customize, Shopify is immensely helpful in organizing products and personalizing storefronts. Also, it packs a long list of advanced features that make it just perfect for every need. It runs well on all browsers and it is easy to install and upgrade from time to time without breaking the theme or complete site like WordPress and Magento.

If you are focused on quality and want to make sure that your store shouldn’t look like a template-based cheap store then you should hire an experienced Shopify designer that understands your business fully and also that is capable of designing stores that not only attract website visitors but also convert them into customers.

• Qualities That a Shopify Product Designer Should Have
• What Qualifications do Product Designers Need?
• What a Product Designer Should Know?
• How Do You Start a Product Design Career?
• Is Shopify Designer Friendly?
• How do I Make my Shopify Store Attractive?
• What Are The Skills of a Product Designer?
• Can You Become a Product Designer Without a Degree?
• What do Product Designers Actually do?
• What is a Product Designer?
• How do You Become a Product Designer?
• Do You Need a Designer For Shopify?
• How Much Does a Shopify Designer Cost?
• How Much Does it Cost to Hire a Shopify Expert?
• Where Can I Find a Shopify Web Developer?
• What Can a Shopify Web Developer do For me?
• How do I Find a Shopify Web Designer?
• What Makes a Good Shopify Store?
• What Should I Not Sell on Shopify?

Qualities That a Shopify Product Designer Should Have

Following are the few essential qualities your product designer tool should have. Checking the below factors can save you from regrets and can help you to upgrade your business.

The Ease of Use

Who is your target audience? Is it only the professionals, designers, or the general public? To keep your audience interested, you will need to know your audience first. Make sure you know who your audience is and their technical strength because it is common to have an audience who is not as tech-savvy as others.

Read Also: Benefits of Offering Customization Through Your Shopify Store

Thus, it is advisable to keep your designer tool easy to use for a non-tech-friendly audience also. Because if you need to hire a professional to manage it, then it is not worth the time and money you put into building it.

And even when the customer is done with the design, they are not required to send the designs separately by mail or any other medium for sending them to get printed. They just have to select the material they want their products to be printed on, and that is it.

As a store owner, you will receive their requirements and a file ready for printing as per their requirements. You just need to print that file on the desired material with the required dyes. Now, that is how you can make technology easy for your customers to access your services.

Supports Multiple Languages

If you want to attract an audience on your Shopify business globally, then it is vital for your website to enable multiple languages in your product designer tool. How can you do this? By opting for multilingual support in the tool that converts the inputs at the front-end interface and back-end interface both in your preferred language(s). You should consider the local languages of the major part of the countries and regions where your target audience resides.

Knowledge is Power

When you start any conversation with someone by naming that person, it is natural that the person will feel important or related to you. The point here is the way you remember your teammate’s or customer’s detailed information; your designer software should do the same for your customers.

Greeting them with their first names with a popup when they visit your store or displaying their names on the dashboards are some of the ideas you can start with. They will just have to fill in the login details, and every time they login with the same id, their names will pop up.

The more knowledge you will gather about your customers, the more it will empower you to serve them better. You can even save some of the information of the customers, like the address or payment details, in their personal dashboard.

This way, they do not have to enter the details manually every time they place an order. And all of this offers customer satisfaction, what is better than that? Also, choose a software that allows your customers to engage with your company directly. How? By highlighting contact details like email id, helpline number, address, etc.

Compatibility

The online Shopify product designer software should have cross-platform compatibility. It means that your tool should be compatible to work seamlessly on different browsers and with different OS without compromising efficiency.

To make it even more versatile, you can even have mobile compatibility and mobile responsiveness. Essentially ‘mobile first’ policy is a must for your online Shopify store as it provides multiple options of devices to your customers.

It should be compatible across browsers. Any glitches in your software across any browsers can affect your store business adversely. Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, Bing, etc., are some of the browsers you must do a test run on. Apart from that, make sure your product design tool works efficiently on multiple devices like computers, mobile phones, laptops, or tablets.

Provide Good Quality Output for Designed Products

Maintaining the quality of your products is very important for winning the trust of your customers. The first thing you need to make sure of is providing the best quality print. For that, you will need to ensure that your designer tool provides quality outputs for the customized products. If your final design is of good quality, you can avoid hiring a dedicated designer to check and do the editing before final print. This will save you money and time both.

Allow Social Media Login and Sharing

It would not be wrong to say that more than half of the world is scrolling through social media sites at the moment. As maximum people are always online on such platforms, it is easier for them to login directly from their social media account. Thus, you should consider offering direct login from social media instead of going through the entire process of adding themselves with a new user subscription.

You can also offer direct share buttons for the products designed by them. This helps when they are confused or want to flaunt their designs to their friends or groups. In return, you get more subscribers and more people sharing your products on social media platforms.

What Qualifications do Product Designers Need?

As a product designer, you’ll create a range of items, from everyday products such as mobile phones, household appliances and cars, to larger items such as industrial tools, equipment and machinery.

Using your understanding of technology, materials and manufacturing methods, you’ll improve the design and usability of an item. This may involve working on new products or improving existing ones.

Most product designers have a degree, foundation degree or HND in a related subject such as product design. Any courses that offer a design element as part of general design or technology studies, would also be relevant.

In addition to product design, the following degree and HND subjects may be useful:

• industrial design
• spatial design
• 3D design.

Courses that include a relevant placement year or those with significant practical design content are particularly helpful. You’ll be required to show a portfolio of your design work when applying for jobs so anything that helps to build this up will be useful.

Entry without a degree or HND is extremely unlikely.

A Masters’ degree or other postgraduate qualification might be an advantage in certain sectors, especially when working with European customers and competitors.

What a Product Designer Should Know?

According to Eric Eriksson, a product designer at Facebook (and formerly of Spotify), a good product designer creates solutions for user problems and validates concepts at each step of the way.

• They understand all the intricacies of the business, and know how to balance user goals with business goals
• They know when to deliver wireframes, when to deliver pixel perfect mockups, and how to provide the right context for their designs to anyone involved.
• They know when to prototype, and how to test the designs with the right users.
• They understand the implications of their design on the company’s processes and technical capabilities.
• They know how to focus on the right problem based on quantitative data (e.g. Google Analytics) and qualitative data (e.g. user interviews), then convincingly communicate their solutions to all stakeholders.

Product designers are not yet clearly defined and are capable but not limited to the following skillsets:

• Behavioral patterns recognition
• UX and interaction design
• Design facilitation
• UI and graphic design
• User research
• User Analytics
• Prototyping

Use a combination of the following tools to prototype and test your idea with potential users and customers.

i. QuickMVP – QuickMVP allows you to conduct customer interviews, create a landing page and test if customers will sign-up and calculate key business metrics like profit margin and market size.

ii. Prototyping on Paper– POP allows you to create a simple and intuitive prototype just by using paper, pen and your smartphone. An extremely quick way to test your low-fidelity concept.

iii. UXPin– Great product design requires great user experience design. UXPin provides a fast and easy collaborative tool for designing products on any device. The tool also integrates with Photoshop & Sketch.

iv. Skala Preview– An essential tool for every digital product designer. nce you get into the visual design phase, you may want to see how your product looks on the actual device while designing.

v. UserTesting – Very useful tool for recruiting and testing designs with any amount of users. UserTesting is great for scaling your usability tests since the process is just as sooth for testing with 5 or 500 users. They also allow you to test prototypes or completed products.

How Do You Start a Product Design Career?

As for breaking into product design, folks tend to gravitate toward it from two disciplines: engineering and graphic design. For technical folks looking to tap into their inner designer, they must learn a few new tools and concepts.

However, it is primarily finding an opportunity to display their craftsmanship and attention to detail in a product design context. For graphic designers, the challenge is in expanding their purview from making something look great to making something work great.

Building out a product design skill set not only immerses oneself in the tools they will use once they get a job. It also gives them countless opportunities to practice and become fluent using them.

And once a certain level of mastery is achieved, there’s no shortage of opportunities to put those skills into action in the real world before getting a paycheck by helping cash-strapped startups or lending those talents to a nonprofit or great cause.

These experiences will not only be great practice. They will also augment their portfolio, which is key to landing a position in the field. This not only shows that a candidate has the skills and talent to do the work. It also gives employers a sense of their taste and style, which are far more important in this role than they would be in others.

Luckily, someone can build a portfolio without actually having a product design job first. The portfolio should include projects that are relevant to the job and facilitate telling a story about how the problem was assessed and the solution was designed, not just the finished product.

Unlike other professions, a college degree or resume isn’t enough to land a product design gig. Just like writers and architects, examples of previous work are essential to getting the job.

Is Shopify Designer Friendly?

Shopify lets you have complete control over the look and feel of your website, allowing you to make it look exactly how you want.

Shopify is designer-friendly, so you can use any text editor to edit all template files and assets. At any time you can sync your changes to your live store and test your new design.

To begin building your website, all you need is a basic understanding of HTML and CSS. We use a designer-focused programming language called Liquid that’s easy to learn and is well documented and supported to help you along the way.

The Shopify theme store has hundreds of professional website designs ready for your choosing – many of which have been designed by world renowned designers. Get a great looking design at a fraction of the price that a custom web design would cost.

How do I Make my Shopify Store Attractive?

Your website is the heart of your digital marketing efforts, so crafting a beautifully designed site is paramount to helping your company grow online. You can use a platform like Shopify to build your eCommerce site.

So, how can you get the most from your Shopify site?

1. Choose the right theme for your business

If you want to know how to design a Shopify store, start by choosing the right theme for your business. The theme is the backbone of your website and determines how your site appears to your audience. Considering that 94% of first impressions relate to web design, you want to ensure you choose the right theme to make a good impression.

Shopify offers numerous templates you can use for your site. They offer free and premium templates that cost anywhere from $100 to $180.

So, how do you choose the right theme for your website?

When you’re trying to craft your Shopify store design, you’ll want to ask yourself questions like:

• How do I want my products displayed on my site?
• What features do I need for my store?
• How do I want users to shop on my site?
• What type of experience do I want to deliver for my audience?
• How much can I spend on my design?

By asking these questions, you can determine which design is best for your eCommerce business.

P.S. When you customize your Shopify store, make sure you choose one that’s mobile-friendly! A mobile-friendly theme is crucial if you want to deliver a top-notch browsing experience on your site. You can check in the description of the theme to verify it’s mobile-friendly.

2. Use apps to build your site

Next on our list of Shopify store design tips is to use apps to build your site. Like WordPress’s plugins, Shopify utilizes apps to help you add features to your site that enhance the audience’s experience.

You can use dozens of apps to build your site. App categories include:

• Finding products
• Places to sell
• Store design
• Marketing
• Sales and conversion
• Orders and shipping
• Inventory management
• Customer support
• Trust and security
• Finances
• Productivity
• Reporting

Whether you’re looking to optimize your sales process or manage your inventory, you can add an app to help build a better eCommerce site.

3. Make sure your site loads quickly

One of the most critical Shopify website design tips is to make sure your site loads quickly. Users won’t wait for slow-loading sites and will abandon them if they take too long to load. In fact, slow-loading sites cost businesses $2.6 billion in revenue loss each year.

When you use Shopify as your site builder, you want to check your site load time to ensure that you deliver the best experience for your audience.

You can use a tool like Google PageSpeed Insights to help you see your site’s current load time.

If your site loads too slow, you can improve your site load time by:

• Avoiding third-party themes: Shopify enables you to use third-party themes on your site. The risk with this is that they can have additional features that bog down your site. It’s best to stick to Shopify’s themes since you know what you’re getting with them.
• Compressing image file sizes: Adding product photos to your site is a great way to provide a great user experience, but it can also slow down your site. You may need to compress the image file sizes to help your site load faster.
• Analyzing your app and widget usage: When you build your site, you’ll add tons of apps and widgets. If you find your site running slow, you might have too many of them. You’ll want to comb through your apps and widgets to ensure you only use essential ones on your site.

You can also get help with your site load time by investing in page speed services.

4. Use visuals on your site

Next on our list of Shopify website design tips is to add visuals. Since people can’t see the product in person, they need to get as close as possible to seeing it “in person” through your visuals.

You can use both photos and videos to help showcase your products online. When you upload these visuals to your site, you want to ensure you use high-quality visuals that showcase every angle of your product.

5. Add elements to connect with leads

When you do your Shopify store design, you want to create opportunities for leads to link up with your business. You need to customize your Shopify store with elements that enable you to connect with prospects.

One element you’ll want to include is social media buttons. These buttons provide your audience with an opportunity to follow your business on the social media platforms you use. It’s a great way for prospects to connect with your company.

Another element you can add is an email sign-up bar. You can use an email sign-up bar to capture leads for your business. You’ll want to design this bar with a call to action (CTA) button that pops off the page so users see and sign up for your emails.

6. Don’t overdo it

If you want to know how to design a Shopify store, follow this tip: don’t overdo it. One of the biggest mistakes companies make is overloading and over-designing their site.

When you have tons of information to share with your audience, you want to include all of it on your site. The problem with this approach is that it can easily lead to overcrowding on your site.

When you do your Shopify store design, make sure that you utilize whitespace throughout. Whitespace enables you to keep your audience focused on your text and photos while scrolling through your site.

As you add design elements to your site, make sure they don’t make your site look disorganized or overcrowded, so you don’t overwhelm your audience. You can use A/B testing to help you test elements on your site to ensure they’re enriching the audience’s experience.

What Are The Skills of a Product Designer?

You need to know how to design (and design well) from end to end. Interaction/UI Design and Visual Design were mentioned in all 30 of the job descriptions — almost unanimously rating them highly skilled. With UX Design only missing out by one on the full score, with 29 mentions.

The ability to Prototype your designs is expected by 70% of the companies. The type of prototyping varied from company to company, but it was mostly using Principle, InVision, or HTML/Javascript.

User Research and conducting User Testing came in with an unsurprisingly high amount of mentions; 27/30. Out of those 27 mentions, 23 of them said you need a high level of experience with it.

In order of popularity and skill importance:

1. Interaction / UI Design
2. Visual Design
3. Communication /Articulation
4. Collaboration
5. UX Design
6. High Work Standards
7. Efficient
8. Decision Making
9. User Research / User Testing
10. Customer / User Focus

Can You Become a Product Designer Without a Degree?

Nobody will dispute the fact that a degree will make things easier for you, provide you relevant skills and theories, as well as give you a certificate to use in getting yourself a job as a product designer.

But the truth is, having a university degree is not a must in the design world even though it helps.

While each designer has their own unique path, we can reach a conclusion on things you need to learn and do to become a product designer even without a university degree. These will be discussed below.

Choose an Area of Specialization

If you do not own a university degree, you will do yourself some measure of good by not becoming a jack of all trades. Those with university degrees end up specializing. What you specialize in should be determined by your passion and not the amount professionals earn in those fields, because the design world is ruled by passion-driven individuals. There are many fields you can specialize in as a product designer.

Graphic design is a popular choice, and in fact, you can hit the ground running after learning it. Other fields in the profession include logo design, web design, mobile app design, and many others.

Make sure you choose a specialty with lots of free tutorials available on the Internet if you know you do not have money to spend on paid courses. However, the best tutorials online are paid as they are usually current, constantly been reviewed, and written in such a way that learning is made easy.

Learn how to Use the Required Software

How good are you with the tools you need for your day to day job as a product designer? That will determine how far you will go. If you are a web designer then you need to be good with either Sketch, Plant, InVision, Photoshop or other popular design tools. The quality of work you do will be determined to a great extent by the tools you use for the job.

If you do not invest both your time and money in tools, you will end up wasting a lot of valuable time and energy. The best tools are the ones that will save you time, do a lot of heavy lifting for you — and get your designs to be in the best way possible in terms of appearance and usability.

Learn Relevant Theories

Self-taught designers or rather, designers without a degree have this notion that all those theories learned in school are a waste of one’s precious time. Well, if you have this in mind, it is time to have a rethink.

The truth is, whether you like it or not, theories in all fields are very important, especially in a field like product design that’s user-centric. You have to know that what gave birth to the practical aspect you are tilting toward are theories, and as such, learning them will do you some good.

Interestingly, you can start learning them straight away. You do not have to wait semester by semester to be learning them in bits. Just do research on the necessary theoretical knowledge you require in your chosen field and then try as much to understand them.

This will make you a better designer and also earn you respect and increase your confidence when speaking with others. You also require it during interviews.

Learn User Experience Designing

Yes, the goal of every product designer is to develop a product that its users will love and cherish. Now for users to love a product, the user experience must be great. You do not have to design a very complex User Interface for users to love.

No, simple User Interface that is easy to understand and use even for first-time users is the best. You need to incorporate all of your theoretical knowledge to make sure usability is top-notch. I have seen products fail just because of issues in their usability.

Build an Impressive Portfolio

Let me tell you something — there’s no replacement for a great portfolio, not even a university degree will suffix. With a university degree, employers will assume you know what you are doing even before testing your abilities and inabilities.

However, when you do not have a degree, then you have to make your portfolio stand out. You have to go the extra mile to prove to potential employers that you can get their job done, and the only way to do that is by building a portfolio with relevant projects.

There are many ideas for a portfolio. One very popular one is to look out for poorly designed work, redo it, and then state what’s bad about the work and showcase how you have transformed it.

The world is going online, and a good number of the world’s population, especially in the developed world, are connected to the internet, and as such, your portfolio should be available online for all to see. Make sure only your best works are showcased in the portfolio and avoid including tutorial themed projects.

What do Product Designers Actually do?

Product designers may be asked to operate at both very high-level design (such as designing the overall system or information architecture) and very granular details (pixel-specific mockups or CSS templates). Regardless of what they’re working on, the user experience is front-and-center for their work.

Product designers have a number of artifacts they may deliver as part of their job, including but limited to:

• Prototypes
• Wireframes
• Mockups
• User Journey Maps

While the “traditional” model was to hand off a product to product designers after the requirements were set, many product designers now work hand-in-hand with the product team throughout the product development process. By being involved throughout, they can influence what the product does as well as how it does it, keeping the user experience top of mind.

Product designers typically take the reins for prototyping and user testing, as their goal is to create an excellent product experience. They may also actually do some coding (typically more with front-end presentation languages such as HTML and CSS) and create digital assets such as logos, icons and buttons, along with helping author the text used in the product.

For solutions that include physical products or hardware, a product designer has additional responsibilities, such as helping select materials, colors and textures, possibly even using 3-D printers for prototyping or recommending production methods. Product designers will also maintain the design library of the product suite for future reference.

What is a Product Designer?

A product designer is responsible for the user experience of a product, usually taking direction on the business goals and objectives from product management. Although typically associated with the visual/tactile aspects of a product, product designers can sometimes also play a role in the information architecture and system design of a product as well.

A product designer may also be referred to as a User Experience Designer, Customer Experience Architect, User Interface Designer, Interaction Designer, or Information Architect depending on the type of company, the size, and diversity of the design department and the particular individual’s area of expertise.

While companies can always benefit from a product designer, they play a particularly important role during key stages of the product development. During the initial design and proof-of-concept phase, they can translate the goal of the product into a functional user experience and provide requirements feedback regarding what must be in place for users to achieve their goals.

As a product grows and adds more features and functionality, they can ensure the user experience is intuitive and reduce points of friction. And once a product is mature they can help refine the user experience and make the product more efficient to improve page load speeds, etc.

Product designers are seen as a luxury for some companies that might delay adding someone in that role until further in their lifecycle, while others might hire a product designer before they even add a product manager. Product design can also be outsourced relatively easily, so many companies rely on outside consultants and agencies for this function.

How do You Become a Product Designer?

A product designer needs a unique toolbox to do their job, spanning from the “arty” to the “techie” aspects of the role. They obviously must be creative, but they also must be effective communicators and storytellers to explain their vision for the product design.

As an advocate for the customer, they must understand the business environment while also having the courage to say “no” when a decision could negatively impact the customer experience. “Customer empathy” is another common thread when it comes to describing the product designer role in this context.

Design thinking is pretty much a given for the role, as product designers will be asked to develop user stories (including worrying about edge cases), storyboard and mockup interfaces. Product designers may also be tasked with performing user research.

Visual design tools such as PhotoShop and Sketch are go-tos for many product designers, as is CAD software when its relevant. A mastery of design suites is a prerequisite for most role as they will rely on them for both prototyping and delivering finished assets to the engineering organization, as is an understanding of color palettes, typography and layout.

Some product designers may also be asked to do a bit of copywriting to add the text required as part of the UX design of a product, including tooltips and help text.

User testing is also more complicated than it might sound, and product designers may need to design and conduct the tests, analyze the results and even recruit the participants.

An understanding of Google Analytics and similar tools is also important for web and mobile product designers, as they provide key insights into real-world usage and can influence product modifications and design changes.

Do You Need a Designer For Shopify?

Without a doubt, Shopify offers a variety of premium and free themes. However, you may need more than just what is on offer to gain a competitive edge. After all, Shopify themes may be so typical that your store lacks that distinguishing appearance.

Shopify templates are ideal for those starting, but you are not the only user that same template. There may be thousands of others like you that found it appealing. Your primary goal is to impress and attract customers to your store, but you may fail to do so if they see the appearance of your store is just like the other one they viewed.

Another limitation associated with freely available themes is in customization. You must know how to implement CSS and HTML effectively to take full advantage of the templates. If you are incompetent in that aspect, you feel yourself being limited on customization.

Many business people do not have this technical knowledge and find themselves stuck in the same spot for a long time. CSS and HTML require coding skills which may be costly learn.

Additional spending to determine may be counterproductive since your goal is to save money as much as possible. Even when you learn the language, there is no guarantee that you will manage the process all by yourself.

For those familiar with SEO, then you are aware how much the coding of a theme affects your online presence. It affects how potential customers find you the internet — not every theme that’s created the same way regarding SEO. The template that you finally select does not guarantee it was optimized for SEO.

Hiring a Shopify web designer is not a bad idea. They will make your website unique that you will not have to worry your store may be too similar to that of the competitor. The web designer will perfectly adapt your store to be according to your business specifications. The professional loop you in every stage of the planning process.

This means that additional features will be inserted as per your specifications to make as attractive as possible. Other benefits will include having an up to date design. Webpage trends change rapidly, and the Shopify themes may not change at the same rate. They may lag, and this would affect your business significantly.

A Shopify web designer will ensure that your website is search engine friendly. These professionals know how much this means for your store when it comes to attracting the right people. As mentioned above, the coding used in your store determines your overall online visibility. Let a professional do it for you if you have no idea how to use CSS and HTML.

How Much Does a Shopify Designer Cost?

For basic Shopify web design services, expect most agencies start around $500 to $1,000 for basic ala carte Shopify graphics or template creation. While you may be able to find an up-and-coming agency to design your entire Shopify store for $500 – $2,000 – more times than not, you get what you pay for. Most established Shopify design agencies’ costs will range from $5,000 – $20,000 for a custom-designed Shopify website.

At OuterBox, the majority of our Shopify website design projects fall somewhere in between the $10,000 – $20,000 range, with extensive projects approaching the $100,000+ mark.

Shopify website designs inherently follow a variety of unique page templates. For basic Shopify eCommerce stores, you need separate pages designed for product pages, category pages, blog pages, etc. Some Shopify store owners may develop one product page to be used for all products or may want custom-designed product pages for their more important pages.

In general, the number of unique page designs and the extent of custom functionality needed beyond Shopify’s built-in features (integrations with a custom ERP or CRM, for example) quickly add to the cost of a professionally designed and developed Shopify store.

How Much Does it Cost to Hire a Shopify Expert?

There are several factors you need to consider when thinking about the cost of hiring a developer.

• First, you need to understand that these experts have different rates depending on the type, difficulty, and volume of work they will take.
• Second, their rates also vary on experience which means that the more experienced a developer is, the higher his/her rate will be.

However, you can still have a seasoned Shopify web developer to do complicated features and functionalities at a fraction of a price. How is that possible? The answer is, of course, outsourcing.

• Web developer rates can also depend on their location. Freelancers who live overseas, for example, typically follow the rates based on the standard wages of professionals in their country.

Let’s look into all of these factors to give you an estimate of your total cost for setting up your Shopify store.

US vs Non-US Web Developer

The statistics presented in this section of this article is based solely on a survey conducted by Codementor 2017 that estimated the cost of freelance web developers across the world.

• The average hourly rate of web developers is $61-$80. This includes countries in the regions of Latin America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East
• In Canada and the US, the rate is higher at an average of $81-$100
• Developers from Australia and NZ is on par with the US, averaging at $70/hour
• From a different source, as of 2018. Shopify web developers from Asia can work from an affordable range of $20-$50 per hour, depending on the level of expertise needed. This coincides with Codementor’s results that the least expensive countries have, on average, 28% lower hourly rates.

Based on Scale of Work and Business

If you are looking at the amount and type of work of a Shopify web developer, rates can vary from hourly to a fixed price per project. Hiring a Shopify expert that will develop and do a complete setup of your web store will cost around $500, at an average. If you want to work on limited features and functionality, you can expect to spend around $100-$250.

In a 2018 article of Freelancing Gig, the cost of web developers can also differ based on how large or small your business is. A large scale Shopify store will take around $700-$1000 to complete full development. For medium to small scale Shopify stores, experts advise to get web developers who have specific experience on the work you need done to optimize your costs.

Where Can I Find a Shopify Web Developer?

A good thing about outsourcing freelancers is that you can tap a global pool of talents that you didn’t even know you could work with. There are professional developers in almost all parts of the world and you can hire them with just a few clicks on your computer.

Here are the Top 3 places online where you can find and hire a Shopify web developer.

1. FreeeUp

The web developers on FreeUp are among the top 1% of freelancers the marketplace. They have been pre-vetted and are world-class professionals. You will find a vast array of experts here to help you with every one of your projects.

Among them are developers who can help build mobile apps, do backend development, build proprietary software, WordPress blogs, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, and Shopify stores among many other skills.

2. UpWork

Previously oDesk, UpWork has been one of the longest-running freelance platforms with a global pool of talents. Unlike FreeUp who is specialized in assisting e-commerce businesses and entrepreneurs, UpWork caters to almost any kind of business.

Just recently, they have revamped their application process to be able to assist their clients better. At UpWork, you can choose from different remote Shopify web developers with different rates, depending on their location, skills, and experience.

3. Shopify

Shopify doesn’t only provide you hosting services to launch your online store but they also have a wide array of resources for you to tap into, including the services of Shopify experts. The advantage of hiring a Shopify web developer from the website itself is that you are assured that they are experts of that platform and how it works.

What Can a Shopify Web Developer do For me?

There are a lot of requirements for building a winning web store. While Shopify provides templates that are pretty easy to use out-of-the-box, there are many things — other than creating an attractive landing page — that need to happen in order to create a successful business website.

Setting up payment methods and other back-end development tasks may not be as easy for a non-Shopify expert as compared to an experienced Shopify web developer.

Here are some of the specialized tasks a freelance web developer can do for your Shopify store.

1.  Customize the UI of your store.

One thing you need to understand with being an e-commerce entrepreneur is that website design and usability is important. Your site’s goal is to attract customers and make sure that when they’re in, they can navigate it easily. If a few more clicks can help get them to the payment button right away, you’ll want to do it.

Understanding your customer interface design is the work of a web developer. Even the small adjustments made on your UI have a big impact on each buyer’s shopping experience. Hiring an expert for your Shopify store is the best decision.

2.  Make integrations.

One of the first few things that you will need the help of a Shopify web developer for is integrating various components of your overall online presence, sales and marketing funnels, and other tools with your Shopify store.

This may include connecting your Shopify store with social media platforms such as a Facebook store, a Google store, and Pinterest. Integrations also include store compatibility with your CRM tools such as Klavio, Aweber, ActiveCampaign, ConvertKit, or whatever you use to email your leads and customers.

3.  Make code changes.

Another reason you may need to reach out to a Shopify web developer is to make code changes on your website. For instance, you may want to make modifications and customizations to your website footer, navigational menu, product pages, blog pages or homepage for a more attractive look.

The template that you choose for your Shopify store may already have a lot of functionality and is available to you at the click of a button. However, you may quickly reach the limits of what you’re allowed you to do. A web developer can edit codes for you to create a better shopping experience for your customers.

Obviously, web programming is not for everyone. Even if Shopify provides good instructions on how to make changes to the code yourself to achieve the goal you want, you simply may not be comfortable doing the work. In this case, hiring a skilled Shopify web developer would be a good option.

4.  Ensure that your store is functioning properly.

There are a lot of “T’s” to cross and “I’s” to dot when it comes to building a successful web store. In all of this, it’s easy to have glitches occur on your site. When you face such issues that you can’t fix, a Shopify web developer is the exact person you need to reach out to.

You can be the type of business When you experience a problem, break something or cause an error, you can reach out to the developer to help fix your goof-ups.

5.  Optimize store performance.

Have you ever experienced trying to access your favorite shop’s online store on Black Friday but the web page never seems to pull up? This can also happen to your customers. Sometimes, your website can get so much traffic that your load speed seems slow, images are not appearing on the site, buyers are stuck on checkout.

A Shopify web developer ensures that the performance and functionality of your online store are in top shape. Some of their tasks include doing quality checks such as testing and monitoring to provide an amazing experience for your buyers and potential customers.

How do I Find a Shopify Web Designer?

Here are nine ways to help you find the right web design company for your business.

1. Set a budget for your website design

If you haven’t thought about how much you’re willing to spend on web design, this should be your first step when looking for a website designer. There’s no such thing as industry standard pricing for how much a website should cost, so you need to have a good idea of what your upper limit is.

The size of your budget determines both what level of web design you want and where you’ll get it from. Once you’ve established a tentative budget, you‘ll have a better idea of what results to expect, and where you might go for your design work.

2. Choose what kind of designer you want to hire

Web design is a very saturated industry. This is good for you as a business owner or marketer, because you have a lot of room to find the perfect fit for your project.

Here are the most common providers of web design services:

The freelancer

Web design is filled to the brim with freelancers of varying capabilities. Freelancers will generally be the cheapest option, excluding certain well-known designers that are constantly sought after.

Working with a freelancer is usually more of an informal process, which is both good and bad. Good freelancers will be communicative, accommodating, and adhere to typical turnaround times on design work.

On the other hand, there are plenty of unprofessional freelancers that will do just the opposite.

The design agency

Agencies that specialize in web design are made up of small-medium sized design teams that work together on client projects.

Design agencies will usually be more expensive than freelancers because you’re paying for pooled expertise. Professional design agencies offer frequent communication, extreme customization, and quick turnaround times.

The full-service agency

As the name implies, a full-service digital marketing agency does web design alongside things like SEO, PPC advertising, and more. Full-service agencies are more expensive than freelancers, and may or may not be more expensive than specialized design agencies.

Full-service agencies are a great bet if you think you’ll be interested in digital marketing services beyond just web design. All of the specialized teams within these agencies work closely together, so that communication is simple and the final result will be cohesive.

3. Look at their portfolio

The first step to finding the best web design companies is looking at their portfolio. You want to see if they have experience with your industry. Looking at their portfolio gives you great insight into a website development company.

You can see if a website developer has experience with your industry. If they do, you can look at examples of websites they’ve designed for companies similar to yours. It’s a great way to get insight into a company to see how they produce designs for your industry and if you like their designs.

If they don’t have experience with your industry, you can still look at their portfolio to see their design style. It’s a great way to understand a company’s design style and see if it fits with what you like.

Taking a look at a web designer’s portfolio will help you see what they can potentially create for you.

4. Read client testimonials

The next step is to look at client testimonials. Client testimonials give you insight into a company and the type of work they do for their clients. When you aren’t familiar with a website developer, client testimonials, as well as reviews, help you see if a web design company will provide you with great services.

Companies that have dozens of client testimonials typically provide great service for their clients. People are happy to talk about the positive experience they have with a company. When dozens of people are sharing that same positive experience, it’s a good sign that a web design company is a good company.

5. Check out pricing

Your budget is an important part of your business. You want to find a web design company that you can afford. By checking out the pricing for website designers, you can see who will work with your budget.

This can be a tricky task because it’s hard to pinpoint an exact price for building a website. The cost depends upon what all you need on your site. Someone who needs a simple site will pay less than someone who needs an in-depth website.

Many companies don’t publish their prices online, either. Companies want you to contact them to get their pricing. This makes it challenging for you to price compare and see which company fits your needs and budget best.

When you’re looking to find a website designer, look for any indication of online pricing. Some companies may offer a website design cost calculator, which allows you to input what you need for your site. You input the information and see the approximate cost for your website.

6. See if they offer additional services

When you try to find a website developer, you want to see if they offer additional services.

As you build your customized site, you may find that you’re going to different services. You may need search engine optimization (SEO) to promote your website or copywriting to create content for your website.

You want to find a website designer that offers more than just web design. Look for a full-service company that provides other services. It’s a great way to keep your campaign cohesive and all in one place.

By looking for a full-service digital marketing agency, you’ll get everything you need in one place.

7. Ask lots of questions about the web designer’s process

Many aspects of web design can be hard to understand if you’re not familiar with the industry.

The very best agencies and freelancers will have no problem sitting down and explaining exactly what they do, how they do it, and why it’s beneficial to your business.

If they’re using terminology you’re unfamiliar with and spouting wild promises, tell them to slow down and explain in more detail. Failure to do so is a big indicator that you should be cautious moving forward with that specific web design option.

Ambiguity, in general, is a red flag, and can be indicative of rushed work, “one size fits all” solutions, and shady sales tactics.

8. Request references

Ideally, you want to ask for references within the same industry as you. They can relate directly to the type of work you want done, and will give you the inside scoop on whatever agency or freelancer you’re currently vetting.

You should be immediately wary of any web design prospect that can’t provide you with a reference list upon request.

9. Shop around and find multiple web designers

Don’t let a potential agency or freelancer pressure you into signing a contract right away. This is your money and your website, after all, and there’s no reason to feel bad about thoroughly exploring all of your potential design options. Spend time looking for a web designer and you will find a good web designer and developer for your business.

Most web designers will happily give you a free quote or free consultation, and you should take advantage of every offer. This will give you a more comprehensive idea of what work is necessary to meet your vision, and how much it will cost you when everything’s said and done.

High-pressure sales tactics, constant upselling, and pushy behavior are never promising signs when it comes to high-quality web design.

What Makes a Good Shopify Store?

A Shopify store is equipped to look pretty good right out of the box. This both means that it’s simple to put up a beautiful storefront and you are competing with similarly lovely looking stores.

So, the bar for what sets you apart from the competition has been raised (assuming they also have a Shopify store). 

What makes a Shopify store great isn’t just one thing. It is multifaceted and depends on your particular customer base. One thing is for sure: you need to be more visible and enticing than your competitors.

While your target market may be unique to your vertical, there are many site improvements that any customer will appreciate. 

• A unique and striking storefront. The fact is that ugly sites don’t inspire people to stick around. Many brands have moved toward minimal and modern design aesthetics, moving beyond the standard Shopify themes available and utilizing a powerful page builder for a totally customized storefront.
• Stunning photography. Really great stores have incredible imagery to go along with that freshly designed site experience. You want to represent your amazing products in the most flattering (and descriptive) way from a shopper’s first visit to the site all the way to when they click that buy button. 
• Responsive shopping experience. Shopping happens wherever people are, whether on their laptop at home or out and about with their mobile device. If your site isn’t optimized for the mobile experience, you are losing out on sales. 
• Quick loading pages. Humans are impatient creatures. If a page doesn’t load fast enough, we’ll just go elsewhere. In fact, conversion rates drop 4.42% each second in the first five seconds of loading. So, the faster your site loads, the better your conversion rate will be.
• A significant influx of traffic. You can’t expect conversions if you don’t have enough traffic to convert. Through a great SEO strategy and a strong social media presence, you can start to drive all that amazing traffic to your store.
• Powerful integrations. A store on its own can go a long way but integrations can bring it over the line with additional functionality that makes the customer experience better and the store owner’s experience easier. Shopify apps can help you manage your email marketing, implement customer loyalty programs, utilize social proof, help with customer support, and so much more.
• Free shipping! The power of this offer is undeniable. Even if the final cost ends up being the same (or more), shoppers do not want to pay for shipping. A whopping 73% of consumers said that free shipping greatly impacts their decision to buy. 
• Descriptive product pages. You have to understand what your online store is replacing—the in-person shopping experience. In the store, shoppers can pick up a product, look at it from all sides, get a feel for texture. You have to do that with only photos, videos, and detailed descriptions. If they fully understand what they are buying, they are less likely to return it. So, be descriptive!

What Should I Not Sell on Shopify?

Shopify has one of the longest lists of prohibited and restricted items out of any eCommerce platform. From financial services to regulated products, there are hundreds of them. If your business deals with any of these (even if they’re legal where you live), Shopify won’t let you sell them.

1. Alcohol

The US alone is home to 8,386 breweries, 8,275 of which (that’s 98.67%) are craft breweries. If you’re one of these businesses, know that you can’t sell your products on Shopify. It’s one of the (many) age-restricted items included in the list of Shopify prohibited items.

2. Tobacco and E-Cigarettes

If your business sells anything that has to do with smoking, Shopify won’t accept you as a merchant. The company prohibits the sale of tobacco, cigarettes, e-cigarettes, e-juices, and smoking accessories. Pipes, bongs, and vaporizers can’t go on sale via this eCommerce platform either.

3. CBD

Market experts say that the cannabidiol (CBD) market will become a $2.5 billion+ industry come 2022. In both the US and Canada, it’s legal to sell CBD products, so long as they have a THC content of 0.3% or less. THC, which stands for tetrahydrocannabinol, is the cannabinoid that has psychoactive effects.

The thing is, Shopify has quite the restrictions on the sales of CBD-related products. For starters, there’s the “Attestation for the Sale of Hemp and Hemp-Derived Products.” It’s a form that all US-based CBD sellers must need to complete before they can sell their items on the platform.

Note that this is only for US merchants. If you’re a Canadian merchant, you have to have a cannabis license to sell your stuff on Shopify. You must also sign up with the platform’s “Shopify Plus” plan.

What if you’re in Europe, where CBD is now legal almost everywhere (except Italy and Slovakia)? Well, Shopify doesn’t have a detailed page about it. Instead, its information on selling CBD products is specific to US merchants.

That said, you’ll likely have issues selling CBD items on Shopify if you live outside of the US (or Canada). In fact, some US merchants even reported having had their hard-earned money placed on hold.

4. Fireworks

Certain types of consumer fireworks are legal in 46 states as well as Washington, DC. The only state where it’s completely illegal (as in all forms of it) is Massachusetts. Illinois, Ohio, and Vermont impose stringent laws on these products’ usage.

Unfortunately, these products are one of the many generalized Shopify prohibited items. So, even if fireworks are legal in your area, you won’t be able to use Shopify’s Payments Services.

5. Firearms and Weapons

Shopify prohibits firearms and anything else that can classify as a weapon, even knives. Neither does it allow the sales of munition, gunpowder, similar substances, and explosives. You can’t sell crossbows, air guns, pellets, or targets either.

Now, a lot of these restrictions are understandable, since there are extensive state laws restricting them. However, Shopify imposes them not just on specific locations, but for every user.

6. Solvents

There are at least 350 common solvents used in the US, such as alcohol, benzene, gasoline, and kerosene. Lighter fluid and portable camping stoves also use solvents in the form of butane.

Sounds like your online store? If so, then your store classifies as one of Shopify’s prohibited businesses.

7. Pharmaceuticals

Online pharmacies can’t do business on Shopify, even if they’re a legal entity in their country. It also prohibits the sales of nutraceuticals, peptides, research chemicals, and pseudo-pharmaceuticals. The same goes for any product claiming to have health or therapeutic benefits.

8. Gaming Restrictions

Shopify prohibits internet gaming, video game currency, and online game credits. The only ones allowed to sell gaming currency are the actual operators of the game itself. Depending on your location, you may also not be able to sell games with age restrictions.

9. Certain High-Demand Items

Shopify’s prohibited items recently grew to include specific personal protective gear. This includes masks, sanitizers, isopropyl alcohol, and disinfecting sprays just to name a few. Because of this move, the eCommerce platform ended up suspending thousands of stores.

Read Also: Why is Product Customization Ruling The E-commerce Industry?

Unfortunately, this move affected even legitimate merchants. Some users also reported that Shopify closed their store even if they didn’t sell masks. Worse, many shop owners experienced not only a few hours of downtime, but days of it.

Summary

These are the several qualities you should consider while choosing product design software for your Shopify store. Many more features and factors like safety & security, FAQs, an exclusive admin dashboard, etc., are to look for. And in order to stand out from the crowd, your online store must have something special that others lack.

Anything like advanced features, beautiful packaging, or an engaging user experience can work wonders. These factors can help your business promote online users to buy your products and stay loyal to your company.