You might know Shopify as a leader among e-commerce platforms, but several recent announcements have positioned the company as an undeniable powerhouse. In four major aspects of e-commerce—checkout, social commerce, market reach, and advertising—Shopify has launched new products and partnerships that can help small businesses take their online business to the next level.
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- Shopify launches Shop Pay Installments with Affirm
- Shopify partners with TikTok to launch TikTok Shopping
- Shopify takes on the world with Shopify Markets
- Roku launches new app for Shopify merchants
- Shopify advances goal to make commerce better for everyone
Shopify launches Shop Pay Installments with Affirm
The rush of Shopify announcements started in early June with the launch of Shop Pay Installments in the U.S. This tool is the result of Shopify’s partnership with Affirm, a leading fintech provider in the Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) space. The Installments feature is integrated directly within the broader Shop Pay platform, which helps businesses create a simpler checkout process and a richer post-purchase customer experience as a whole.
The addition of BNPL functionality offers a few unique advantages, and Shop Pay Installments has already proven its value in preliminary findings. According to the launch announcement, “one in four merchants using [Shop Pay Installments] during early access saw 50 percent higher average order value compared to other payment methods.” Merchants that have already started using the tool have also seen almost one-third (28 percent) fewer abandoned carts compared to third-party BNPL tools.
With the exception of Square, no other e-commerce platform natively supports or has plans to support BNPL technology. Retailers can connect third-party services like Sezzle and Klarna to their payment processing systems or e-commerce platform—including Shopify. However, third-party integrations often offer less data-backed insights and can be less reliable than a natively-supported feature.
The Shop Pay Installments launch was quickly amplified when Shopify announced that the Shop Pay platform would be available to any business selling on Google, Instagram, or Facebook—regardless of whether or not they used Shopify as their e-commerce platform. Together with Affirm, Shopify has created a system that offers unprecedented flexibility to a wide variety of merchants and their customers.
Shopify partners with TikTok to launch TikTok Shopping
In late August, Shopify revealed a new and somewhat unlikely collaboration with TikTok, a popular video-based social media platform, in the form of TikTok Shopping. “For the first time,” the press release states, “Shopify merchants with a TikTok For Business account will soon be able to add a shopping tab to their TikTok profiles and sync their product catalogues to create a mini-storefront that links directly to their online store for checkout.”
With minimal effort, e-retailers can add their Shopify product listings to TikTok, where customers can shop without ever leaving the app. Merchants will also be able to add Shopify product listings to organic TikTok posts as a way to harness the tremendous amount of engagement the platform generates. It’s worth noting that this partnership is exclusive to Shopify. No other e-commerce platform, including WordPress, BigCommerce, Squarespace, and Square, supports TikTok Shopping.
This announcement reflects the rise in social commerce trends that has already seen some success on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. A recent report, The Future of Social Media: New Data for 2021 & Beyond, found that 35 percent of survey respondents have purchased products or services directly from a social media platform. More businesses are shifting their e-commerce strategies to align with these trends, so the TikTok integration with Shopify comes at an opportune time.
Shopify takes on the world with Shopify Markets
On September 14, 2021, Shopify announced in a product news statement that it had launched a new feature called Shopify Markets to “remove the complexity of international commerce.”
This tool is included in the e-commerce platform and offers a way for SMBs and large organizations alike to expand their business to new international markets with a few clicks. From one central platform, businesses can control the domain, language, currency, pricing, logistics information, and more.
This new feature makes it easier for businesses to broaden their commerce horizons, and it does so in a way that ensures their presence in each market is optimized for local interactions. For instance, localized domain and language settings benefit local SEO and create a more personalized customer experience, which in turn help drive sales conversions more broadly.
Few e-commerce platforms on the market today make it as easy to manage and grow a global business. Alternative platforms like WordPress require third-party add-ons that can be frustrating to manage, and some vendors like Square don’t offer support for international commerce at all. Shopify’s announcement offers a compelling solution for businesses that want simplicity without sacrificing opportunity.
Roku launches new app for Shopify merchants
A week after the Shopify Markets announcement, Roku—a television streaming platform and hardware manufacturer—announced the launch of a new app for the Shopify App Store. This opportunity is motivated by Roku’s revenue goals for its OneView Ad Platform more than Shopify’s e-commerce functionality goals, but the announcement presents a unique opportunity for Shopify customers nonetheless.
The streaming advertising platform operates similarly to social media or search engine advertising platforms. Once a marketer has the creative assets finalized, all they need to do is select the appropriate audience, budget, timing, and duration for the campaign. Some professional-quality video marketing ads can be made using only a smartphone—they don’t need a big budget to have big results.
Streaming services are transforming the media industry, and they are having a major impact on advertising opportunities for even the smallest of businesses. In fact, according to Roku’s press release, nearly half (49 percent) of all consumers polled in a recent study reported that “they have seen an ad on their TV streaming device that caused them to pause their TV and shop for the product online, a significant increase from 2020.”
With the new Roku integration, Shopify merchants can capitalize on this shift and reach their customers in a new and impactful way. The app is currently in public beta testing, but it is expected to be available for all Shopify customers ahead of the 2021 holiday season.
Shopify advances goal to make commerce better for everyone
All of Shopify’s recent announcements directly contribute to its mission to “make it easier to start, run, and grow a business.” The new tools are helping businesses of all sizes reach new audiences and improve existing customer relationships, and their success is paying off: a recent report from Business Insider revealed that Shopify had more unique visitors to its site last quarter than Amazon did. It’s clear that Shopify has become a giant among e-commerce merchant platforms.
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