The Shop App isn't just another sales channel; it's an integral part of a successful ecommerce strategy.

As a merchant in the Shopify ecosystem – or someone planning to be, making sure that you’re getting the most out of what the Shop app offers to businesses is a relatively easy way to maximize your revenue and keep your customers returning to your storefront. 

Here’s all you need to know about Shopify’s Shop app, from its key features and benefits, to how to ensure it’s set up in a way that works for your business. 

What is the Shop App?

Initially launched as the Arrive app in 2017, the Shop app represented Shopify's foray into revolutionizing package tracking. Its primary goal was to consolidate delivery tracking through linked Gmail accounts, giving users real-time updates on their order's delivery statuses. Fast forward to 2020, and this app underwent a significant rebranding in an attempt to be an all-in-one mobile shopping hub.  

Today, the Shop app stands as its own unique ecosystem, brimming with optimizations and features designed to elevate the online shopping experience for both customers and the merchants who serve them.

Key Shop App Features

The Shop app has evolved to offer a suite of features that cater to the modern ecommerce landscape. These include:

Real-Time Order Tracking

Shop’s primary and most loved feature. Customers can track all their shipments in one single UI, in real-time, staying updated at every stage of the delivery process with push notifications sent to their device every time their package carriers update their delivery/order status. This feature makes it easy to keep an eye on multiple deliveries without having to keep track of a mess of confirmation emails and tracking numbers. 

As a merchant, even if you haven’t yet enabled other Shop app functionality on your store, your customers can still use the app to track orders made with your company. If you’d like to encourage the app’s adoption further to take advantage of some of the other features the app offers merchants, you can activate the Track with Shop feature from the Shop channel section of your Shopify admin – but we’ll delve into that later. 

Personalized Shopping Experience

Leveraging user data, the Shop App offers personalized product recommendations based on their shopping habits, enhancing customer engagement. Since the Shop app acts as a main shopping hub for many of your customer’s favorite stores, it can also display your store’s stock to people who may not have yet shopped on your website. 

The app's home page displays multiple custom sections to users, offering tailored recommendations based on their past purchases and browsing history and making it easy for them to order products from multiple stores, all in one place. Users can also follow your store, making it even easier for your business to keep your customers focused on your products every time they open the app. 

Synced Checkout Process 

The Shop App makes repeat purchases quick and hassle-free with saved payment and shipping information. With the Cart Sync feature, users can sign into their shop account from anywhere (mobile app, desktop browser, etc) and enjoy an accelerated checkout experience when their cart remembers where they left off on their other device.

The Shop Sign-In feature further accelerates checkout and improves upon the customer experience by enabling anyone to sign into your store with their Shop credentials, whether or not they’ve already shopped with you before. 

Streamlined Payments with Shop Pay

In the same vein as Cart Sync and Shop Sign-In, customers can also use Shop Pay to pay for their orders, removing the need to type in their payment details whenever they want to shop at your store. Instead, all it takes is a quick 6-digit code verification process. Using Shop Pay reduces the purchase process down to one single click. 

With the option to pay in full, in interest-free payments for up to 12 months, or with interest for 3 - 24 months, Shop Pay allows customers to pay in a way that fits their budget and needs, making larger purchases easier on the wallet, and increasing overall sales for merchants. 

Your customers can also feel good about using Shop Pay on your store with Shop’s carbon-removal program to reduce their order’s environmental footprint with every purchase. 

Shop Cash

Working in tandem with Shop Pay and available to users in the United States, Shop Cash is a rewards program that allows users to earn cash back on eligible orders that they can use on future Shop app purchases. 

This feature is a great way to boost customer acquisition and grow your client base. As a merchant, you can create special offers to increase the “value” of a Shop App customers’ Shop Cash when they spend it on your store. For example, you can set a prospective customer’s $5.00 in Shop Cash as having a value of $50.00 if redeemed on your merchandise. This way, they can purchase more expensive items for much less. 

In such an ecommerce landscape where retargeting opportunities are drying up, finding any new channel for customer acquisition is like striking gold. Set your Shop Cash multiplier to value cash back at something close to your business’s customer acquisition cost, and watch the orders and first-time buyers roll in! 

A store with this feature enabled gives customers a financial incentive to shop with you over a store that isn’t taking advantage of Shop Cash. Customers can earn Shop Cash when they buy on any Shop App store and redeem it on subsequent orders at your store. Because of this, Shop Cash can be the most successful retargeting campaign you’ll run all year!

Local Discovery and Shop Search

Customers can discover and shop from local and independent businesses, fostering community engagement. The Shop Local section of the app will display qualifying stores within 31 miles (50 kilometers) of their current location as long as the merchant has at least 20 days of sales in a month within the year and has made a sale within the last 30 days. 

Shop Search, which is currently in early access in the United States, Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom, offers customers the ability to search for specific products right from the mobile app. The app will filter results based on whether the store is on their favorites list, whether they’re in stock, and whether they ship to their location. 

Shop Chat

Available to merchants who are using the Shop Channel and have Shopify Inbox set up, the Shop Chat feature allows your customers to message your store with any questions they may have about your business and products/services. 

Being available to people from multiple sales channels is a great way to increase conversion rates and build valuable relationships with your customers, no matter where they shop. 

Performance Analytics

The Shop app isn’t just another way for your customers to browse online stores and spend money. It also comes with its own set of analytics. With the Shop Channel activated, you can view sales, orders, tracking, and impressions made with the mobile app. As long as you have enough customers using Shop, you will have access to this stream of stats. 

Product Reviews

Collect feedback on your store and products with a review section in the mobile app. After purchase, your customers will receive a notification seven days after the order is marked as “delivered”; otherwise, if no tracking is available, they will be asked 14 days after your store fulfills the order.  

Customers can leave a star rating and a 1000-character-long written review on your products, which will then be visible – after screening – to the public on the product details page. 

As a merchant, you can also reply to your reviews, and your customers will receive a push notification through the app when they are approved after screening. 

Marketing Tools

Re-engage your store’s customers and followers with the Shop app’s own set of marketing tools. The mobile app allows merchants to post updates to their store pages for new collections, products, or special offers. Updates also come with analytics data so you can gather information about impressions. 

Additionally, merchants can set up post-purchase offer automations with discount codes to turn their one-time customers into repeat fans of their business with minimal effort. These offers also have performance metrics displayed in the Shop Channel. 

Shop Minis

Shop Minis essentially function as miniature versions of Shopify stores within the Shop app. Using the React Native SDK and APIs, developers can translate other Shopify app functionality to the mobile experience or simply build brand new mobile shopping experiences from scratch.  

Find a Mini that interests you, or publish your own (currently open to early access partners) to the Shopify app store for other stores to use for their own products.

How to Set Up The Shop App as a Merchant

To be featured in the Shop app, your Shopify store must meet several requirements that ensure a consistent experience for both merchants and customers:

• Compliance with Shopify's Acceptable Use Policy.
• An active Shopify plan (Starter or higher).
• Activation of Shopify Payments.
• Activation of Shop Pay.
• A chargeback rate below 1% in the last six months.
• Installation of the Shop channel app from the Shopify App Store.
• At least one product meets Shop's eligibility criteria (only approved products will be shown if you sell both prohibited and approved products).
• An operational Online Store sales channel that is not password-protected.
• Absence of certain apps like password control or age verification apps (e.g., Advanced Registration, B2B Login Access Management, Locksmith, etc.).

If these conditions are met, congratulations! Your store is already visible in the mobile app! While eligible stores with the Shop Channel app are visible on the mobile app by default, you should still take some time to customize your store to make sure that it’s working as hard as it could be for you.

By default, your Shop store will use your online store’s brand assets. Still, you can edit this separately to create a new experience for your customers and display separate product collections, announcement banners, and more based on how you’d like to appear in the app.

Conclusion

The Shop App is more than just an extension of your Shopify store – it's a vital tool for enriching the ecommerce experience. Whether you're already a part of the Shopify ecosystem or planning to join, leveraging the Shop App can significantly enhance your business's potential and lead to higher customer acquisition and retention rates.

With its growing list of features like real-time order tracking, personalized shopping experiences, streamlined checkout, Shop Cash rewards, Shop Minis, and more, the Shop App not only simplifies the shopping process for your customers but also opens up new avenues for customer engagement and business growth. 

As a certified Shopify Plus Service Partner, Blue Badger offers everything you need to get your business up and running with all things Shop. Offering services like design and development of custom themes and apps, strategy, conversion rate optimization, performance marketing, and more, let us help you build an ecommerce ecosystem that you can rely on. Get in touch with us today to learn more.