Let’s face it: the ecommerce space is overcrowded, and the herd doesn’t seem to be thinning any time soon. That means that if you want to stand out as an online merchant, you’ll have to pull some tricks out of your sleeve. 

That said, your tricks don’t have to be difficult, time-consuming, or expensive to set up. In this article, we’ll break down one of our agency’s favourite Shopify features, Shop Cash, and help you leverage it to enhance customer loyalty, boost sales, and acquire new customers.

What is Shop Cash by Shopify? 

Shopify’s Shop Cash is an incentive to Shop App users, which merchants can then leverage to acquire new customers. It allows people to earn points (cash back) by making purchases, referring friends, or engaging with the Shop App through various activities. Merchants on Shopify can offer multipliers on these points as a way to net new customers and subsequently turn them into repeat buyers.

These points, known as Shop Cash, can then be redeemed towards future purchases, incentivizing return visits to the Shop App and, if implemented in tandem with Shop Cash Offers, fostering long-term relationships between your store and its customers.

Shop Cash can be redeemed on its own or in combination with any other payment methods available in your store, such as PayPal or credit. Customers can also choose where and when they’d like to redeem their Cash, rather than having it automatically prioritized at checkout. This allows users to spend their Shop Cash balance when they feel they have a high enough discount, rather than having to redeem small amounts on their subsequent purchases. 

Currently, Shop Cash is a reward available only to users of the Shop App (or Shop on the web) with billing addresses in the United States or Canada. Customers must also use Shop Pay at checkout to redeem or earn Shop Cash. 

Setting up Shop Cash 

As with most baked-in Shopify features, getting started with Shop Cash is quick and easy. As long as your store is available on the Shop App sales channel and has Shop Pay enabled as a payment method, your customers will earn Shop Cash at a rate of 1% on all their eligible Shop purchases with you. 

You can track transactions made with Shop Cash from your Shopify Dashboard, just like you can with any other payment method your store accepts. This will enable you to monitor the impact of Cash on your store’s sales and adjust your marketing and promotion strategies accordingly. 

Note that if you use a third-party integration, such as an ERP, OMS, or fulfillment system, Shop Cash may not be recognized as a payment method by default. To resolve this issue, you can map shop_cash as a new payment method, or you may need to contact the third-party app/system for assistance.  

How to Maximize Store Engagement with Shop Cash

Shop Cash isn’t just a simple points/rewards program built to help Shopify retain customers for its own app. Shopify also offers a few additional tools and features to help merchants maximize the benefits of the feature. Here’s how to use Shop Cash to both increase sales and acquire new customers. 

Multiply Cash Value with Shop Cash Offers/Shop Campaigns

Where activating Shop Cash really shines is with Shop Cash Offers. These allow you to boost the value of Shop Cash earned at your store or increase the value of your customers' existing Cash when spent on your products, thereby growing your customer base and increasing your average order value/numbers. 

If your addressable market uses the Shop App, you can offer multipliers on their Shop Cash to attract them as customers. This is incredibly powerful since customer acquisition on traditional channels like Google and Facebook is drying up in a cookieless world. 

Think about it: if your store is on the Shop App, you can now access its entire customer base. Using Shop Cash to incentivize these users to shop at your store using Cash Offers can be a great way to get them to try out your products while spending less “real” money or earning more Cash in the process. 

For example, using Shop Cash Offers, you can display an item regularly priced at $95.00 as priced at $49.00 while also displaying that the customer’s order will earn them a 3x multiplier on their Cash if they spend over $100.00.

Users will see these deals under Shop Cash Offers in their app. On the merchant side, these are referred to as Shop Campaigns. 

You can also increase this discount based on how much Cash a customer uses on their purchase. Doing so gives Shop App users a financial incentive to consistently choose your store over a competitor’s, helping drive both first-time and repeat purchases if you offer the better Cash deal. 

Want to use Shop Cash Offers as limited-time promos? You can do that too! For example, you can run a promo where customers earn 20% Shop Cash on all purchases made at your store in the Shop App for a limited time. Promote the offer on social media and through email to increase sales and encourage people to explore what you’re offering and shop with you. 

Shop Campaigns can be set up under the “Advertising” tab of your Shop channel settings. Merchants can set their cost per acquisition (CPA), minimum order value, and daily budget. 

Use Shop Cash Data to Create Customer Segments

Customers who place orders using one of your Shop Campaigns will have the “Shop Cash offer acquired” tag placed on their profile. Depending on your needs, you can either view your customer segments for all your Shop Campaigns over time or drill down to specific ones. 

Much like you can use Shopify Audiences to create custom audience lists to advertise to, you can also use your Shop Campaign segments to create targeted marketing/email campaigns to retarget these customers – or find lookalike customers – and get them back to your store to make more purchases and earn more Cash.  

Get Promoted on Facebook and Instagram

When merchants create Shop Campaigns, they can select “Advertise campaign on Facebook & Instagram,” which grants Shopify permission to run ads promoting their Campaigns through their Facebook and Instagram pages. These ads are paid for entirely by Shop and can result in tons of visibility on your store if they feature your products in their ads. 

Ensuring that this option is selected is a no-brainer for anyone using this feature, especially since it’s an opportunity only offered to merchants using Shop Cash. These ads can also occasionally include co-branded giveaways that allow customers to claim small amounts of free Shop Cash upon interacting with ads for your Shop Campaigns – another easy (and free!) way to get new people to view your shop. 

Advertise your Shop Cash Offers

While the official Shop social media pages can include your store and offers in their ad campaigns, a great way to get eyes on your store and Shop Campaigns is to run your own paid media campaigns to drive traffic to your store through Shop Cash Offers. 

Shop Cash is still a relatively new Shopify feature, and many Shop App users have Cash burning a hole in their virtual wallets. Run a few ad campaigns centred around saving money on products with Shop Cash Offers on your items, and some awareness campaigns to let people know that your store accepts Cash to drive some extra traffic to your storefront. If you’re running any limited-time Shop Cash multiplier offers, make sure to advertise those as well!

If you send regular promo emails or newsletters, make sure to mention your offers to your subscribers as well. Not every customer shops through the Shop App and may not even know about this program otherwise. Remember, Shop Cash can help with customer acquisition; you just need to make people aware of the value of the feature and the potential savings/cash back available. 

Benefits of Using Shop Cash for Merchants

Shop Cash is yet another native Shopify solution that requires minimal setup, making it an obvious choice for any merchant using the Shop Channel. Besides how simple it is to get started, here is how Shopify merchants can benefit from using Cash and Shop Cash Offers:

1. Boosted Customer Acquisition: Merchants accepting Shop Cash can offer product discounts to Shop App users who apply some of their Cash to purchases at your store. This incentivizes customers to shop at your store over competitors who don’t use this feature.

2. Maximize Sales: Just like customers are happier to shop at stores offering Shop Cash discounts, they’re also more likely to spend money when they can get some of it back via rewards like this. This can be further boosted through Shop Cash Offers/Shop Campaigns to ensure they select your store over others with less attractive offers.

3. Enhanced Customer Loyalty: Consistently rewarding purchases puts stores in a great position to develop a customer base that appreciates the store and the value it provides. This translates directly to business growth and a strong brand reputation. With Shop Cash multipliers, customers can make the Cash they earn across the Shop App go further at your store than anywhere else. Merchants get to make bigger sales, while customers get to both spend and earn rewards every time they shop with you. 

4. Real-Time Analytics: Track performance metrics related to Shop Cash directly from your Shopify admin dashboard and use that data to inform your marketing strategy and campaigns. 

Conclusion

Shopify Shop Cash is more than just a rewards program; it's an alternative to traditional customer acquisition channels and a strategic tool that can maximize sales and build lasting customer loyalty. By integrating Shop Cash into your payment options and taking advantage of its promotional capabilities through Shop Campaigns, you can create a compelling shopping experience that stands out. Activate Shop Cash to unlock the full potential of your Shopify store, fostering a thriving business ecosystem where customers are excited to return and shop again.

As a certified Shopify Plus Service Partner, Blue Badger offers everything you need to get your business up and running with all things Shopify. 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.