If you’re looking to add a new revenue stream to your offline business because of the recent economic disruption caused by COVID-19, the clear choice is to start selling online. These days, many people are eager to support local and small businesses, from retail to restaurants to professional services. To give these potential patrons a way to buy your products online while they shelter-in-place, what you need is WooCommerce.

If you already have a WordPress site, WooCommerce is the seamless, trusted solution you’ve been looking for. Get ready to have some fun and, more importantly, to grow your business or give it some much-needed relief. 

As a WooCommerce store owner, you not only need to find new customers, but you need to make the most of the ones you have. You know you’ve got great products, but it often takes more than just great products to keep customers coming back to buy more.

The world’s going through significant changes and your customers have a lot of distractions and concerns. This doesn’t mean that you should go quiet; instead, it’s more important than ever to follow up with customers. They’ll appreciate the reminder or hearing a brief message from you. 

Fortunately, with AutomateWoo, you can create automated email workflows that will lead people back to your WooCommerce site again and again.

It’s always important to truly understand your customers. What do their day-to-day lives look like? What problems does your product or service solve for them? Why did they choose you over a competitor? 

This is especially true during periods of rapid change or uncertainty in the market and around the world. Your customers’ lives may look very different than they did even a few months ago. Knowing this about your customers will allow your store to adapt to changing needs and enjoy continued success.

When someone purchases from your store, you have the opportunity to communicate with your customer in a way that both delights them and makes them more likely to buy from you again.

According to advisory firm Bain & Company, increasing customer retention by just 5% boosts profits by 25% to 95%. Why? Because it’s anywhere from five to 25 times more expensive to acquire new customers than to keep current ones. It makes sense: you don’t have to spend time and resources finding new customers — you just have to keep existing ones happy.

Convincing someone to make their first purchase can be difficult, but once they’ve started doing business with you, they’re much more likely to come back. This is called the “foot in the door” philosophy, and it’s why post-sale emails are so effective.

Here are seven ways to engage customers with email after a sale. Best of all, you can automate these emails to nurture customer relationships (and repeat purchases!) with minimal time on your part.

Whether you’re a crafter who works with paper, wood, gems, or textiles, you’ve likely got an inventory of beautiful products waiting for the right buyers. A lot of creatives use a third-party storefront, like Etsy, to kick-start a business and find an audience. But once you have a small-but-growing set of fans, it’s time to maximize profits and take your business to the next level with your own online store.

Spreading yourself too thin can cause problems for your business. Whatever stage your company’s in, choosing a niche is a critical step to being profitable. So you need to ask yourself: “What do we sell, to whom, and why?”

Your niche defines the products and services you develop. It directs your marketing. It focuses your attention on specific problems facing your customers. It differentiates you from the competition.

A niche also enables you to be found more easily. So many businesses struggle with the question, “Why aren’t more people finding us online?” But if you’re trying to appeal to everyone, you’ll struggle with this forever, no matter how much money you invest in marketing. 

Food isn’t just sustenance, it’s an experience. The word “foodie” started trending on Google in 2004 and, less than two decades later, food is everywhere. People love talking about food, watching videos of food, taking pictures of food, and learning about food. It’s no wonder that the US online grocery market is the fastest-growing eCommerce product category.

It’s also crowded. How do you compete in that market and share the food you’re passionate about with the people who want to eat it?

TL;DR: A major update is available for WooCommerce! When you’re ready, update via your WordPress Dashboard. To make the process as smooth as possible, view our documentation on how to update, make a backup, update your extensions, and then update WooCommerce.

After a lot of hard work behind the scenes, we’re excited to announce that WooCommerce 4.0 is here! The primary focus of this update is to transition towards a more React-driven experience so that store owners can better leverage the power of WordPress.

What does this mean for you? You’ll enjoy a more efficient workflow as the result of an improved management panel and new reporting features.

This release integrates WooCommerce Admin into WooCommerce Core, which includes:

• Enhanced reporting tools and analytics
• Simplified notifications
• Improved store management tools

Let’s dive a little further into the benefits that WooCommerce 4.0 brings to your store.

If you’re thinking about starting an online store, you may be considering selling subscriptions. It’s a smart move: the subscription eCommerce market is growing by more than 100% a year, with companies selling everything from wine to crafts to toys. 

The lifetime value of a subscriber is much higher than the average shopper because subscribers generate reliable, recurring revenue. What business doesn’t want to make money every month without having to find new customers?

To be successful, put the right measures in place. Let’s take a look at six key steps for starting a subscription business with WooCommerce.

On Wednesday, March 11, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 to be a pandemic and advised people everywhere to “make a plan in preparation for an outbreak of COVID-19 in your community.” 

Also on Wednesday, the WordPress.org Community Team published their recommendations for organizers of WordPress Events and Meetups.

Our Recommendations

We recommend that all WooCommerce community organizers follow the guidelines set by the WordPress Community Team.

If you are planning a meetup or event scheduled between now and June 1, and there is any evidence of community transmission of COVID-19 in your area, we strongly recommend that you suspend in-person gatherings until later in the year.

Focus on growing your local community virtually. Consider providing virtual office hours and remote meetings with audio and/or video chat.

Lots of us have hobbies, and lots of our hobbies have the potential to provide a partial or even full-time income. Specialized bracelets, woodwork, hand-crafted clothing, homemade toys — the possibilities for original, one-of-a-kind products are endless, as is the potential demand. 

Online marketplaces like Etsy may seem like the easiest way to start an online store, but then you’re subject to their rules and regulations, which can change at any time. In fact, Etsy recently announced that all businesses will be automatically enrolled in a new advertising program that takes 15% of income from eligible sales — a big chunk of  sellers’ hard-earned money!

With WordPress and WooCommerce, you have full control over your content, products, and where your money goes. You can create a store that’s as large (or small!) as you’d like and customize everything to be as unique as your products.

Ready to start a business or expand your sales beyond local shops and farmers markets? Let’s take a look at how to create an online store, make money online, and market your products with WordPress and WooCommerce.

Author: Kahl Orr is an entrepreneur, web developer, and the founder of Rise, a digital agency that specializes in web design. Rise builds high-end, custom websites and apps for national brands.

I’ve always been enthusiastic about coding. In 7^th grade, I launched a successful arcade website,Venom Arcade, that made a few hundred dollars a month through AdSense ads. At the time, I thought it was a lot of money! And it foreshadowed my future career.

In high school, I took computer science courses and won a few programming competitions with the American Computer Science League. Later, I enrolled at Penn State University, but when I wasn’t being challenged enough, I left to pursue hands-on work and landed a job as a web developer with a small company. 

There’s one thing all WooCommerce store owners have in common: the responsibility to file and pay taxes. A yearly inconvenience? Yes — but it’s also a great opportunity to review best practices and find new ways to save money.

Proper tax preparation and best practices can have a major impact on your bottom line. In fact, Forbes reported that over 90% of US business owners overpay on their taxes! Why? Because taxes are complicated. The tax code in the US, for example, is over 70,000 pages long. Yes, seventy thousand pages.

While we can’t summarize 70,000 pages worth of information, we can take a look at the most useful and common ways to legally reduce your tax liability.

The Gutenberg Block Editor makes WordPress even more accessible for site owners of any skill level, allowing you to create intricate pages by dragging and dropping blocks of content. With WooCommerce blocks, you can select and display products, categories, filters, and more virtually anywhere on your site — no need to use shortcodes or edit lines of code! 

Let’s take a look at the available WooCommerce blocks and learn how to use each one.

You have a beautifully crafted store, people are finding your website, and sales are trickling in. What’s next? You could wait and hope that sales keep increasing, or you could be proactive: track your conversion rate and take steps to improve it. 

Pop-ups are one of the most effective ways to do this and, with the Convertiply extension, you can create beautiful, effective designs that engage your customers.

If you’re considering dropshipping, you’re certainly not alone. At the beginning of 2020, searches for “dropshipping” hit an all-time high, according to Google Trends.

The concept is simple: you list products for sale on your site. The products themselves are manufactured and held by a third party. When someone places an order, the third party ships them directly to the consumer.

The ability to add inventory without having to deal with production, stocking, or fulfilling orders may seem like a dream. And the success of well-known brands that were built on dropshipping, like Wayfair, make it all the more tempting. 

But is dropshipping worth it? Let’s explore some of the advantages and disadvantages to help you make the best decision for your business.