WooCommerce is one of the most popular WordPress plugins designed to help you run an online e-commerce store. It is a free plugin that comes with additional extensions that provide different features (we will discuss them later in the post).
You will need four things to be able to start using WooCommerce: web hosting and a domain name, WordPress website, WooCommerce plugin, and WooCommerce compatible WordPress theme.
WooCommerce is best known as a platform for selling products and services, and it has been around since 2011.
It is a free and open-source plugin for anyone to install and use. It is easy to use, especially if you are just beginning to learn how to monetize your store.
When we talk about the WooCommerce plugin specifically, it comes with features such as the ability to sell any kind of products, to add images, to show ratings and reviews, to customize local and global services (currency, language, measurements), to choose how you want to process payments and shipping options, and many more.
Many WooCommerce plugins are great for most online stores. However, if you want to create a specialized store with unique features, check our list of WooCommerce extensions you will need. They deal with shipping, payments, analytics, rewards, and product design features.
There are hundreds of possible #WooCommerce extensions you might use, but here is the list of top 8 we recommend. Click To TweetWooCommerce Table Rate Shipping
This tool covers one of the most important aspects of WooCommerce stores, the shipping aspect. What is the purpose of WooCommerce Table Rate Shipping? To help you implement advanced shipping rules and use destination, weight, cart total, and quantity to calculate shipping costs.
With it, you get to create shipping methods and name them whatever you want. The same shipping methods can be imported and exported as well as hidden or forcibly used when necessary.
Handling fees can also be added to each order using this plugin and you can create a shipping rate plan that is perfect for your business. But, our favorite feature no doubt would be the one for creating shipping rules which apply to logged-in users only. This can significantly impact the number of sign-ups your store sees.
WooCommerce Order Export
Getting your order data in check doesn’t have to be a challenge if you use plugins like WooCommerce Order Export. How does this plugin help? It exports order data as well as other data automatically/on a schedule to your inbox or through FTP.
Exports come in the CSV format with columns you can reorder. Multiple filters are also at your disposal so you truly get the data you need. Exports can also be copied between stores. And not to forget, this plugin remembers what you already exported so no redundant data ends up on your desk.
Direct Checkout for WooCommerce – Skip Cart with Buy Buttons
Do you like wasting time in the cart section of your WooCommerce store? I’m sure you don’t. The same applies to your customers.
How can you get them to the checkout the fastest? Using buy buttons created with Direct Checkout for WooCommerce!
When clicked on, these buy buttons help the customer skip the cart and go right to the checkout. This can work for all your products or just individual ones, you choose.
What’s more, the buttons can be placed anywhere on a site, not just product pages. The buy buttons go well with simple, variable, and affiliate products and simple as well as variable subscriptions.
Sumo Reward Points
Sumo Rewards Points is a loyalty rewards system that rewards your customers for their loyalty. Basically, it is like any rewards system of any other major store, except you will be using it online for your store.
You can reward your customers for any product purchases, reviews, referrals, or social promotions for your site. Customers like it when they feel appreciated, and when they feel appreciated, they will come back for more (think returning customers), but they will also be more likely to refer their friends to your site (more customers=more sales). This reduces the amount of money you need to spend on advertising and promotion.
Another beneficial part of having a loyalty program is that you can segment your customers and build relationships with them. Overall, having a loyalty program makes your customers happy, which is good for business.
WooCommerce Waitlist
WooCommerce Waitlist notifies your customers when a product has become available for purchase. This extension lets you track the demand for out-of-stock items by making sure your customers are well informed about the availability of their desired product, so they are more likely to buy it.
Basically, with this plugin, you create a waiting list of customers willing to buy the product, so they are automatically notified when it is back in stock. Customers sign up for an email alert, which means they are more likely to wait and buy the product than turn to your competitor. This reduces the cost of lost sales but also makes your customers feel valued.
It allows you to replenish stock based on demand and not spend money on products that are not demanded by your customers. It allows you to spend money intelligently by making you spend only when a product is in demand.
Amazon Pay
Amazon Pay offers buyers who already have an account with Amazon (meaning millions of customers) to shop on your website by using their existing Amazon account. They can checkout without the need to create a new account. They simply log in by using their Amazon account, select their shipping address and payment method, and confirm the order.
The benefits are that the customers stay on your site all the time, you know the sale is secure as Amazon has proven technology against fraud and malware, and your customers can pay in various currencies, which makes it convenient for global markets. Moreover, this plugin is free to use and easy to install.
WooCommerce Google Analytics
WooCommerce Google Analytics helps you learn what channels drive the most traffic to your site (organic search, social, email or ads), see if and how you are losing sales (cart abandonment), and determine what your customers want and what products they are looking for.
This extension tracks data with Universal Analytics (sessions, users, and events) and enhances e-commerce analytics to get data on cart actions and product views.
This extension comes in a premium version ($79 for a single site) with additional features regarding your sales funnels so you can see where you are losing money (at what stage of the consumer decision journey) and how you can fix that. This is automatically updated to Google Analytics so you can see metrics like average order value, conversion rates, and sales by product or category. The advanced tracking gives you a lot more details about your sales process so you can track events such as “viewed”, “coupon applied”, or “car quantity.”
Product Add-Ons
Product Add-Ons allows your customers to personalize their products while shopping on your online store. This removes the hassle of your customers, sending you emails and asking if they can personalize their product, and then you have to respond, and so on. You simply add options for each product that can be customized, either by adding personal engraving, changing the fabric, or any other option. This is probably one of the most popular extensions that gives you and your customers more options when it comes to products and sales.
Your customers can change the products with the help of text input boxes, dropdowns, checkboxes, sample images, and the options to select gift messages, engravings, or donations.
We have to say, this extension is definitely worth $49 for a single site as it provides you with a lot more options and opportunities to close the sale, and it makes your customers come back for more.
Conclusion
Hopefully, you found what extension works best for you and your WooCommerce store. Just make sure you pay close attention to any analytics and demographics about your customers and the products they want so that you know what plugins and extensions you need to get to ensure your business runs smoothly.