Shipping, Payments & Co: These Shopify Settings You Should Know (Guide)

Before you start selling on Shopify, there are a number of settings you should definitely configure. These settings lay the foundation for your online store's success by ensuring that important features like payments, shipping, and checkout run smoothly.

In this tutorial, based on the experience of our Shopify expert Adrian, we'll guide you step by step through all the basic settings – from shipping, payment providers, checkout setup, domains, and taxes. So you can be completely confident that your online store is optimally prepared for your customers.

1. Overview: The basic settings on Shopify
   1. These are the most important settings on Shopify:
2. Add payment providers to your Shopify store
   1. The most popular payment methods on the Internet
   2. How to add payment providers to Shopify
   3. Add PayPal to Shopify
   4. Save manual payment methods
3. Save shipping settings on Shopify
   1. Create shipping profiles
   2. Set up shipping zones
   3. Define shipping rules and shipping rates
4. Set up the checkout
5. Other important settings
   1. Tax settings
   2. Domains
   3. Notifications
   4. Guidelines

1. Overview: The basic settings on Shopify

1.1. These are the most important settings on Shopify:

In addition to designing your store and managing your products, there are also many important basic settings in the Shopify admin that require your attention. You can find these in the menu on the left under "Settings."

In this area, you can configure everything from shop information to payment methods. This includes

• Basic information: Enter basic information such as address, contact details and the shop currency.
• Pricing plans and billing: Choose the right Shopify package and manage your invoices. You can find an overview of Shopify's pricing plans in our blog.
• Users and permissions: Create employee accounts and assign access rights.
• Payment providers: Add payment providers that your customers can use.
• Shipping Settings: Define shipping options and rules for your store.
• Checkout: Customize the checkout process to your needs.
• Notifications: Configure the email notifications your customers receive.
• Tax Settings: Specify how taxes should be calculated and displayed.

Shopify is constantly evolving, so expect more settings to be added over time. Below, we'll walk you through the most important options step by step.

2. Add payment providers to your Shopify store

2.1. The most popular payment methods on the Internet

Our experience confirms: Offering payment methods in your Shopify store is one of the most important factors for a positive customer experience. To enable your customers to complete transactions at checkout, you must first add and activate the appropriate payment providers in your store.

Fortunately, thanks to a variety of existing integrations, this is done on Shopify in just a few easy steps.

In our experience, these are the most popular payment methods in Germany that you should integrate into your online shop:

• Credit card payments: Although it was less common for a long time, more and more customers are now choosing to pay by credit card. Therefore, enable payments via Visa, Mastercard, and other cards.
• Apple Pay and Google Pay: Ideal for mobile users.
• Paypal: The most popular payment method in Germany, which will cover the majority of your online shop transactions.
• Sofortüberweisung: A fast and secure method for customers who prefer prepayment.
• Purchase on account: This method is particularly popular with older target groups and can be integrated into Shopify via Klarna. Payment providers like Klarna Purchase on account minimize the risk associated with delayed payment, but charge high transaction fees.

2.2. How to add payment providers to Shopify

In your Shopify account, open the "Payments" section in the settings. You'll be taken to a form where you can add your payment providers.

In general, you can distinguish between two types of payment methods at Shopify:

• Automated payment methods: These are easy to integrate and include services like Shopify Payments and PayPal. Setup is quick, and payments are processed automatically.
• Manual payment methods: These require more effort, as you have to manually verify and post payments, such as advance payments. You have to manually reconcile payments and verify incoming funds.

2.3. Add PayPal to Shopify

Activate PayPal in your online store by navigating to "Payments" in the settings. Under "Supported Payment Methods," you'll find the option "Activate PayPal."

You will then be guided through the remaining steps. You need to establish a connection between your Shopify account and your PayPal business account. You'll know the setup was successful when the status changes from the red "inactive" to the green "active."

2.4. Save manual payment methods

To add a manual payment option, follow the same process. Go to "Settings" and then "Payment Methods." In the "Manual Payment Methods" section, you'll be guided through the next steps to add your desired payment method.

3. Save shipping settings on Shopify

Shipping is another important area you should definitely configure in your Shopify store. To do so, go to "Shipping and Delivery" in the settings.

In the shipping settings you will find the following important options:

• Shipping profiles
• Shipping zones
• Shipping rates
• Shipping rules

3.1. Create shipping profiles

Here you can set individual shipping rates and rules for different products and product groups. If, for example, you have bulky items in addition to standard products that need to be shipped via a freight carrier, you can easily accommodate these differences. Shopify allows you to create different shipping profiles to meet such requirements.

Typically, when you open your Shopify store, a general shipping profile is initially set up for all products. If you want to add additional shipping profiles for specific product groups, you can easily do so using the "Create New Profile" button.

3.2. Setting up shipping zones

You can set different shipping rates and rules depending on the recipient country. You can make the following distinctions:

• Which countries you ship to.
• Which countries you do not ship to.
• Whether certain countries you ship to should be grouped into a common shipping zone (identical shipping rules then apply to these countries).

At the top of your selected shipping profile, you'll see the products to which the general profile applies, along with the associated shipping rates and rules. Below that, the different shipping zones are displayed.

You can set the following here:

• Create new shipping zones: Click the "Create Zone" button to create additional shipping zones. A window will open showing all the countries in the world. You can select the desired countries and regions using the checkbox and add them to a shipping zone.
• Edit existing shipping zones: If you want to edit a shipping zone you've already created, click the three dots to the right of the shipping zone name and select "Edit Zone" from the dropdown menu. A window will open where you can change the included countries and regions by selecting or deselecting the checkboxes.
• Deleting existing shipping zones: If you want to remove a shipping zone, click the three dots next to the shipping zone name. Instead of selecting "Edit Zone," select "Delete" to remove the shipping zone.

3.3. Define shipping rules and shipping rates

For each shipping zone, you can set different rates based on specific rules. You have the following options:

• Shipping time: Here you specify the name of the shipping rate that will be displayed to your customers during checkout.
• Price: This is the amount your customers pay for shipping at checkout.
• Conditional pricing: You can set the shipping price based on the item weight or order value. For example, you can set a higher or lower shipping price depending on the order value.
• Minimum and Maximum: Here you specify the price range within which your chosen shipping rate applies. For example, you can specify that a certain rate applies to orders between EUR 0.00 and EUR 50.00.

You can choose to base your shipping rate on either item weight or order price. However, we recommend that you choose either item weight or order price and not combine both. Otherwise, you risk displaying different shipping rates at checkout, which can lead to confusion and potentially abandoned purchases.

4. Set up the checkout

While you can customize the look of the checkout in the Shopify Theme Editor, basic settings can be configured via the Settings area in Shopify.

Here are some of the options you can set in the checkout settings:

• Customer contact method: You can choose whether your customers should provide their phone number or email address as their primary contact method.
• Customer information to be requested: You can specify which information your customers must provide when placing an order and which is optional. This includes first and last name, the company field, address line 2, and a phone number.
• Newsletter subscription: To expand your email contact list, you can give your customers the opportunity to subscribe to the newsletter using a checkbox.
• Address auto-completion: Shopify offers the option to enable address auto-completion, making it easier for your customers to enter their address correctly.
• Enable final order confirmation step: In the US, a final order confirmation step isn't always required, but in Germany it is. Therefore, you should enable this option to meet expectations in the German market.
• Abandoned checkout emails: Shopify offers a feature that allows you to automatically contact customers who abandon their checkout process via email. Since this is subject to stricter regulations in Europe, you should leave this feature disabled.
• Checkout language: You can set the checkout language. By default, this is German if you sell in German-speaking countries.

5. Other important settings

In addition to the settings for payment methods, shipping, and checkout already mentioned, you'll find a wide variety of other options. In this article, we'll focus on some of the configuration options that we consider particularly relevant.

5.1. Tax settings

A key aspect of your Shopify store is setting up the correct tax rates, especially if you sell products with different tax rates. In the "Taxes and Duties" section, you can specify the details for calculating taxes in your online store. Here, you can also define VAT rates based on shipping zones.

If you prefer to display net prices in your shop instead of gross, you can also do so in this section by deactivating the corresponding checkbox. You can also specify whether VAT should also be applied to shipping and digital products.

5.2. Domains

To ensure your visitors find you at your preferred web address, you can add your own domain in the "Domains" section. There are two ways to do this:

• Buying a domain through Shopify
• Connection to existing domain

5.3 Notifications

When customers place an order in your Shopify store, they automatically receive an order confirmation. This and other transactional emails are sent directly from Shopify, so you don't need a separate email marketing program.

To customize the content and design of these notifications, you can make changes in the "Notifications" section. We recommend that you customize and personalize the email templates before launching your online store. Using the "Customize Email Templates" button, you can, for example, select the colors and add your logo to ensure a professional appearance.

In this section, you can also specify that all visitors who subscribe to your newsletter must first provide double opt-in before receiving advertising from you. This is required by law in Germany and should be configured by activating the corresponding checkbox.

5.4. Guidelines

The "Policies" section is particularly important for storing all legally relevant texts in your shop. This includes:

• Cancellation policy
• Privacy Policy
• General Terms and Conditions (GTC)
• Shipping conditions
• Contact information
• imprint

Be sure to fill out these text fields and have them reviewed by a legally qualified person. If these texts are entered correctly, they will automatically be displayed in the checkout, linked, and included in the order confirmation.

There are several ways to have your legal texts created. In our experience, retailers are on the safest side by using a paid service for modular legal texts.