Set up your online store

Your online store is built from the catalogue you already have: the same products, prices and stock as your till. Nothing is public until you publish, and you can try everything in test mode first.

Who can do this: You need to be an owner or admin to do this.

Have your store built for you

1. Choose Store, then Build my store.
2. Say what you sell and who to. Add your Instagram handle or your website if you have them: the builder reads them for your style and your words. Leave Use my till products on to start from your catalogue.
3. Choose Build my store. You’ll see each stage as it happens: your products, photos, colours, pages, delivery and tax.

Selling on another platform already? Move your store brings your products, customers and links across instead.

Review the proposal and publish

The builder doesn’t change anything until you say so. It shows Your store, proposed, with a phone and a desktop preview, grouped into brand, products, pages, delivery and tax, policies, domain and channels.

1. For each item choose Accept, Edit or Leave out. Not happy with the look? Choose Redo on the brand.
2. Confirm each of Our guesses one by one. They’re the things it had to assume, such as your delivery prices.
3. Choose Publish. Your accepted items are applied and the site goes up at its address.

New products the builder writes start as drafts, so they’re not on sale anywhere until you put them online.

Get your store ready to open

On Store, the checklist Get your store ready to open lists what’s left, each with a link straight to its fix. Items marked Before live orders must be done before real shoppers can pay; test orders work all along. They include:

• your business address and email, which shoppers see at checkout and in their emails (under Store settings)
• your store’s policies, which you approve
• at least one product ready to sell online
• your delivery rates, set up from your address for you: check them and confirm them under Shipping
• tax: VAT in the UK, or the states you’re registered in in the US
• taking real payments, which means going live with a short verification

When nothing blocks it, the heading changes to Your store is ready to open.

Test it first

In test mode your store has its own test address, and pages show a Test site badge. Its checkout takes only test cards, so no money moves. Place a test order to see what your shoppers will see, from checkout to the emails.