Shopify is the most popular hosted eCommerce platform for beginners and experts alike. You can get started quickly with Shopify, and it’s easy to use, but Shopify is often seen as less extendable than WooCommerce with its famous extension ecosystem. However, Shopify does have a thriving ecosystem for what they like to call “apps.” If you’re familiar with WordPress and its plugins or WooCommerce and its extensions, the comparable way to extend Shopify is with apps.
In this post, we’ll explore the best apps for Shopify to ensure your store is a success.
The Best Shopify Apps for Your Store
1: Jilt for Shopify ✉️
Our top pick for essential WooCommerce extensions is Jilt, and since there’s a Shopify version as well, Jilt takes our number one spot here also. It’s just that good.
From the team at SkyVerge, Jilt is essential for all Shopify stores because it handles email marketing so well. Engaging and re-engaging customers intelligently by email is critical to running a successful eCommerce store, and Jilt makes that easy.
What Jilt does for you:
- Handles all your transactional emails for Shopify, giving you better deliverability.
- Sends beautiful custom newsletters to your buyers.
- Recovers abandoned shopping carts.
- Sends re-engagement emails to win back old customers with automated campaigns.
Without a doubt, Jilt is a must-have tool for your Shopify store.
Jilt — Pricing
There’s a limited free plan for 300 customers, and then paid plans start at $29/month for 1,000 customers.
2: ReCharge Subscriptions 📦
ReCharge Subscriptions is an easy-to-use Shopify app that makes it simple to turn your one-off Shopify products into recurring (weekly, monthly, or yearly) plans.
If you convert people who make one-time purchases into repeat customers, your MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue) goes up, and your churn rate goes down. Those are two key indicators of eCommerce success!
ReCharge’s Key Features:
- Turns any product into a subscription product.
- Increases your revenue by switching to a subscription-based business.
- Allows customers to manage their subscriptions directly from their account.
- Mobile friendly — works great across desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobiles.
ReCharge — Pricing
This is not a cheap app, but there are two plans:
- Standard — $60/month, plus 1% per transaction, and 5 cents per transaction plus gateway fees.
- Pro — $300/month, plus 1% per transaction and 19 cents per transaction plus gateway fees.
To put ReCharge’s pricing tiers in perspective, the most popular subscription plugin for WooCommerce costs $199/yr which is almost $3,400/yr cheaper than Shopify’s most expensive plan. 💸
3: Google Channel 🛍️
The Google Channel app developed by the Shopify team is a must-have for any Shopify store owner. It allows you to add your products from your store to Google Shopping, giving your store an SEO boost.
The Google Channel app also integrates with smart shopping campaigns so you can use your Google Ads account to run paid campaigns and get even more conversions.
Key Features of Google Channel:
- Send your products to Google to be discovered by users in Google Shopping results.
- Create a paid ad campaign for your Shopify store’s products quickly and easily.
- Track your sales and results to adjust your ad spend — all without leaving your Shopify dashboard.
- Get $100 in ad credit when you spend $25 if you’re new to Google Shopping.
Google Channel — Pricing
The core Google Channel app is free on Shopify, and the only costs for it are related to ad campaigns you run via Google Ads. If you do use Google Ads, the costs vary based on a number of factors, including the keywords you use.
4: Plug In SEO 🔌
Plug In SEO is the Shopify equivalent of Yoast SEO for WordPress. At its heart, it’s an SEO app for Shopify that allows you to specify meta descriptions, titles, keywords, and so much more to help your storefront rank in search results.
Plug In SEO also has built-in support for schema (also known as “rich snippets”), which is useful if you sell products that regularly show up in search with schema output.
What else can Plug In SEO do?
- Structured data (JSON-LD Schema Markup) AKA Rich Snippets
- Bulk edit SEO data
- SEO meta title and meta description templating
- Fix headings, image
alttags, and filenames - SEO for special pages, including collection, search, filters, tags
- Blog optimizer
- Fix broken links that generate 404 errors
- Keyword tools
- Multilingual for Non-English Language SEO
Plug In SEO is extremely powerful and a must-have in any Shopify store.
Plug In SEO — Pricing
There’s a 7-day free trial and then two different plans: Free (no charges ever for basic functionality) and Plus ($20/month), which includes full SEO control, Schema (JSON-LD) rich snippet compatibility, and premium support.
5: Oberlo 🏷️
If you’ve jumped on the dropshipping bandwagon or are planning to, then Oberlo is an essential app for your Shopify store.
Oberlo allows you to import a variety of products into your Shopify store and start dropshipping them. It also has an easy-to-use product finder.
Key Features:
- Finds products you can sell and dropship.
- A Google Chrome extension to add AliExpress products to your Shopify store in a few clicks.
- Bulk order support.
- Real-time tracking.
Oberlo — Pricing
Oberlo has three different pricing plans:
- Explorer — A free plan that includes some basic functionality and is perfect for exploring if dropshipping is the business you want to be in. Has a 500 product limit.
- Grad — $7.90/month and includes more functionality and all the Oberlo dropshipping courses to level-up your dropshipping game. Has a 500 product limit.
- Boss — $29.90/month and includes all Oberlo functionality which includes advanced features like real-time ordering tracking. Has a 30,000 product limit.
⚠️ A word of caution: Dropshipping is hard work. It isn’t a get rich quick scheme. You need a targeted store, good customer service, and great products.
What are the best Shopify Apps for you?
Creating a new eCommerce store is an exciting but daunting time for critical planning for future success.
Whether you’re getting started with dropshipping, selling your own products, or stocking a local supplier, the right extensions will make your eCommerce store support your business model and direct you toward your goals.
What are your favorite Shopify apps? Have you ever used any of the ones we mentioned in our guide? Let us know what your thoughts are in the Commerce Journey Facebook group.