Shopify Custom Checkout: How to Customize the Checkout Page in Shopify

by

Chris Rausch

|

April 19, 2023

Shopify’s checkout is well-designed, optimized, and effective - but it’s not a one-size-fits-all solution. If you want to provide the best customer checkout experience, you need a Shopify custom checkout.

Looking to grow revenue, increase average order values, and optimize your conversions? Keep reading to learn how to customize the checkout page in Shopify.

How to Create a Customized Shopify Checkout Page

Shopify custom checkout customizations

When you’re ready to design your Shopify custom checkout, you have a few options to consider. The right choice will depend on your needs and your Shopify plan, but you’re likely to use a combination of these strategies to achieve the best results.

Theme editor

All Shopify stores use a theme that sets the structure and outline of your online store. The theme will change layouts, fonts, colors, elements you can use, and much more to be uniform and consistent throughout the site for the easiest use. This includes the checkout page.

By accessing your settings, going to checkout, and choosing to customize checkout, you’ll gain access to a variety of basic elements and styling that you can edit for your checkout. Things like logos, banners, colors, fonts, and button styling are all customizable with a limited interface that can allow you to make Shopify’s checkout a bit more branded.

But, the theme editor alone is not sufficient for more customizations - especially if you’re trying to optimize for conversions or increase your AOV.

Checkout Extensibility and Checkout.liquid

For Shopify Plus merchants, checkout.liquid and Checkout Extensibility provide the ability to make more in-depth changes to your site. They’re both frameworks for how your checkout page and process will look, with checkout.liquid being the older resource that is soon to be deprecated.

Checkout.liquid allows you to edit the code of your theme’s checkout page by going to your theme and choosing to edit the code. Here you can add elements, change styling, and much more - but you need to have coding experience to make sure you don’t break anything. So, it’s usually reserved for businesses with a developer who can work within the theme files to achieve your desired results.

Checkout Extensibility is the newer version of checkout that makes it easy to customize elements and the design of your checkout page using apps. Through native features and checkout extensions, you can easily implement just about any visual or functional change to your site that you need to. This could be something as simple as easily changing styling that the theme editor can’t access or being able to add a powerful Shopify upsell at checkout to increase AOV and revenue.

Apps

Apps are the simplest way to customize your store as a whole, including the checkout process. They’re built by developers to edit a wide range of aspects of your checkout page which can include adding, removing, styling, or totally overhauling the page to fit your needs. The only limitation that apps have is that you need to find the app that does what you need, which isn’t always available.

To add apps, all you have to do is navigate to the Shopify app store and add them to your store. They’ll have a user interface to help you use them so that you can make changes yourself without the need for coding experience, making them accessible for all store owners.

3 Crucial Elements you Need to Include on your Shopify Checkout Page

crucial elements of shopify custom checkout

Ready to make your Shopify custom checkout page the best it can be? Here are 3 crucial elements to add:

Upsell Options

Do you want to generate more revenue by increasing AOV on your site? Then an upsell at checkout on Shopify is for you.

Upsells and cross-sells are simple but effective ways to increase profits by getting customers to spend more money in your store. They usually consist of a discounted upgrade or additional complementary product that makes sense with the primary item they’re purchasing - or any other way to increase the value of the sale.

Upselling and cross-selling can be used at various points of the checkout process, including the cart page, checkout, and post-purchase pages. The right Shopify upsell app will also make it easy for you to create your own offers, use data to generate recommendations for offers to make, and allow you to place the offer at prime locations so that you can achieve the best results.

Important Product Information

If you want a successful checkout process, you need to do everything you can to avoid customers leaving the checkout page. Once they leave, it’s much harder to close the sale.

As part of your Shopify custom checkout additions, be sure to include important information that’s easily accessible so that customers don’t go looking for it. Return policies, guarantees, shipping information, and FAQs are all elements to consider adding to your checkout page.

Social Proof Elements

recommendation from a friend social proof

In the world of e-commerce, trust is everything. If your customer doesn’t trust your checkout process, they aren’t going to be comfortable entering their information. You also want them to be as confident as possible that your product is the answer to their problem so that you can convert the sale.

To instill confidence and demonstrate trustworthiness, add forms of social proof to your site so that potential buyers can be reassured. Positive reviews, testimonials, feedback, and any other recommendations that you can use should be added so that buyers have no reason to change their mind. 

4 Ways to Customize Your Shopify Checkout Page

improve your Shopify custom checkout process

When it comes to improving your checkout process, there are a number of strategies to keep in mind for maximum conversions.

Maintain Consistent Branding Throughout

Whether you’re a multinational corporation or a small e-commerce business, your branding plays a significant role in the way your customers interact with your business. An efficiently customized and crafted checkout page that aligns with your business helps to build trust with your potential customers - and in online sales, trust is everything.

If your branding is too erratic or inconsistent, you risk looking unprofessional and raising red flags that may be enough to turn a customer away. Plus, if it looks like your checkout page is for an entirely different brand (or isn’t customized at all), the rest of your checkout optimizations will be for nothing.

Aim to maintain a similar font and color scheme throughout the entire custom checkout process. Adding a logo to reassure potential customers that they’re in the right place can also help to address concerns.

Extend Functionality with Apps or Custom Logic

Sometimes Shopify’s checkout can’t do something that you need it to. Fortunately, they make it easy to find and implement upgrades with apps or developer access.

Apps are one of the easiest ways to improve your checkout page. With so many different apps available, you’re bound to find something that your page needs to perform better. If there isn’t an app that does what you need, you can also implement custom logic with the help of a developer to edit the features of your checkout.

For example, adding an app that turns the checkout process into a progress bar can be a good way to make the process less intimidating. You may also need an app for scheduling delivery dates, adding customizations or special notes to your order, or placing crucial elements on the checkout page. Developers may write custom logic to dictate free shipping requirements, change the way order information is displayed, or be able to assist with adding necessary fields so that you can collect all the information you need at once.

Offer Upsells and Cross-Sells to Improve AOV

The goal of upgrading your Shopify custom checkout isn’t just to make it look good - it’s to increase your sales.

By implementing customizations that make your page look complete, you’re more likely to convert customers. But, you can also improve your AOV at the same time with Shopify upselling and cross-selling offers.

With a Shopify upsell app like UpsellPlus, you’re able to craft offers that provide customers with added value and increase your sales numbers. They’re great for the checkout page because it’s easier to see the value of your offer within the order summary. For example, a customer may be willing to buy more products to reach the free shipping threshold once they see how much it can save them.

You can also implement upselling and cross-selling offers after checkout. These offers are effective because you’ve already convinced the customer to open their wallet. Now that it’s open, they’re more likely to make an impulse purchase - and post-checkout upselling and cross-selling lets you make 1-click additions to your order. Protection plans, shipping upgrades, and additional products can easily be implemented as post-purchase offers. Plus, they’re risk-free because the primary order has already been submitted.

Use Pixels for Customer Behavior Tracking

When trying to maximize your conversion rate, information is essential. The more information and feedback you receive relating to your Shopify custom checkout process, the better you can refine it.

With Shopify pixels, you’re able to track exactly what your potential customer is doing during checkout. Are they reaching the shipping page and leaving because of the costs or delivery date? Is your checkout process too intimidating to even begin? Do you not have enough payment options for the customer?

All of these answers tell you what parts of the process need to be changed and show you where you can improve conversions.

UpsellPlus: Your Trusted Custom Checkout App

Your checkout page is a crucial element of your online business. You need to move leads through the checkout process to secure the sale, so if you’re not inspiring action with your page, you need a Shopify custom checkout.

By including essential information and reassurances on your checkout page, you’ll convert more leads. But, your custom checkout doesn’t just need to convert sales - it should also help you generate them.

UpsellPlus is the best Shopify upsell app for your store that can help you make the most of your checkout conversion optimization. It will help you to build effective Shopify upsells and cross-sells so that you can increase your average order value and maximize profitability. UpsellPlus can also be easily branded to fit your store so that you ensure cohesion and uniformity that instills confidence in your customers.

Get started with a free trial today.

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