If you've just launched a Shopify store, you've probably read the same conversion checklist a dozen times. Add reviews. Use good photos. Write clear descriptions. Be fast. None of it is wrong, but it doesn't tell you what to do first when you have ten things to fix and one free evening.
These are the changes we'd make first on a new store, in the order we'd make them. Most need no code and take an hour or two each.
1. Say what you sell on the first screen
Someone landing on your homepage should know within a few seconds what you sell, who it's for and why it's different, from the headline they see before scrolling, not from a paragraph under the banner.
"Premium athletic wear" doesn't do that, and neither does "Crafted with care". Shoppers have seen those phrases everywhere. Specific beats aspirational: "Running shorts that don't chafe past mile 20" tells a customer something. Put that line in your hero banner's heading and link the button straight to your best collection.
2. Buy something on your own phone
Most new merchants build their store on a laptop and rarely check it on a phone. Your analytics will show how your visitors split between mobile and desktop; for most stores, mobile is a big share. Open your store on your phone and place a real order. Note every place you pinch to zoom, tap twice, wait, or lose your place.
If pages feel slow, start with the usual suspects: apps you no longer use, oversized videos, and heavy homepage sections. Shopify already resizes images and serves them from its CDN, so image files are rarely the whole story. Our guide on why apps slow down a Shopify store helps you find the cause.
3. Give people reasons to trust a store they've never heard of
A new store has no reviews yet, and customers want to know someone else has bought from you. What helps:
- Your first reviews. Ask your first customers personally for an honest review, and show even one or two prominently on the product page. Never fake them.
- Real activity. A note that a product was just purchased, or how many people are viewing it, shows the store isn't empty. Our Social Proof app shows these from your store's real orders and visitors, never made-up numbers, and has a free plan (App Store).
- A human behind the store. A real About page, a contact email that gets answered, and clear return terms. These matter more on a new store than on a famous one.
4. Show shipping costs before checkout
An unexpected shipping charge at the last step is a classic reason to leave. Make the math obvious early:
- Put your free shipping threshold in the announcement bar: "Free shipping over $50."
- Say how fast it ships near the add-to-cart button: "Ships in 1–2 days."
- Link your shipping policy from the product page, not only from the footer.
If your shipping is expensive, say so and say why. Customers can live with a fair price. It's the surprise they don't forgive. Our look at why customers leave at the payment step covers what happens once they're in checkout.
5. Cut the taps between product and cart
Every choice a shopper has to make before adding to cart is a place to drop off. Show colors as swatches instead of a dropdown, pick sensible default variants, and keep the add-to-cart button in reach on long product pages. See how to show color swatches on collection pages for the first part. For the last, our Sticky Cart app keeps an add-to-cart bar on screen as shoppers scroll, on mobile and desktop (App Store).
6. Put bundle offers on the product page, not at checkout
To raise order value, many stores add upsells at the cart or checkout. By then the shopper has usually settled on what they're spending, and a late offer can feel like a detour. Showing the deal next to the price works better: "Buy 2, save 10%." Shopify's own discounts can require a minimum quantity, so you don't need an app to start. More ideas are in how to get Shopify customers to buy more per order.
7. Switch on abandoned checkout emails
Shopify can email shoppers who started checkout but didn't finish, at no extra cost. The automation now lives in the Shopify Messaging app, and those emails don't count toward your Shopify Messaging email allowance. Check that it's on, that the email looks like your brand, and consider adding a small discount for the first few months.
8. Hold the popup
The most common mistake we see on new stores is an email popup that fires the moment someone arrives. It covers the product before the visitor has decided whether they care about your brand. If you want one, show it after someone has looked around for a while or is about to leave, and keep it off the homepage for first-time visitors.
Where to start
Do the first screen, then mobile, then trust, then shipping. Everything else builds on those four. If you'd like a second pair of eyes on what's holding your store back, talk to us. We audit Shopify stores and look after them on monthly care plans, and what we see wrong in most stores we audit is a good place to begin.