The Wish Co

Could you briefly explain the products that The Wish Co sell?

We sell unique handmade jewelry created from dandelion seeds, feathers, immortalized flowers, clover, leaves and crystals. Many of our pieces can be customized with your choice of charms, chain lengths etc. All purchases come in a handcrafted gift bag or box.

What was the motivation behind starting The Wish Co and when did you get started with Shopify?

I’ve always loved dandelions - they bring back childhood memories. I started creating dandelion seed jewelry about 2 years ago and then from there was inspired to incorporate flowers, leaves, feathers and other pieces of nature into my jewelry. I got started using shopify in 2016 with my other store (the Dandelion Wish Co.) but recreated the store with all my updated designs and renamed it ‘The Wish Co.’ in January 2017.

Did you build your Shopify store yourself or hire a designer?

I built it myself through a lot of trial and error. Fortunately Shopify is very user friendly and the 24 hour chat service has been a huge help.

What theme are you using? Have you done any theme customizations?

I am using the Debut theme. I have customized it using the available shopify customizaton tools. I have created a slide show for my header and customized all the collections and individual products visible on my homepage. I was also able to customize my ‘About’ section, Footer and Checkout page through the theme customizer

How long did it take until you were ready to launch?

It took about a week to complete from start to finish, with several hours work each day.

I was already selling my products on Etsy, and was able to import these listings onto Shopify which saved a lot of time. Shopify’s bulk editor also made it easy to edit listings quickly.

What are your most successful marketing avenues and tools? Do you use any tools for customer retention like email marketing? Is SEO a big part of your store?

Since recreating my store, I have not had the chance to do a whole lot of marketing as of yet, but plan to start Facebook advertising and Google Adwords. I am still working on optimizing the store’s SEO and plan on using Mailchimp for email marketing.

What Shopify apps do you use? Which apps are most important to your business?

I use the following apps in my store:

• Upsell motivator Bar - which pops up briefly at the top of the webpage. It’s a great, yet subtle way to advertise promotions etc.
• Consistent Cart - To send fully customizable abandoned cart emails to customers who do not complete their purchases.
• Coin - For currency conversion. This app automatically converts the currency based on the customers location.
• Email Pirate - Which I use as a fully customizable pop up to capture email leads.
• Mailchimp - For email marketing and newsletter sign ups
• Limespot - Which displays targeted product recommendations to customers (such as recently viewed products, similar products etc). I use this on my individual product pages and on the checkout page as an upsell motivator.

The most important ones at the moment would probably be Coin, as I sell a lot of products internationally. Also Limespot has been great for upselling and increasing cart value.

What does your fulfillment & shipping process look like? Do you handmake all of your jewellery to order?

Some of my best selling jewelry is already made up ready to go, but then each piece is customized (ie chain length, color, charm etc) based on the customer’s selections. Other pieces are made from scratch. All are created by myself and shipped out on the same business day.

Are there any metrics you can share in terms of Monthly sales, traffic or order volume?

At this point in time I am averaging 5-10 orders a day through Amazon and Etsy.

I have not yet had the chance to market my new Shopify store as it has only been completed for a little over a week. I am looking forward to slowly increasing the traffic and sales through my own store and building a customer database.

My goal is to receive the majority of my sales directly through my Shopify store rather than through online marketplaces.

Any other advice for Shopify store owners? Anything you would do over if you started again?

As this was my second attempt at creating a Shopify store, I am pretty happy with the way everything worked out. My advice for Shopify store owners would be to utilize the apps available. There seems to be an app for almost anything and everything, and this is a great way to further customize your store and take it to the next level. If you are currently selling through other online platforms (ebay, amazon etc), I would also suggest making use of the Shopify importing tool as it is a huge timesaver. I was not aware of the bulk editor in the beginning, but have since saved a lot of time using this fabulous tool!