Online shopping has taken over the world and become a stable, profitable, and customizable replacement for the conventional stores we are used to. You are about to start making money on your site, but you have no idea how to open an online store. In this guide, we will show you how to turn a regular WordPress site into an e-commerce store using a proven WooCommerce tool.
WooCommerce is a free, open-source e-commerce plugin designed specifically for WordPress. This is a great platform for stores of any size. WooCommerce offers a range of features, including payment methods, delivery options, custom product types, and more. In this WooCommerce guide, you will learn everything you need to set up and open an online store on your WordPress site and start selling your products.
WordPress Environment Installation
First of all, get a WordPress site up and running. Within the Virtuozzo Application Management marketplace, you can choose a standalone or clustered package based on your requirements and install it automatically in a matter of minutes.
You can learn more about the differences between the packages in the WordPress Packages Overview article.
Regardless of the package you choose, the installation process is similar and, in our case, requires the “Install WooCommerce” option to be selected. It will automatically install the WooCommerce plugin and all the necessary components for your online store.
WooCommerce Configuration
If you have not pre-selected the Install WooCommerce option during the WordPress environment installation, you can still install the plugin manually.
1. Log in to the admin panel and go to the Plugins tab. Find the WooCommerce plugin, install it, and activate it.
Note: If you use NGINX-based installation, some additional configurations may be required for the W3Total Cache plugin to avoid conflicts with the WooCommerce plugin. Refer to the WooCommerce official documentation for more details.
2. After the plugin is activated or on the first access, you will be redirected to the WooCommerce Setup Wizard. Click Set up my store and follow through the steps of your online store configuration.
2.1. Choose your store state.
2.2. Describe your store by entering the name, type of products, location, and email address.
2.3. Optionally, enable additional plugins that will help you to manage your store.
2.4. Wait a minute for the store to be set up.
3. Congratulations! Your store is almost ready to sell, but it needs the goods to be filled with. WooCommerce provides several ways to add products to your online store. You can manually add products one by one or import them in bulk (via the .csv file).
Tip: For testing or development purposes, you can also use plugins (e.g., WooCommerce Product Generator or WS Smooth Generator) to generate sample products.
