The growth can be tied to Shopify’s user-friendly status that enables businesses to create e-commerce websites without the need for technical knowledge or coding skills. For example, users can change the website’s front end, do stock counts, pull analytics, check what’s selling with just a click of the button.

Most of Shopify’s customers are based in the US. In fact, as of January 2022, the platform has 2.666.627 online stores coming from the US (a growth of 178.53% compared to March 2020).

The number of European online stores on Shopify has also witnessed a significant growth: currently there are 156.466 online stores on Shopify from the UK, followed by France, with 59.590 stores. However, the number of customers in Germany recorded the highest growth rate between March 2020 and January 2021 with 480.18%. As of today, the platform runs 78.638 online stores from Germany, compared to the 13.554 stores in March 2020.

Most of the newly added Shopify websites are smaller players that are not properly equipped to compete with e-commerce giants like Amazon but focus on customer satisfaction, set up credible, secure, and user-friendly websites, and provide unique products or services to get higher ratings instead.

If from one hand the rise of more online stores has given retailers access to a wider audience, it also has increased competition among retailers. Consequently, they’re compelled stand out from the competition and attract new customers. What are the main strategies to reach those goals?