#1 - Lower Credit Card Processing Fees
When you use Shopify Payments, which are pretty much a no-brainer at this point, the credit card processing fees with Shopify Plus are 0.25% cheaper per transaction than they are for the next plan down (Shopify Advanced). Given, the plans also have a delta in monthly pricing, but at a certain point the cheaper processing rates make up for that difference, and for this reason alone, if your business is bringing in more than $5 million annually, it is not only better, but also cheaper, to be running on Shopify Plus. If that’s you, just stop right there and forget the rest—let’s get you upgraded. But even if you’re not quite above the $5 million mark, there are still *plenty* of good reasons to upgrade.
#2 - Wholesale Functionality
Shopify’s wholesale functionality has gone from an acceptable bolt-on to a full throttled juggernaut with last year’s release of the B2B side of the platform, exclusive to Shopify Plus accounts. The program is the exact right amount of pre-set and customizable, and it does everything a good wholesale platform should—from customer-specific pricing, to terms, to buyer profiles and locations. It works great, and since pure DTC is pretty much a thing of the past, built-in wholesale functionality is a key component to a real omnichannel strategy.
#3 - Checkout Extensibility
Out of the box, the stability of Shopify checkout has been one of the platform’s primary benefits in the past decade or so—and it continues to be! But when we look at opportunities to boost average order value and conversion rates, one of the things we typically look at is in-checkout functions for upsells and trust boosts—those little things that help make a sale a good sale. With the new checkout extensibility exclusive to Shopify Plus, this is both possible and productive.
#4 - Expansion Stores
One of the major benefit of Shopify Plus is that it comes with nine extra stores. What do you need extra stores for? What *don’t* you need extra stores for?! Spin up a discount store to move that extra inventory without diluting your brand! Build out geographic outlets with special pricing for international markets! Whip something up for a flash sale! The sky is the limit.
#5 - Accounts & Permissions
Unlimited Staff Accounts! Granular Permissions! Extra functions around POS staff! You want a setting, Shopify Plus has likely got it—plus increased API call limits and really just whatever you need to make your Dev team happy. It’s us, we’re the Dev team.
