For entrepreneurs looking to start their own subscription business, picking the right e-commerce platform can be one of the most important (and daunting) decisions.
Of the many choices available, Cratejoy and Shopify are two of the most popular options. Founded in 2006, Shopify is a broad e-commerce platform designed to help small businesses and shops get their products online, while Cratejoy, a newer platform, is an all-in-one solution designed specifically for subscription box entrepreneurs.
Although both Shopify and Cratejoy share a number of features, each excels at a different type of e-commerce, until now. Subscription box entrepreneurs interested in using Shopify AND Cratejoy now have a great option for running their business with a joint solution:
Cratejoy’s Hosted Checkout
Hosted Checkout makes it easy for subscription box owners to use their existing websites (or websites built and hosted on services like Shopify) while still utilizing Cratejoy’s checkout and order management systems. Cratejoy merchant Brave Crate, above, is a great example!
Simply put, if you’re using Shopify to build your website but want Cratejoy to process your subscription orders, Hosted checkout will give you the best of both worlds and allow you to effectively run your subscription box business on Shopify.
Pricing for Cratejoy plus Shopify
Cratejoy Hosted Checkout: $19/mo + transaction fees
Shopify: Starts at $29/mo + transaction fees
Benefits of using Hosted Checkout
- Easy to set up and easy-to-use checkout experience
- Customizable, responsive design
- Supports 138 different currencies
- Free listing on the Cratejoy marketplace
- Supports credit card and PayPal Checkout payments
- Built-in options legally needed for subscription businesses
- Fraud prevention (more info & and even more info)
- PCI/DSS security-compliant (more info)
How to Connect Cratejoy to Shopify
- Create a Cratejoy Store
- Customize the theme so that the checkout portion matches your existing Shopify Store
- Set up a subscription product
- Connect a subdomain to your Cratejoy account
- Direct your customers to your hosted checkout
Need more info? Check out our full help doc on integrating Cratejoy with a Shopify Store or learn more about hosted checkout.
What Will Hosted Checkout Look Like?
Hosted checkout takes your subscribers to a Cratejoy-hosted payment page. Here users will enter their payment info and get directed to a confirmation page once their information has been verified by your payment processor (Stripe, Authorize.net, etc.)
What Hosted Checkout Users Are Saying:
“I use CrateJoy [sic] as my back end. The CJ website was just not aesthetically what I was looking for, but the administrative/pay processing features on CJ are spot on – so I really wanted both…. I can’t imagine trying to manage the subscriber list/recurring payments without CJ.” – Becky Hoy, Brave Crate
