Shopify’s early access to store credits is here! Gone are the days of using gift cards or discount codes to get around it. You can now issue store credits directly in your Shopify admin. Early access to store credits is available to: Limited feature set Access to all Shopify businesses worldwide.
The new store credit feature gives you more flexibility in interacting with customers, improving operational efficiency and preventing lost sales.
What is store credit?
Store credit is monetary value that a customer or potential customer can use in your store. Unlike gift cards or discount codes, store credit is not transferable and is linked directly to the customer it is issued to, with or without an expiration date.
In Shopify’s early access release, store credit can be viewed, credited, and debited directly from customer profiles, and logged-in customers can choose to use store credit at checkout.
What are the benefits of using store credit?
Store credit helps you create loyal customers, which are key to the long-term growth of your business. 21% of customers generate 44% of revenue and 46% of orders.The cost of acquiring new customers is also low. It costs five times as much It’s about the same cost as it costs to retain an existing customer.
Offering store credit to customers gives you more flexibility in how you interact with customers and improves operational efficiency, leading to increased customer retention, loyalty, and sales.
Increase customer retention and sales
Store credit is an incentive for customers to return to your store. Loyalty ProgramStore credit can be used as a way to show appreciation to repeat customers.
Customers often end up paying more than the balance of the store credit they were issued. For example, if a customer is issued a $20 store credit, they are likely to pay more than $20 when they redeem that credit on their next purchase. Increasing the average order value of returning customers is a simple, yet effective strategy that can help increase customer lifetime value over the long term.
Increase flexibility in customer interactions
Every customer interaction is an opportunity to turn a one-time interaction or visit into a lifelong customer and loyal brand advocate. Offering store credit in your loyalty and customer support workflows, both pre- and post-purchase, helps build relationships and a reputation that leads to repeat business. And because store credit is non-transferable, you can be confident that any store credit issued is used by the intended recipient.
Store credit can be offered as compensation for a bad experience, to reward customers for previous purchases, and as part of a marketing incentive or campaign to help boost sales.
Build a source of truth for store credit balances, orders, and customers
Unlike common workarounds for store credit, like gift cards or discount codes, store credit balances and transaction history are recorded and can be viewed directly in a customer’s profile. Early access also includes store credit as a payment method type in analytics and reporting within your Shopify admin.
Choosing to introduce store credit into your workflow instead of workarounds will give you greater transparency and precision when analyzing your customers, their behavior, and orders.
How does store credit work?
Store credits are available to all Shopify businesses worldwide, and the feature set will continue to grow throughout the year.
Apply store credit at checkout
Enabling store credit at checkout allows your customers to redeem the store credit you’ve issued. When your customers check out, they’ll see the option to apply store credit to their order when they log in to their customer account. Your customers can log in directly from the checkout page using a one-time 6-digit verification code that’s sent to their email address.
Store credit can only be accessed when the customer is logged in. New Customer AccountBefore issuing store credit to a customer, Login trial version Set to New Customer Account in Shopify admin or Customer A URL that allows access to a new customer accountYou can find this URL in your customer account settings even if your login experience version is set to Classic customer account, or if you have no login experience at all.
Issue store credit directly from your Shopify admin
Store credit can be deposited and withdrawn directly from a customer’s profile, and you can also view a customer’s current store credit balance in one or more currencies.
When you issue a store credit, you can enter the amount to credit and whether the credit expires on a specific date. You can manually deduct store credit from a customer profile by debiting the balance. Customer expenditures, or manual debits, are applied first to the credit that is expiring earliest. When a credit or debit is issued, the change to the customer’s store credit balance appears as a timeline event on the customer profile. When a customer uses their store credit at checkout, it’s reflected on the order timeline.
Store credit tracking and analysis
Knowing how much outstanding store credit you’ve issued to customers and understanding how and when that store credit can be redeemed can help you plan your long-term strategy.
By selecting a store credit balance in the currency specified in a customer’s profile, you can view all transactions made related to that store credit balance, including the existing balance, detailed transaction history, and expiring amounts.
Further prospects
Shopify store credits are currently in early access, and we plan to roll out new features by the end of the year, including:
- The ability to issue store credit instead of refunds can reduce the amount of returns your team has to process, preserving cash flow for your business and improving customer retention.
- Improved analysis of store credit, ability to assign reason codes for reporting, and store-level reporting on balances and encumbrances
- With segments, triggers, and automated workflows, you can target customers with store credit, automatically issue store credit as an incentive, or notify customers when their store credit is about to expire.
Tips for getting the most out of your store credit
Get creative with store credit
Store credit isn’t just for resolving customer support issues and increasing customer loyalty — it can also help you attract new customers and increase brand awareness. Referral Program Store credit is a versatile tool for your business, whether you want to encourage former customers to recommend your products to family and friends or offer store credit to employees as a job perk.
Cross-sell and up-sell with the Customer API
Are you looking to improve and diversify your marketing campaigns? Our Customer Account API allows you to identify your customers’ store credit balances, making it easy to send engaging, personalized marketing communications to customers who have store credit.
Get started with store credit now
Win back your customers and build brand loyalty. Use Shopify’s early access feature to issue store credits directly from your Shopify admin. For more information on how to issue store credits now, Help Center.
