Why Merchants Choose to Leave Squarespace for Shopify

Before diving into the migration process, it’s worth understanding why this particular platform switch has become so common. Squarespace certainly has its merits—beautiful templates, user-friendly content management, and an all-in-one approach to website building. However, when it comes to dedicated e-commerce functionality, Shopify offers several compelling advantages.

Firstly, Shopify’s feature set is designed exclusively for online retail. This means everything from inventory management to abandoned cart recovery, multi-channel selling, and advanced reporting comes built-in or is readily available through vetted applications. Squarespace, by contrast, was originally conceived as a website builder that later added e-commerce capabilities, meaning some features feel like afterthoughts rather than core functionality.

Secondly, scalability becomes a pressing concern as businesses grow. Shopify can comfortably handle everything from a handful of products to catalogues containing thousands of SKUs, processing millions of pounds in transactions. The platform’s infrastructure is built to manage high traffic volumes during peak trading periods without performance degradation—crucial during seasonal sales or successful marketing campaigns.

Finally, Shopify’s app ecosystem is unparalleled. With over 8,000 applications available in the Shopify App Store, you can extend your shop’s functionality in virtually any direction—from sophisticated email marketing automation to augmented reality product visualisation. This flexibility allows your technology stack to evolve alongside your business needs.

Pre-Migration Planning: Setting Yourself Up for Success

A successful migration begins long before you export your first product listing. Proper planning will save you countless headaches and ensure business continuity throughout the transition.

Start by conducting a comprehensive audit of your existing Squarespace store. Document everything: your current product catalogue, including all variants, descriptions, images, and pricing; your customer database; order history; blog content; page structure; current traffic sources; and any custom functionality or integrations you’ve implemented. This audit serves as both a checklist for migration and a baseline for post-migration verification.

Next, choose the appropriate Shopify plan for your business. Whilst you might be tempted to start with the basic tier, consider your current transaction volume, required features, and growth projections. The Shopify plan (middle tier) offers the best balance of features and value for most growing businesses, including professional reports and lower transaction fees that quickly offset the higher monthly cost.

Timing is another crucial consideration. Avoid migrating during your peak trading periods—never attempt a platform switch in the weeks leading up to Christmas or during your busiest season. Instead, identify a relatively quiet period in your calendar when you can afford some operational flexibility should unexpected issues arise.

Finally, inform your team and set clear expectations. Everyone who touches your e-commerce operation—from customer service representatives to warehouse staff—needs to understand what’s changing, when it’s changing, and how it will affect their workflows.

The Technical Migration Process

With planning complete, you’re ready to begin the technical migration. This process can be accomplished through several methods, each with its own advantages depending on your technical expertise and store complexity.

Using Migration Apps

The simplest approach for most merchants involves using a dedicated migration application. Tools like Cart2Cart, LitExtension, and Matrixify offer automated migration services that can transfer your data from Squarespace to Shopify with minimal manual intervention.

These applications typically work by connecting to both platforms via API, extracting data from Squarespace, transforming it into Shopify’s format, and importing it into your new store. Most services allow you to select exactly what data you want to migrate—products, customers, orders, or all three—and offer a free demo migration so you can verify the results before committing to a full transfer.

The primary advantage of migration apps is speed and convenience. A store with several hundred products can often be migrated in a matter of hours rather than days. However, these services come at a cost, typically calculated based on the number of entities being transferred.

Manual Migration

For smaller stores or those with unique requirements, manual migration might be preferable. This involves exporting data from Squarespace in CSV format, reformatting it to match Shopify’s required structure, and importing it through Shopify’s built-in CSV import tools.

Whilst more time-consuming, manual migration offers complete control over the process and ensures you understand exactly how your data is being structured in Shopify. It’s also an excellent opportunity to clean up your data—removing discontinued products, correcting inconsistencies, and optimising product information.

Migrating Specific Data Types

Products: Your product catalogue is the heart of your store. Ensure that all product information transfers correctly, including titles, descriptions, variants (size, colour, etc.), SKUs, pricing, images, and inventory levels. Pay particular attention to product categorisation—Shopify uses collections rather than categories, which offers more flexibility but requires thoughtful organisation.

Customers: Customer data migration must be handled carefully, both for business continuity and legal compliance with GDPR. Shopify can import customer names, email addresses, and order history, but for security reasons, passwords cannot be transferred. Customers will need to use the “forgot password” function on their first visit to your new Shopify store.

Orders: Historical order data provides valuable insights for business intelligence and customer service. Migrating this information ensures you maintain a complete view of customer relationships and purchase patterns.

Content: Don’t overlook your blog posts, about pages, and other content. Whilst not directly transactional, this content drives organic traffic and builds customer trust. Most migration tools don’t transfer blog content automatically, so this may require manual recreation or separate migration using CSV imports.

Design and Customisation

Once your data is safely in Shopify, attention turns to design. Unlike Squarespace, which is renowned for its design-forward templates, Shopify’s strength lies in customisation and functionality.

Begin by selecting an appropriate theme from Shopify’s theme store. Free themes offer solid foundations, but premium themes (typically ranging from £140-280) provide more advanced features, superior support, and greater customisation options. Consider themes specifically designed for your industry—fashion retailers have different needs than electronics shops or food and beverage brands.

Shopify’s theme customiser allows extensive modifications without touching code. You can adjust colours, typography, layout, and content sections to align with your brand identity. For businesses with specific design requirements, Shopify’s Liquid templating language enables unlimited customisation, though this typically requires developer expertise.

Remember that your new Shopify store doesn’t need to replicate your Squarespace design exactly. This migration presents an opportunity to refresh your brand presentation, improve user experience based on analytics from your previous store, and implement e-commerce best practices you may have struggled to achieve on Squarespace.

Setting Up Essential E-Commerce Features

Shopify’s true power emerges when you configure its e-commerce-specific features and integrate essential applications.

Payment Processing: Configure your payment gateway—Shopify Payments (powered by Stripe) offers the most seamless integration with no additional transaction fees, but Shopify supports over 100 payment providers globally. Ensure you set up all payment methods your customers expect, including digital wallets like Apple Pay and Google Pay.

Shipping Configuration: Shopify’s shipping features are considerably more sophisticated than Squarespace’s. Set up shipping zones, rates, and rules that reflect your actual fulfilment capabilities. Consider integrating with shipping carriers for real-time rate calculation and label printing directly from your Shopify admin.

Tax Settings: Configure tax collection based on your business location and where you have tax obligations. Shopify can automatically calculate taxes for most jurisdictions, but international sellers should verify settings carefully to ensure compliance.

Essential Apps: While Shopify’s native features are extensive, strategic apps enhance functionality. Priority integrations typically include email marketing platforms (Klaviyo, Omnisend), customer review systems (Judge.me, Yotpo), and inventory management tools if you’re selling across multiple channels.

SEO Considerations and URL Redirects

One of the most critical—and frequently overlooked—aspects of platform migration is preserving your search engine rankings. Your Squarespace site likely has established authority and rankings for various keywords; losing this organic visibility could significantly impact revenue.

The cornerstone of maintaining SEO during migration is implementing proper 301 redirects. These permanent redirects tell search engines that your pages have moved to new URLs, transferring most of the SEO value to the new locations. Shopify’s URL structure differs from Squarespace’s, so every product, collection, and content page from your old site needs a corresponding redirect to its new location.

Create a comprehensive redirect map before going live, matching every indexed URL from your Squarespace site to its equivalent on Shopify. Shopify allows you to implement redirects directly in the admin panel, or you can use apps like Redirectify for bulk redirect management.

Additionally, replicate your meta titles, descriptions, and alt text for images. Submit your new sitemap to Google Search Console and monitor for crawl errors in the weeks following migration. Some ranking fluctuation is normal during a platform migration, but proper redirects minimise disruption.

Testing Before Going Live

Never point your domain to a new e-commerce platform without thorough testing. Create a comprehensive testing checklist covering every aspect of the customer journey and backend operations.

Test the complete purchase flow multiple times using different devices, browsers, and payment methods. Verify that products display correctly with all variants and options functional. Confirm that shipping calculations are accurate for various locations. Check that discount codes apply correctly and that tax calculations are appropriate for different jurisdictions.

Review all customer-facing communications—order confirmation emails, shipping notifications, and account creation messages—ensuring they’re properly branded and contain accurate information. Test the customer account portal to confirm that returning customers can log in and access their information.

For backend operations, verify that order notifications reach the appropriate team members, that inventory tracking functions correctly, and that your analytics tracking is properly implemented.

Going Live and Post-Migration Tasks

When testing is complete and you’re confident in your new Shopify store, it’s time to go live. This typically involves updating your domain’s DNS settings to point to Shopify’s servers. DNS propagation can take up to 48 hours, though it’s usually much faster.

During the transition period, monitor your site closely for any issues. Have your support team ready to assist customers who may experience confusion with the new platform. Send a communication to your customer list explaining any relevant changes, particularly the need to reset passwords for account access.

Post-migration, conduct a final verification that all data transferred correctly. Spot-check products, customer records, and orders against your pre-migration audit. Monitor your analytics for any unusual patterns that might indicate problems.

Optimising Your New Shopify Store

Migration completion isn’t the finish line—it’s the starting line for optimisation. Now that you’re on a platform designed for e-commerce growth, take advantage of features that weren’t available on Squarespace.

Implement abandoned cart recovery emails to recapture sales from customers who don’t complete checkout. Set up automated email flows for post-purchase engagement, win-back campaigns, and product recommendations. Explore multi-channel selling through Shopify’s integrations with Facebook, Instagram, Amazon, and other marketplaces.

Use Shopify’s analytics to gain deeper insights into customer behaviour, product performance, and sales trends. This data-driven approach enables continuous refinement of your merchandising, marketing, and operational strategies.

Conclusion

Migrating from Squarespace to Shopify represents a significant undertaking, but for growing e-commerce businesses, it’s an investment that pays dividends through enhanced functionality, improved scalability, and access to a robust ecosystem of tools and integrations. By approaching the migration methodically—planning thoroughly, executing carefully, and optimising continuously—you can make the transition smoothly whilst minimising disruption to your business.

The process requires attention to detail, particularly around data integrity, SEO preservation, and thorough testing, but the result is a more powerful platform that can grow alongside your business. As you settle into Shopify, you’ll likely discover capabilities and efficiencies that weren’t possible on your previous platform, validating your decision to make the switch and positioning your business for sustainable e-commerce success.