Migrating to Shopify is much more than just moving a webshop. It's about ensuring proper handling of data, SEO, integrations, and operations, so you avoid loss of traffic, revenue, and important business logic. With a well-thought-out plan, the move can be used as a strategic cleanup and an upgrade of the webshop, so the new Shopify solution performs better and is easier to scale.
Migrating to Shopify: what it takes to succeed
Migrating to Shopify often sounds like a task where you just move the shop. In practice, it is a project that requires control over data, SEO, integrations, and a plan that holds from the first export to the first order on the new webshop. If the migration is done halfway, you typically get half results, and you risk that problems arise at the worst possible times.
At Mercive, we exclusively work with Shopify and Shopify Plus. Therefore, we always start by assessing the risks and dependencies before moving anything at all. This is the most effective way to avoid costly surprises while ensuring you get a solution that is built correctly from the start.
Shopify migrering: hvad flytter du egentlig
A Shopify migration is the process of moving your existing webshop to Shopify without losing what creates value in the business. It's not just about products, customers, and orders, but also about structure, redirects, tracking, and the integrations that make everyday operations work.
If you want to see how we work on the task in practice, you can read more about our approach to Shopify migrering.
Move your webshop to Shopify with a plan that cleans up
When you move a webshop to Shopify, you need to consider what should be included and what should not. Old categories, outdated apps, and historical solutions can easily sneak in if no clear framework is set for what the new webshop should be able to do.
A sensible process typically starts with a clarification of the following:
- Which data needs to be migrated, and in what format it exists
- Which integrations are critical for operations, inventory, finance, and marketing
- Which URLs should be preserved via 301 redirects to protect SEO
The point is that Shopify should make your work easier afterwards. Therefore, the migration should be a thoughtful cleanup rather than an uncritical copy of everything.
SEO when migrating to Shopify: how to avoid loss of traffic
SEO is often the place where migration projects lose unnecessary revenue. This rarely happens because someone wants it to. It happens because SEO is treated as decoration instead of a part of the infrastructure.
When you prioritize SEO correctly, it especially concerns these classic areas:
- URL structure and consistency across categories, products, and content
- 301 redirects from old URLs to relevant new destinations
- Metadata (titles and descriptions) as well as canonical URLs where relevant
- Internal link structure so authority and navigation are maintained
- Tracking and measurement so you discover errors immediately and not only when the reports are empty
If you also want to enhance the experience and sales, it often makes sense to consider user experience and conversion in the migration. Conversion optimization in Shopify is rarely a one-time project. It involves ongoing improvements and testing, which build on data from the new webshop. You can read more about our work with conversion rate optimization.
Integrations and data migration to Shopify
Most e-commerce companies have more systems than just the webshop itself. ERP, PIM, email flows, reporting, and shipping solutions need to work together when Shopify goes live. Therefore, the integration landscape should be clarified early on, so you know what is standard, what requires customization, and what is a real bottleneck if it doesn't work.
A practical way to create an overview is to divide the needs into three levels:
- Critical integrations: operations cannot run without them, for example ERP, payment, and shipping
- Important integrations: provide better marketing and workflows, for example email automation and product feeds
- Nice to have: can be added after go live, if scope or time requires it
When there is a need for functions that Shopify does not directly address, it may be appropriate to build a solution that fits your setup. This could be done, for example, through custom applikationer, where integrations and business logic are developed to match your workflows.
Shopify Plus migration: when scaling is part of the requirements
A Shopify Plus migration often involves less about getting a new webshop and more about getting a setup that can scale. This can include multiple markets, more teams, more complex operations, and greater demands for governance, workflows, and performance. Here, structure and setup become crucial, as small mistakes can quickly become costly when volume increases.
In many growth cases, it makes sense to consider activation and setup as a separate part of the project, so that Shopify Markets and relevant flows are set up correctly from the start. You can read more about how we approach it with platformaktivering.
If you want to discuss whether a migration to Shopify makes sense for you, and how to avoid the classic pitfalls, you can contact us at contact@mercive.com or call us at +45 61 60 29 83.
