How To Customize A Theme For Your Shopify Store

What Is A Shopify Theme?

A theme is a template for your Shopify store that determines how it looks and feels. When selecting your theme, you’ll want to consider layout, font, colors and overall style. These elements will tailor the store experience to your customer.

Have you never touched a line of code before? No problem. With Shopify’s Theme editor you can easily change the look, feel and functionality of your store at the touch of a button. You don’t need any coding knowledge. Plus, it’s easy to modify your store, with or without the help of a Shopify website developer.

Ready to get customizing? Follow these tips to create a beautifully branded Shopify store.

Creating and Customizing A Shopify Theme

1. Set up your store: Before you start customizing your theme, you need to set up an online store. Signing up to Shopify and setting up an account couldn’t be easier. However, you can enlist the help of our Shopify experts if you get stuck.
2. Customize your store: Once you have finished the setup process, it’s time to customize your store. After you have signed up, Shopify will direct you to the admin screen. You can now select the option, “Customize the look of your website.”
3. Choose a theme: Shopify has its own official theme store with plenty of layouts and styles to choose from. You can select a theme by browsing the theme store. There are over 180 styles to choose from.
4. Sample your theme: Once you’ve chosen a theme, you can click on the theme’s sample image to see how it appears in your store. Here, you’ll find more information, such as whether the theme is mobile responsive, along with other features. You can also scroll down to read theme reviews from other store owners. You can preview a demo of your theme in action by selecting “Preview Theme in Your Store.”
5. Install your theme: When you’re happy with your theme, you can select it by clicking the green button. You will need to confirm that you want to install the theme(don’t worry – you can install a new one if you change your mind later). Once you’ve installed your theme, Shopify will redirect you to the Theme Manager, where you can make changes to your store.
6. Modify your theme: When you’re happy with your theme, it’s time to make it your own. Each theme comes with full support from a professional Shopify developer. Therefore, you can make modifications without any prior coding knowledge. Here, you can make basic setting changes and alter the functionality of your store.

Free Or Paid: What’s The Difference?

There is a comprehensive choice of free themes and premium design on Shopify. The main difference is that third-party designers create the premium themes. These themes come with more modification options. However, you can still achieve a professional looking site using one of Shopify’s free templates.

Searching For A Theme

When searching for a theme, you can filter the results by price, popularity, and features. This can help you find the right template for your business. You can also search by Theme Feature using the top bar search field on the Shopify Theme Store. Examples of search terms you can use include the following:

• Instagram feed
• FAQ page
• Video
• Wide layout
• Search engine optimization
• Quick buy
• Related products
• Product filtering

You can also search by collection or industry and then select a category. However, Shopify themes are not restricted to particular industries. You don’t have to use a theme listed under “Art and photography’ if you’re selling photographs, for example. You can use the filters on the sidebar menu to refine your results.

Changes To Make With The Theme Customization Tool

There are many changes you can make using Shopify’s Theme Customization tool. These include:

• Changing the color of your background, fonts or overall scheme.
• Uploading logos to your store.
• Changing the font.
• Changing the layout by repositioning elements.
• Adding “related items” functionality to product pages.
• Choosing how many items appear in your product or collection pages.
• Uploading image slides to your homepage.
• Displaying social buttons with connections to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and more.

“Know what your customers want most and what your company does best. Focus on where those two meet.”

Kevin Stirtz

Choosing and customizing your Shopify theme couldn’t be easier. Shopify is user-friendly and easy to use for beginners. However, if you do get stuck, we here at Blackbelt Commerce have the best Shopify developers and experts on hand to help you create a successful e-commerce store for your business.

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We also have other terrific blog articles such as Learn about SEO, and eCommerce Email Marketing. How to use social media for your e-commerce store, Best designs practices for an e-commerce store.— We are Blackbelt Commerce, a TOP Shopify & BigCommerce developer.