Level up your Shopify store: harnessing the potential of checkout functions

Shopify is a great platform, but you need to make it work for you.

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You’re a unique business with specific needs for making your business thrive - some of which may not be possible with Shopify’s native offerings.

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Fortunately, through features like Shopify Functions, you can leverage the scalability and rich data provided by Shopify’s platform to build reliable and effective customizations to all elements of your site, including the checkout page.

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What are Shopify Functions?

Shopify Functions are Shopify’s answer to stores wanting more control over their user experience. They’re a new feature that came out alongside Checkout Extensibility that enables all kinds of customizations, including changes to checkout pages, to help stores achieve the functionality they need without requiring coding experience. Using them, you’re able to access the backend logic that makes Shopify work which expands customization further than ever before.

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Shopify Functions come in the form of apps, unlike the prior implementation known as Shopify Scripts, which worked directly with code. These apps utilize Shopify’s API and integrate directly into the admin interface for the function you’re creating, such as the checkout customization section or payment method settings so that you can easily add or remove them as needed. They’re also plug-and-play because they use information stored by Shopify, allowing you to install functions made by others to your store without any compatibility problems.

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How Shopify Functions addresses the need for customization

As the demand for customization, personalization, and unique user experiences has grown, Shopify has begun unlocking some of the core files to allow developers to make the changes they want. Visual, physical, and functional changes are just a few different customizations that stores may want to make, especially to elements like checkout pages where conversion rates are so important.

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To further address the customization needs of store owners, Shopify has constantly evolved new tools and features like Checkout Extensibility that help expand what you can do with a Shopify store. But, out-of-the-box solutions will never be able to address every specific need that a store can have. So, Shopify Functions let you build your own customizations - and integrate them directly into the admin panel for simple, code-free operation.

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How can you use Shopify Functions at checkout?

There is a wide array of different uses for Shopify Functions, especially when it comes to building a checkout page that drives conversions and grows revenue. While you’re slightly limited in what you can access and how you can edit it based on the available Shopify APIs, there are multiple that can be used now, as well as more coming all the time.

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Discounts are one of the potential ways to implement Shopify Functions during the checkout process. Shopify allows for standard discounts to be applied to products on their respective pages and with discount codes at checkout, but more dynamic options aren’t supported. 

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For example, triggering a bulk discount when a purchase contains a certain number of products (like 10% off purchases of 5 or more products) is possible with Functions. You’re able to access the cart contents to count the items purchased, the cart total to find the sum to apply the discount to, and apply the discount to the cost before displaying it for the customer to see and charging them accordingly.

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Cart validation is another significant improvement that Shopify Functions can make to your checkout process. Cart validation means checking that someone has a valid order before they can continue through checkout. Sometimes, you need to limit certain purchases for fairness or safety, so being able to automatically validate the contents of a customer’s carts before they checkout can save you the time, headache, and risk of upsetting a customer who places an invalid order.

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For example, you can limit the number of specific products or the amount spent by a customer as part of a launch to help ensure everyone gets a chance to buy something. You’ve seen this practice in place when it comes to ticket sales, shoe drops, gaming console releases, and other eCommerce applications. During the process, your app will check that the customer’s cart doesn’t violate the criteria established for a valid order and block further progress if it’s not valid.

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Delivery customizations use Shopify Functions to control the customer experience and help simplify getting them their orders. In addition to changing costs, delivery options will also vary depending on where your customer is. Your store might serve both local and national customers, but you can only offer hand-delivery or scheduling to customers within a certain distance, so you need to only show that option when it’s available. To do so, you can use Shopify Functions to access the shipping address the customer entered and query its distance from your shop to determine which shipping options to show.

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Payment customizations allow you to limit which payment method your customers can use based on your chosen criteria. For hand-delivery, you may cut the cash payment option off at $100 to avoid drivers carrying that much cash on them. Or, you may want to disallow certain payment options to international customers due to fees or conversion rates. WIth Shopify Functions, you can collect the information you want to verify and then filter the provided payment options based on your established rules to avoid disruptions in payment collection.

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How do you implement Shopify Functions at checkout?

Shopify Functions have been made easier than their predecessors because they’re simple to implement as apps. Instead of writing or pasting in code and hoping that everything transfers correctly, you can simply install apps off of the Shopify app store and implement them on your site.

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Alternatively, you can also make your own apps if you’re a developer or Shopify Plus merchant. However, it’s best left to those with experience working with one of the supported languages due to the complexity of setup and requirement of coding to establish the necessary functions.

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Checkout Extensions Plus: Leverage Shopify Functions without coding

Looking for an app that makes it easy to implement Shopify Functions for your checkout page? 

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Checkout Extensions Plus combines the ability to style and customize your checkout page through the branding API with the functionality provided by the Shopify Functions APIs. With it, you’ll be able to change colors, fonts, form fields, checkout elements, payment and shipping options, cart validation rules, and much more without needing to install a ton of apps or figure out how to code.

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See what Checkout Extensions Plus can do for you with a free 7-day trial.

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