WooCommerce is a free plugin that turns a WordPress site into an online store. It handles products, a shopping cart, checkout, payments, shipping and order emails, and it runs well on all Hoopla Hosting cPanel plans.
This guide takes you from a new WordPress site to a store that's ready to take orders, plus the hosting settings that keep it fast and secure.
1. Install WordPress
If you don't have a WordPress site yet, install one with WP Toolkit in cPanel. See How to install WordPress with WP Toolkit.
2. Install WooCommerce
- Log in to your WordPress dashboard (see Log in to your WordPress dashboard).
- Go to Plugins → Add New Plugin and search for WooCommerce.
- Click Install Now, then Activate.
- The WooCommerce setup wizard opens. Enter your store's address, what you sell and your currency (NZD for New Zealand stores). You can skip the optional extras and come back to them later.
3. Choose a theme
Most modern themes work with WooCommerce. The free default WordPress themes are a good start, or look for themes listed as WooCommerce compatible. Go to Appearance → Themes → Add New Theme to browse. Check how your shop, product and checkout pages look on a phone, because that's where many customers will buy.
4. Add your products
Go to Products → Add New Product. Give each product a name, description, price, images and stock level, and put it in a category. For products with options such as size or colour, choose Variable product.
5. Set up payments
Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Payments. Popular options for New Zealand stores include:
- Stripe: credit and debit cards, Apple Pay and Google Pay.
- PayPal: PayPal accounts and cards.
- Direct bank transfer: built in, with orders held until you confirm payment.
Most gateways have a test mode. Place a test order before you go live.
6. Set up shipping and tax
Under WooCommerce → Settings → Shipping, create a shipping zone for New Zealand (and any other countries you ship to), and add flat rate, free shipping or local pickup options. If you're GST registered, turn on taxes under WooCommerce → Settings → General and add the 15% GST rate under the Tax tab.
7. Get your hosting ready for a store
- Force HTTPS: checkout must be secure. Our free SSL is added automatically. Then force HTTPS so every page uses it. See Set up redirects and force HTTPS.
- Install LiteSpeed Cache: speeds up your shop pages, and automatically skips caching the cart, checkout and account pages. See WordPress LiteSpeed Cache plugin setup.
- Make sure order emails arrive: set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC for your domain so order confirmations don't land in spam. See Emails going to spam: set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC.
- Keep it updated: turn on automatic updates in WP Toolkit, and act on security alerts quickly. See WP Toolkit security alert emails.
- Protect against bots: scrapers often hammer WooCommerce product filters and can slow your store down. See WooCommerce bot traffic causing high CPU usage.
- Know how to restore: we back up your account daily. See Restore files, databases or email from a backup.
8. Before you launch
- Place a real test order from start to finish, including payment, and check the emails you and the customer receive.
- Add your returns, privacy and shipping policies, and link to them in your footer.
- Set up Google Analytics and Google Search Console so you can see visitors and how your store appears in Google.
- Keep plugins to the ones you need. Every extra plugin adds load and another thing to keep updated.
WooCommerce's own documentation covers each setting in detail.
Need help?
If you have questions about hosting your store, or it's running slowly, open a support ticket and we'll help.
