Selling Abroad with Shopify: A Guide to Shopify Markets

Selling abroad from Türkiye, in other words e-export, is no longer something only big brands do. With the right product, the right market and the right platform, small and mid-sized brands can also reach customers in many countries, from Germany to the United States. Shopify is one of the most popular platforms for this, because it brings the core tools for cross-border selling together in a single store under the name Shopify Markets.

As an official Shopify Partner, Booster Wizard has built Shopify stores that sell to several countries, Germany in particular. In this guide we explain what Shopify Markets offers, what a Türkiye-based store needs to watch out for and the order in which we carry out the set-up.

What Is Shopify Markets?

Shopify Markets is the umbrella name for the international selling tools that let you sell to more than one country from a single store. You define a separate market for each country or group of countries, then manage the settings specific to that market. The main features are:

• Markets: you can create markets that target a single country or group several countries together.
• Pricing: through catalogs you can set percentage price adjustments for each market or fixed prices per product.
• Languages: each published language gets its own URLs, and checkout and notification emails are also shown in the customer's language.
• Translation: with Shopify's Translate & Adapt app, content can be translated manually or automatically; the app offers free automatic translation for up to two languages.
• Duties: with the right configuration, an estimate of duties and import taxes can be collected from the customer at checkout.
• International SEO: Shopify automatically creates hreflang tags for every international domain or subfolder you set up.

Subfolder, Subdomain or Country Domain?

Deciding which address each market will live on should be done early, for both SEO and ease of management. There are three main options on Shopify:

• Subfolder (examplebrand.com/de-de): the easiest option to set up, and it benefits from your main domain's existing authority.
• Subdomain (de.examplebrand.com): gives you a separate structure but may not benefit as much from the main domain's strength.
• Country domain (examplebrand.de): requires buying a separate domain for each country, and each one builds its authority from scratch.

We usually recommend the subfolder structure to brands going abroad for the first time, and Shopify also recommends this method for a first set-up. A country domain makes sense when the goal is a strong local presence in a specific market.

Payments for Türkiye-Based Stores: The Most Important Difference

Using every feature of Shopify Markets depends largely on Shopify Payments, but Shopify Payments is not available to stores based in Türkiye. According to Shopify's help documentation, selling in local currencies is only supported by Shopify Payments and Adyen, and orders placed through other payment providers are processed in the store's default currency. Market-specific price adjustments through catalogs, however, are available on all plans.

To take payments from customers abroad, you therefore need to work with third-party payment providers that accept international cards. Some globally known payment methods are not offered directly to Türkiye-based businesses. When choosing a provider, always check whether it supports foreign cards, the payment methods common in your target country, foreign currency collection and the refund flow. Decide on the store currency together with your accountant and your payment provider too.

For the details of payment infrastructure in Türkiye: Our guide to Shopify payments, shipping and e-invoicing in Türkiye

Planning: Target Country, Pricing and Logistics

Choosing Target Countries

Starting with one or two markets rather than opening up to many countries at once keeps both the budget and operations manageable. When choosing a market, ask these questions:

• Is there demand for your product in that country, and does your current site already get visitors from there?
• Are shipping times and costs at a level customers will accept?
• Does your product comply with that country's regulations, labelling and certification rules?
• Do you have the resources to prepare content in that language and answer customer questions?

Pricing Strategy

Your price abroad should not simply be the currency equivalent of your Türkiye price. Shipping, duties, payment fees, returns and marketing costs differ in every market, so set the price with these items and competitor prices in mind. On Shopify you can use catalogs to apply a percentage adjustment per market or set fixed prices for key products.

Shipping, Returns and Customs

Separate shipping zones and rates should be defined for each market. Every product shipped abroad needs an HS code, and on Shopify you can enter this code and the country of origin from the product page, with the bulk editor or by CSV. This information is used for customs declarations and duty estimates.

Whether duties are collected at checkout or paid on delivery directly affects the customer experience. An unexpected charge on delivery can lead to the parcel being refused. Write a separate returns policy for international orders as well, stating clearly who pays for return shipping and how the process works. When selling to the European Union, review local rules such as the GPSR product safety regulation in advance.

Market-Specific Content and SEO

Automatic translation is a good start, but it is not enough on its own. Product descriptions, collection copy and campaign messages should be reviewed by a native speaker of that language. Translate & Adapt also lets you adapt spelling and messaging differences for separate markets that share a language.

Although Shopify creates hreflang tags automatically, the rest of SEO is up to you. Do keyword research for each market in its own language, translate page titles and meta descriptions, and submit each domain's sitemap to Google Search Console. Test one by one that URL redirects work as expected in market subfolders, and if a market needs a different destination, create a redirect specific to that subfolder.

Marketing for Each Market

Every country has different shopping habits, campaign seasons and channels. Split ad campaigns by market, match landing pages to the relevant language, and segment your email lists by country. Local customer reviews and partnerships that are well known in that country are among the most effective ways to build trust in a new market.

Setting Up Shopify Markets Step by Step

In our projects we usually roll out international selling in this order:

• Define your target markets and the success criteria for each one.
• Choose a payment provider and run a test payment with foreign cards.
• Create the markets in the Shopify admin and decide the domain structure for each one.
• Set market-specific prices with catalogs.
• Add languages, translate your content and have the translations checked by a native speaker.
• Enter HS codes and country of origin on products, and set up shipping zones and rates.
• Publish the international returns policy, legal pages and country-specific notices.
• Add a country and language selector to the theme and place an end-to-end test order in every market.
• Submit the sitemaps to Search Console and set up advertising and tracking for each market.

Set-up time and budget depend on the number of markets and languages, payment and logistics integrations and how customised the design is. For the factors that drive the cost: Our guide to Shopify store set-up costs

Common Mistakes

• Opening up to many markets at once and not focusing properly on any of them.
• Not planning in advance which currency payments will be taken in without Shopify Payments.
• Going live with automatic translations without checking them.
• Not reflecting duties and return shipping in prices and policies.
• Not testing redirects and sitemaps in market subfolders.
• Starting ad spend before placing a real test order in every market.

Conclusion

Shopify Markets gives brands that want to sell abroad from Türkiye the ability to manage several markets from a single store. For Türkiye-based stores, the foundations of success are getting payments and currency right from the start, genuinely localising content and making logistics transparent.

If you are planning to sell abroad with Shopify: See our Shopify Partner services