Jason | Use Shopify to create a multilingual independent website
I am currently working on a website. I am very involved and enjoy it. I work for fun every day. The reason is that I want to receive foreign guests, because most of them are not convenient to use WeChat applets. In addition, in the future, when competition is expected to become more and more fierce, we can play to our language advantage. The languages we can speak are: English, Japanese, French, Korean, and mainly English. This can also encourage everyone to learn languages.
Origin: Earlier, I made some itinerary descriptions in English, but on the one hand, the proportion of foreign guests was too low, which was disproportionate to the energy required for maintenance and updating. On the other hand, it was just an itinerary description, and there was no support for a full English booking system, so the effect was limited. This summer, Vera and I met and chatted in Pu Shi. She mentioned that because of the visa-free policy, the number of inbound guests has increased significantly, and it can be clearly felt in the tourism industry in Shanghai. I said: The transit visa-free policy is 144 hours, but it only allows time to go to big cities, and it cannot reach our Yunnan. I hope that the policy will be more relaxed in the future. A while ago, the number of countries with visa-free entry was greatly relaxed, even from 15 days to 30 days. I started to find a way to build a new system.
One solution is to make an English version of the existing mini program. The advantage is that the Chinese version of the database can be used directly, but the disadvantage is that many foreigners do not use WeChat mini programs. Moreover, the demand for Englishization is not so obvious to mini program vendors, and the progress is controlled by them, and it may even be delayed.
Confirmation: I searched online for possible multilingual website building methods. There is a domestic one, but it is a bit complicated and not easy to use. I found several foreign ones, but I didn’t get the ideal results. I met Ning Yi a few weeks ago and we talked about the needs of overseas guests. She said someone recommended Shopify and they wanted to use it. I had seen Shopify before, but I didn’t test it in depth. I thought it was just a website for overseas products similar to Taobao. After she said that, I thought I would take another look at this website building tool. It turned out that the power of this website building tool was far beyond my imagination. The most powerful feature is that it has an app store with plug-ins made by different third parties to solve different problems. For example, the function of booking dates and time periods that I need is solved by a calendar plug-in. There are more than a dozen such suppliers, some free, and some around $15 per month (most of them are at this price), but if it solves a key problem, this fee is acceptable. Therefore, things with openness and reasonable commercialization are the healthiest and most diverse. There are no functions that cannot be done, only functions that you can’t think of. For example, the age selection that has always troubled me: I have a child (elderly) of X years old at home, which activities are suitable? Reasonable use of the product tag function, customers can find these activities by themselves at once.
Accelerate the promotion: However, to study an unfamiliar system and implement more complex requirements, a lot of learning is required, and there will often be difficulties that affect progress. One day, I happened to talk to Sisitong about using Google Translate to introduce English to an event. She said that chatgpt is easier to use and gave me a link to use it. I tried chatgpt when it first came out, but I didn't use it again because of the restrictions on domestic service IP. Although I think chatgpt may be better, the translation function implemented by Google is already good and can solve my basic problems. But out of curiosity, I still tried the translation function of chatgpt. This was incredible, and I was quickly convinced by chatgpt:
First, it can be translated quickly and conveniently, and it can be summarized clearly and rewritten in a different tone.
Second, I can ask questions about Shopify's website building, and it can even write code according to my needs and tell me where to embed it. In a flash, many problems were solved. As long as you ask good questions or adjust the questions, it will give you multiple good solutions.
Third, it can summarize an article, and it is quite good, with clear layout and a list of one, two, three. When I submitted the article, I did not indicate that it was a translation, but it evaluated the article and had its own opinions and summaries, which were quite insightful.
So a chatgpt, in my work, is equivalent to a working group: a super efficient and excellent translator, a professional consultant who gives solutions and suggestions for product functions, a code engineer, and a copywriter. And they are all available at any time and can solve problems in one minute. (Note: Since chatgpt temporarily failed, I tried Google Gemini, which also works, and seems to be more considerate in translation, like a real assistant to the person in charge, providing several solutions and asking for your opinions. And you don’t have to bother to study how to use it in China. So what’s important is a method and idea, which can be done with different AI tools)
Problems that have been solved so far (I haven’t used paid plans yet, they are all free or basic free versions. When the number reaches a certain level, I will need to pay. I will see if it is worth it at that time. If the free plan can solve it, it would be the best, but good features are also worth paying for):
Multi-language solution: The basic language is English (translated by chapgpt), and shopify can automatically translate to: Traditional Chinese, Japanese (can be edited and adjusted after translation). The system supports three language options.
Blog: Shopify has integrated the blog function. Originally, our blog function was implemented by the official account, but now it is better integrated. In addition, the official account can hardly be modified after publication, which greatly restricts the revision and update. There are also advantages in China, but the openness is indeed insufficient in some aspects.
Support all external links: so the latest event photo introduction can be linked to Instagram, and the customer consultation group can be linked to Facebook message. This openness is something that domestic apps are very resistant to, and they hope to stay within their own closed loop. Fortunately, WeChat has an open mini-program system that can link some content.
Date/time period booking problem: This can be solved using a free calendar tool called bookeasy. It also allows you to send orders for different events to different email addresses, which is great.
Activity classification problem: First, you can display it according to the activity category (that is, the product series therein), and automatically classify it by keywords. It is not the traditional manual classification. I used tags as the basis for judgment. This is very flexible. By modifying the tag, it automatically changes which category to go to.
Appropriate age/content: Also use tags, you only need the built-in tools search & discovery to filter by age, difficulty, and activity content.
Evaluation function: This function is implemented using the Judge.me plug-in. This plug-in not only allows you to write evaluations on individual activity pages, but also allows you to add the latest activity evaluations to the homepage, giving guests reference to recently well-received activities and allowing them to directly click in to make reservations.
AI Consulting: Using the Juphy plug-in, if a guest asks about an activity, it will give suggestions based on the activity description text and directly link to it, and you can also feed it some knowledge. The degree of intelligence is still uncertain.
Add custom instructions: Add the "Assisted Pickup Service" instructions and "Refund and Change Rules" to the event page by default. Previously, it needed to be added to the event description.
Recommended products: "People who have ordered this offer also ordered" This feature can be achieved with the plugin Essential upsell (free). The effect is unknown because there are not enough orders yet. In the built-in "search & discovery", you can manually set recommended or complementary products.
Most popular activities: Use a "product series" to include all activities, and the system will automatically rank them according to the predetermined number.
Integrate Instagram into Shopify: Shopify itself does not have a powerful video and photo gallery function, which needs to be supplemented by Instagram. Just make a link to store daily photos and videos. It is also a possible traffic-generating tool.
Customer consultation group questions: Facebook messenger chat group
Payment: Currently using PayPal, except for this, you need to have a company overseas (Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan). In addition, the system can also be set up for non-payment booking (free booking, on-site payment).
Unresolved: Displays the latest list of scheduled events with dates
The above is some of the progress made so far
The new website address is: dalitrip.com
2024.12.08
After two weeks of study, I have some new feelings:
So far, I haven't used any paid apps. I think the following are some free and built-in tools:
bookeasy calendar booking: the easiest and most user-friendly to set up, and currently free. I have tried most other calendar booking apps, most of which focus on short-term bookings, recurring throughout the day, such as doctor visits, and are cumbersome to set up for one or two events a day. I was looking for a function that shows the available events for each day on the homepage, but I didn't find it. A few have it, but the interface is very ugly and difficult to use.
Metafield: This is a very powerful custom feature. You can add fields to describe activities, such as distance, recommended age, and use field values to add product lines in an intelligent way. For example, for activities within 10 kilometers, you can judge and generate a collection (product line) to display on the homepage. You can combine Nitrolookbook album (free) to display some specific photos in a slideshow (does not take up space), such as comments and photos of a certain season.
Shopify search&filter (embedded function): You can filter activities based on different fields. For example, after entering a collection, customers can continue to filter by their needs (age). I originally wanted to use it to filter for customers, but it was a bit unfriendly. Specific collections were solved with (smart) product series, such as activities suitable for 5-year-olds, which customers can directly enter.
Custom template: Combined with custom meta fields, modify the default template to become a custom template, configure different fields (because the descriptions of products in different categories are very different), so that I can put "accommodation (tour leader's home, which can be expanded to more in the future)" and "tour leader introduction" as a separate category into this system, and make it a fusion website similar to airbnb that has both activities and rooms. Since bookeasy has the function of booking for multiple consecutive days (most calendar tools have this function), booking a room can also be easily achieved. In the future, products can be added to form a new category (bicycle rental business of bicycle shops, specimens of plant studios, ceramic works, etc.). The power lies in the convenient customization, and others can easily upload information
Obstacles: The Chinese firewall may cause problems when editing Shopify content and customers ordering from China. Due to different working modes, the obstacles on the mobile phone are relatively large, but setting up and browsing on a computer is not a problem.
2024.12.26
Welcome to communicate, you can add my WeChat: lingjiec
2024.12.30
Today, I found that bookeasy calendar booking requires a VPN in China. After remote inspection by an Indian engineer, it was found that the service was used. A domestic IT friend said that it should be Google fonts, and the solution is relatively simple.
2025.01.01
Implemented automatic switching of website language according to the guest's client language, and wrote a piece of code to the theme according to the chatgpt guidance.
We need to make a major change, change the basic language to Chinese, and then translate the system to English, because it is easier to translate Chinese into English. When translating English into Chinese, many place names and pinyin will have big problems, and the proofreading work is large. And most importantly, there will be great obstacles for different team leaders to edit their own activities later.
This is redundant work due to lack of technical knowledge, but I have learned it. I wanted to use English as the basic language because I mainly wanted to develop for English users, so I imagined that the first thing to enter the website was English, so I spent a lot of effort to translate Chinese into English. I never thought that it would automatically switch to the corresponding language according to the user's language.
2025.1.8
Today, I solved the problem of clicking a direct link from the independent website to the mini program reservation. Because our mini program has an h5 page, each activity can be a URL link. This has opened up the connection from the independent website to the mini program. Now the only thing left is how to directly link the mini program to the independent website. ), I was lucky to ask Maya (the mini program supplier), otherwise I would have been alone researching the mini program short link for a whole day.
I have been troubled by the booking issues caused by Google services (actually, calendar bookings use Google's re-CAPTCHA detection). Although it is not necessarily necessary, it will cause trouble if I direct guests to the new website (because it is powerful and easy to use) but they cannot make a reservation, and I need to explain the booking method for WeChat guests.
2025.1.13
The day before yesterday, I downloaded a plug-in, section store, which has various component templates, such as video slideshows, photo slideshows, and multi-page switching (saving space and clear at a glance), which can make up for the limited presentation of native templates.
This foldable row is also very practical
2025.1.27
Last night I completely dismantled the homepage and started over again, from complex to simple
From laying out everything on the homepage, to a simple homepage with rich content at the back. Please refer to a separate article: Progressive
