Migrating your store to Shopify? We’ve done this a few times!
Thirteen years as a Shopify Partner and more migrations than we can count - WooCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, Rocketspark and a few platforms that no longer exist. Cycleways and NZ Juice Group came across from WooCommerce. Kereru Natural Products left Wix behind. Nutribullet brought both its NZ and Australian stores over at once.
Here's what we've learnt: the migration itself is the easy part. What matters is that your customers, your orders and your Google rankings arrive with you, and that the new store sells better than the old one did. That's the job.
Most migrations take 4-6 weeks. We'll give you a fixed price after a short look at your current store.
What actually moves when you migrate to Shopify?
Nearly everything. Products, variants, prices, SKUs, barcodes and stock. Images and descriptions. Customers and their addresses. Order history, so you can still see what each customer bought before the move. Pages, blog posts, policies and discount codes.
What we rebuild rather than copy: collections and navigation (usually tidier than before), the design, payments, shipping rates and tax, and apps for reviews, email and loyalty. Where an app lets us import its data, we do.
What doesn't move, on any platform: saved card details and customer passwords. Customers set a new password the first time they log in. Nobody minds.
Will moving to Shopify hurt my Google rankings?
No is the short answer - as long as the redirects are done properly. This is the step most migrations get wrong, and it's the one we're fussiest about.
Every product, collection and page URL on your old site gets a 301 redirect to its new Shopify page, so Google and anyone holding an old link lands in the right place. For Kereru Natural Products we mapped 137 redirects before launch: 100 product URLs, 30 category URLs and 8 pages. We carry across page titles and meta descriptions, resubmit the sitemap in Search Console, and watch for 404 errors in the first two weeks.
Expect a small wobble in rankings for two to four weeks. Then they recover, and usually improve. Shopify's page speed and product data are better than the platforms most stores are leaving, and Google notices.
Migrating from WooCommerce to Shopify
WooCommerce stores carry the most history - years of orders, customer accounts, plugin data, a blog - and all of it comes across. Two things need a plan. Plugin features need a Shopify app that does the same job, and WordPress permalinks rarely match Shopify's URL structure, so we map every one.
Cycleways came over from WooCommerce in 2023. The interesting part was the shop floor: their Lightspeed point of sale now syncs live with Shopify, so in-store stock and web stock always match, and courier labels print straight from the order. NZ Juice Group made the same move in 2026 with a fresh design, product bundles and courier integration.
"We used Elemental to build a new Shopify website and migrate everything over from our old website. Jason was always on hand to answer our questions, offer suggestions and ideas, and was always quick to solve any issues. Elemental made the process so easy for us."
Cycleways
Migrating from Wix to Shopify
Wix will give you an export, but it's not a tidy one. Images come out at reduced resolution, categories flatten into one long list, and duplicated pages need untangling. We rebuild from the live site and reconcile against the export, so nothing is lost and nothing is doubled up.
Kereru Natural Products has been making handcrafted, small-batch natural body care and essential oils in the Pohangina Valley since 1981. Thirty-five years of genuinely good product were sitting behind a dated Wix site that didn't do them justice. In July 2026 we moved the store to Shopify and built a new digital brand around what makes Kereru worth buying from: Bev's story in her own words, the heritage of the range, and clear, honest product information. The seven-category menu became something a shopper can navigate in one click. Every image was replaced at full resolution.
Migrating from Squarespace, Rocketspark or something older
Squarespace and Rocketspark exports are thin, so we usually rebuild product data from a CSV we prepare with you. Squarespace subscriptions need a Shopify subscription app. For older or custom platforms we use the same approach as Wix: scrape the live site, reconcile against whatever export exists, map every URL.
Natural Zest Skincare moved to Shopify in December 2024 with a new design, subscriptions and a move to a .com domain. Matakana Skincare came over from another platform in 2022 and, in their words, were "absolutely delighted with the end result".
"Elemental built a new website for Natural Zest Skincare while facilitating the migration of my old website. The process was smooth from start to finish, and I was kept informed along the way."
Natural Zest Skincare
Migrating a multi-country brand
Nutribullet moved its New Zealand and Australian stores to Shopify with us, keeping the global brand design across both. If you sell in more than one market, we'll plan currencies, domains and which stock each market sees before anything moves.
What do clients say about migrating with Elemental?
"My new site is so much faster and easier to work with than my old site. I am receiving a lot more traffic to my website and my online sales have increased dramatically."
Viva La Moda
"He integrated our store from a previous platform seamlessly. Would highly recommend Jason, he really was with us every step of the way."
Matakana Skincare
All via the Shopify Partner Directory, where Elemental has 87 reviews at 5.0.
How long does a Shopify migration take?
Most take 4-6 weeks.
Common questions
Can we keep trading during the migration?
Yes. We build the Shopify store alongside your live site. On launch day we sync the final orders and stock, then point the domain across.
Do our Google Shopping ads keep working?
They do. Shopify's Google channel rebuilds the product feed, and we set it up before launch so it's approved the moment the domain switches.
What about Xero, couriers and email?
Shopify has apps for Xero, Starshipit, NZ Post, Klaviyo and most of the tools NZ stores use. Reconnecting them is part of the build, not an extra.
What if Shopify isn't the right fit for us?
Tell us what you sell and what your current platform can't do. If Shopify isn't the better option we'll say so - we'd rather lose a job than migrate the wrong store.