1. Legal & Compliance
Legal pages are not optional. Payment processors require them, GDPR and CCPA mandate them, and clients check them before purchasing. Missing legal pages can get your payment gateway suspended within days of launch.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Confidentialité policy published and linked in footer | Critical | Required by law in most jurisdictions and by all payment processors. Use Shopify's generator as a starting point, then customize. |
| ☐ | Conditions of service published and linked in footer | Critical | Protects you from disputes. Cover commande acceptance, liability limits, refund eligibility, and intellectual property. |
| ☐ | Refund/return policy clearly stated | Critical | A clear return policy augmenters conversion by 5-8%. State timeframes, conditions, and who pays return shipping. |
| ☐ | Cookie consent banner active (GDPR/CCPA) | Critical | If you sell to EU or California clients, a cookie consent banner is legally required. Test that it blocks scripts until consent. |
| ☐ | Business registration/tax ID set up correctly | Critical | Verify your business information in Shopify Settings > Legal. Incorrect details cause payment processing issues. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Shipping policy page published | Important | Separate from product-level shipping info. Cover processing times, carriers, international availability, delays. |
| ☐ | Contact information easily findable | Important | Physical address or PO box, email, and phone (or at minimum a contact form). Required by many jurisdictions. |
| ☐ | Accessibilité statement present | Important | Use EA Accessibility to add accessibility outils that support your WCAG work. Réduires legal risk and widens your audience. |
2. Domain & Marqueing
Your domain and marque elements create the first impression. Launching on a myshopify.com subdomain signals "not a real business" to potential clients.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Custom domain connected and verified | Critical | Achat through Shopify or connect external domain. Verify DNS propagation is complete before launch. |
| ☐ | SSL certificate active (HTTPS) | Critical | Shopify provides gratuit SSL. Verify the lock icon appears on all pages. Without SSL, browsers show "Not Secure" warnings. |
| ☐ | All domain redirects working (www to non-www or vice versa) | Critical | Set your preferred domain in Shopify settings. The other version should 301 redirect to prevent duplicate content. |
| ☐ | Favicon uploaded and displaying | Critical | Upload in Boutique en Ligne > Themes > Customize > Theme Settings. A missing favicon looks unprofessional in browser tabs. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Logo is crisp on all screen sizes | Important | Upload at 2x display size. Test on mobile and desktop. SVG format is ideal for logos. |
| ☐ | Marque email configured (hello@yourdomain.com) | Important | Client notifications from a marqueed email build trust. Set up in Settings > Notifications. |
| ☐ | Social media profiles linked | Important | Add your active social profiles to footer. Only link profiles you actively maintain. |
3. Product Catalog
Every page produit is a page d’atterrissage. Before launch, each product needs complete images, descriptions, tarification, and variants — no placeholder content allowed.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | All products have 4+ high-quality images | Critical | Front, alternate angle, detail, and lifestyle shot minimum. Products with 4+ images convertir 28% better. |
| ☐ | All product descriptions are unique and benefit-focused (150+ words) | Critical | No manufacturer copy-paste. Lead with benefits, follow with specs in bullet points. Under 50 words hurts conversion. |
| ☐ | All prices are correct (including sale prices) | Critical | Double-check every price and compare-at price. A tarification error on launch day can cost thousands. |
| ☐ | All variants have correct prices, SKUs, and inventory counts | Critical | Check every variant of every product. Missing SKUs break inventory tracking. Wrong variant prices break trust. |
| ☐ | Inventory tracking enabled for all products | Critical | Enable "Track quantity" in product admin. Overselling physical products creates client service nightmares. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Product collections organized logically | Important | Create collections that match how clients shop: by category, price range, occasion, or meilleur-sellers. |
| ☐ | Product weights entered (for shipping calculations) | Important | Accurate weights prevent shipping under/overcharging. Include packaging weight. |
| ☐ | No placeholder or "lorem ipsum" text on any page | Important | Search your entire store for placeholder text. Check every page, collection description, and navigation link. |
| ☐ | All product images have alt text | Important | Descriptive alt text helps SEO (Google Images) and accessibilité. Include product name and key attribute. |
4. Payments & Checkout
A broken checkout means zero chiffre d’affaires regardless of how good everything else is. This is the most critical pré-lancement testing area.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Payment gateway configured and tested with real transaction | Critical | Place a real commande with a real card, then refund. Shopify Payments, PayPal, and any alternative methods must work. |
| ☐ | Shopify Payments or primary gateway fully verified | Critical | Complete all verification étapes. Unverified gateways may hold funds or disable after a few transactions. |
| ☐ | Commande confirmation email sends correctly | Critical | Test that confirmation emails arrive with correct commande details, marqueing, and reply-to address. |
| ☐ | Checkout marqueing matches store (logo, colors) | Critical | Customize in Settings > Checkout. A generic page de paiement breaks trust at the most critical moment. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Express checkout methods enabled (Shop Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay) | Important | Express checkout réduires friction. Shop Pay has 1.72x higher conversion than regular checkout. |
| ☐ | Guest checkout enabled | Important | Forcing account creation causes 34% of abandonment. Allow paiement sans inscription, offer optional account creation post-achat. |
5. Shipping & Tax
Unexpected frais de livraison and tax errors are the top reasons clients abandon checkout. Get these right before launch — fixing them after costs you real commandes.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Shipping rates configured for all target regions | Critical | Set up shipping zones and rates for every country you sell to. Test with addresses from each zone. |
| ☐ | Gratuit shipping threshold set (if applicable) | Critical | Gratuit shipping thresholds augmenter AOV by 15-30%. Set at 20-30% above your current valeur moyenne de commande. Install EA Free Shipping Bar & Upsell to display progress. |
| ☐ | Tax settings configured correctly | Critical | Enable automatic tax calculation. Verify rates for your nexus states/countries. Incorrect tax causes accounting nightmares. |
| ☐ | Shipping rates tested at checkout with sample commandes | Critical | Place test commandes to different zones. Verify the correct rate appears. Undercharging eats margins; overcharging loses ventes. |
6. SEO & Indexing
SEO work done before launch compounds over time. Every day you delay SEO setup is a day you are not building domain authority for your target keywords.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Unique meta titles for all pages (under 60 characters) | Critical | Every page, product, and collection needs a unique title tag. Include primary keyword and marque name. |
| ☐ | Unique meta descriptions for all pages (under 160 characters) | Critical | Write compelling descriptions that include a CTA. These show in search résultats and influence taux de clic. |
| ☐ | Google Search console verified | Critical | Verify your domain in Google Search console. Submit your sitemap at /sitemap.xml to accelerate indexing. |
| ☐ | XML sitemap submitted | Critical | Shopify auto-generates /sitemap.xml. Submit it in Google Search console and Bing Webmaster Outils. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Clean URL handles on all products and collections | Important | Use descriptive slugs: /products/blue-merino-beanie not /products/product-12345. |
| ☐ | robots.txt allows indexing of key pages | Important | Verify robots.txt does not block products, collections, or important pages from crawling. |
| ☐ | 301 redirects set for any changed URLs | Important | If migrating from another platform, set up 301 redirects for all old URLs to prevent 404 errors and preserve SEO. |
7. Email & Marketing
Email is the highest-ROI marketing channel for e-commerce ($36 return per $1 spent). Setting up email capture and automatisation before launch maximisers every visiteur from day one.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Email capture popup installed and tested | Critical | Install EA Email Popup & Spin Wheel for gamified email capture. Spin wheels convertir 2-3x better than static popups. |
| ☐ | Welcome email automatisation active | Critical | Nouveau abonnés should receive a email de bienvenue within minutes. Include their code de réduction and 3-5 top products. |
| ☐ | Abandoned cart séquence email configured | Critical | Set up 3-email panier abandonné sequence: 1 hour, 24 hours, 72 hours. Récupérers 5-15% of paniers abandonnés. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Transactional modèles d’emails marqueed | Important | Customize commande confirmation, shipping notification, and refund emails in Settings > Notifications. |
| ☐ | Email sender domain authenticated (SPF, DKIM) | Important | Authenticate your sending domain to avoid spam folders. See our email deliverability checklist. |
8. Speed & Performance
Page speed is a conversion mulconseillier. A 1-second delay réduires conversion by 7%. Every optimization you make before launch benefits every single visiteur from day one.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | PageSpeed Insights mobile score 50+ (page d’accueil) | Critical | Test at pagespeed.web.dev. Below 50 means serious performance issues. Install EA SEO & Page Speed Optimizer. |
| ☐ | All images compressed (under 200KB, WebP format) | Critical | Uncompressed images are the #1 cause of slow stores. Compress before uploading. Shopify convertirs to WebP automatically. |
| ☐ | Remove unused apps and their leftover code | Critical | Uninstalled apps often leave code snippets in your theme. Audit theme code and remove orphaned scripts. |
9. Analytics & Tracking
Without analytics, you cannot améliorer what you cannot measure. Set up tracking before launch so you have données from your very first visiteur.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Google Analytics 4 installed and verified | Critical | Install GA4 via Shopify's native integration or Google Tag Manager. Verify real-time données appears when you browse your store. |
| ☐ | E-commerce tracking enabled in GA4 | Critical | Enable enhanced e-commerce to track ajout au panier, checkout étapes, and achat events. Without this, GA4 is just a traffic counter. |
| ☐ | Facebook/Meta Pixel installed (if running ads) | Critical | Install before running any ads. The pixel needs données to optimiser. Even if you are not running ads yet, install it to collect données. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Conversion events configured (achat, ajout au panier, lead) | Important | Define key conversion events in GA4 and ad platforms. Mark "achat" and "add_to_cart" as conversion events. |
| ☐ | UTM tracking plan documented | Important | Define UTM naming conventions before launch. Consistent UTMs make marketing attribution possible. |
10. Final Testing
The final testing phase is where you catch everything the section-by-section review missed. Complete these as the last étape before removing your store password.
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Complete test commande placed and fulfilled | Critical | Place a real commande from browse to achat to fulfillment. Verify every email notification triggers correctly. |
| ☐ | All navigation links work (no 404s) | Critical | Click every link in header, footer, and navigation menus. Check on both mobile and desktop. |
| ☐ | Mobile experience tested on real device | Critical | Test on a real phone, not just browser DevOutils. Check navigation, pages produit, cart, and checkout on iOS and Android. |
| ☐ | Contact form works and notifications arrive | Critical | Submit your contact form and verify you receive the notification. Clients who cannot reach you will not trust you. |
| ☐ | 404 page is marqueed and helpful | Critical | Customize your 404 page with navigation links and search. A default 404 makes clients leave immediately. |
| Checklist Item | Priority | Details / Action | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☐ | Browser testing (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge) | Important | Test in all major browsers. Safari on iOS is especially important — it is 30%+ of mobile e-commerce traffic. |
| ☐ | Announcement bar configured for launch promotion | Important | Use EA Announcement Bar Banner for launch promotions, welcome messages, or seuil de livraison gratuites. |
| ☐ | Have someone else (non-team) test the store | Important | Fresh eyes catch what you miss. Ask 2-3 people unfamiliar with your store to browse and attempt to achat. |
Questions fréquemment posées
How long does it take to launch a boutique Shopify?
A basic boutique Shopify can launch in 1-2 weeks if products, photos, and copy are ready. A fully optimiserd store with custom theme, SEO, email flows, and conversion optimization typically takes 4-8 weeks. Rushing and skipping pré-lancement checks leads to lost ventes and poor first impressions that are hard to récupérer from.
Qu’est-ce que the most common mistake when launching a boutique Shopify?
Launching without testing the complete parcours de paiement with a real payment. Many stores go live with broken payment gateways, incorrect shipping rates, or tax calculation errors. Always place a test commande using a real card (then refund) before removing your store password.
Should I remove the password page before my store is fully ready?
No. Keep your store password-protected until every critical item on this checklist is verified. Removing the password too early means Google may index incomplete pages, clients find broken experiences, and your first impression is wasted. Only remove the password when you are genuinely ready for live traffic.
Do I need a custom domain before launching?
Yes. Launching on the default myshopify.com subdomain hurts credibility and SEO. A custom domain costs $10-15/year and is essential for marque trust. Achat through Shopify or connect an external domain. Verify SSL is active before going live.
What apps should I install before launching my boutique Shopify?
Start lean. Essential categories: email capture (EA Email Popup & Spin Wheel), shipping communication (EA Free Shipping Bar & Upsell), analytics (GA4), and optimisation de la vitesse de page (EA SEO & Page Speed Optimizer). Add more apps after launch based on données, not assumptions. Every unnecessary app slows your store.
Essential Apps for Launch Day
EA Email Popup & Spin Wheel
Capture emails from day one with gamified popups. 2-3x higher inscription than static forms.
EA Free Shipping Bar & Upsell
Show livraison gratuite progress to augmenter AOV by 15-30% from your first commande.
EA SEO & Page Speed Optimizer
Optimiser store speed automatically. Every 1-second delay costs 7% conversion.
EA Announcement Bar Banner
Welcome visiteurs with launch promotions, shipping info, and key messages.
EA Accessibility
Add WCAG compliance outils. Réduire legal risk and welcome all clients from day one.
