Setup WooCommerce Free Shipping: 4 Proven Methods [With Practical Tips]

Free shipping eats into your profits- You might hear this statement from many!

But it’s not true.

Offering free shipping can be a game-changer for your business.

How?

Free shipping can motivate your customers to complete their purchases. It will also minimize cart abandonment on a large scale.

According to a 2016 research by Walker Sands, free shipping motivates 9 out of 10 users to shop online more frequently.

As a result, your SALES WILL BE DOUBLE!

All you have to do is apply the correct methods of free shipping to avoid any loss.

In this article, I will show you how you can apply 4 PROVEN FREE SHIPPING METHODS that works. Also with practical tips.

First, let’s go through when and how you should offer free shipping without cutting your pocket!

Ways To Offer WooCommerce Free Shipping Without Losing Money

Limited locations are one of the ways to maintain profitability while offering free shipping.

You can offer free shipping to locations that are close to your distribution center or your local retail outlet.

Offer free shipping on your high-end products.

This can help you cover the shipping cost as your consumers spend more money buying high-end products.

You can also offer free shipping in stock clearance sales.

With this strategy, those older items that are lying in your store become way more attractive, with free delivery on top.

not only ways but timing is very important in terms of offering free shipping.

Let’s go through it :

Be Cautious About Timing of Offering WooCommerce Free Shipping

In terms of timing, you can’t just offer free shipping out of nowhere.

Short-term campaigns like seasonal sales, new product releases, and other promotional events are already planned properly to get profit from sales. So, you can apply free shipping in these short-term campaigns.

You can use free shipping as a loss leader.

The concept of a loss leader can be applied to free shipping as well.

For example, if you have an eCommerce business with a subscription model, offering free shipping on the first order may increase conversions, even though you may be absorbing the cost of shipping.

4 Proven Methods To Setup WooCommerce Free Shipping

As you already know about how, why, and when you should apply your free shipping, you should plan your free shipping according to your business size.

There 4 methods to set up Woocommerce free shipping.

I will take you through the process step by step. I will start with the basic settings that will be needed for any method application.

Set Up WooCommerce Shipping Zones

After that, you need to set up your desired shipping zone. The shipping zone is the area you want to offer your shipping.

You can select several countries and regions as per your needs.

To set it up,

Go to your WordPress dashboard. Then select Settings.

Now notice the panel under settings and go to the tab “Shipping”.

Now look for the shipping zone sections. See the highlighted point and select the “shipping zone button”.

As you scroll down you will find a default zone name “Rest of the world”.

Now to set your desired zone, click on the button “Add Zone”

Here, give your new zone a name.

For example: here I’m creating a zone with the name “Specific Shipping”

Scroll down and you will find a button for Zone Regions.

Zone region means which locations fall under your desired zone. Click on the left box labeled as start typing to filter zones.

You can choose from:

• Countries: You can select your desired multiple countries.
• States: If you just want to select states, not the entire country you can separately do that.

After that, in the blue line, you will see an option named “Limit to specific ZIP/postcodes”.

As you click you will get this box as below.

Once you’ve defined the zone name and region, click the “Save Changes” button at the bottom of the page to save your zone.

Method 1: Set Up WooCommerce Free Shipping on All Products

Next, you need to add a shipping method.

Now I will explain how you can set up Woocommerce free shipping on all products.

As you scroll down to the shipping zone, under the zone region button, you will see the option shipping method.

From the pop-up menu, select “Free Shipping“. And then, hit Continue.

After that, in the “Free shipping requires” option you will get 5 options.

Here’s what each means:

• No requirement: Free shipping is automatically applied to all orders regardless of order value or coupon use.
• Valid free shipping coupon: Customers must enter a specific promotional code to receive free shipping on their order.
• Minimum order amount: Orders must reach or exceed a set purchase total to qualify for free shipping.
• Minimum order amount OR coupon: Free shipping is granted if either the order meets a minimum value or a valid coupon is applied.
• Minimum order amount AND coupon: Customers must both meet a minimum purchase threshold and use a valid coupon to receive free shipping.

To set up WooCommerce free shipping on all products, select the option “no requirement”.

Then press the button “Create and save”.

after that, check out and check whether the offer is applied to all products properly or not.

Method 2: Set up WooCommerce Free Shipping on a Single Product

As you have learned how you can set free shipping on all products, now I‘ll show you how you can set up free shipping on a single product.

First, set up the shipping zone and region as you did last time. Then you need to create a shipping class.

Step 1: Add shipping zone & method

Follow the process of setting the zone name and zone region as before.

After that click on “Add shipping method”.

From the pop-up choose “Flat Rate” and hit on Continue.

After that, a pop-up with these options will come up.

• Name
• Tax status
• Cost

Your customers will see the name of this shipping method during checkout.

Step 2: Create a Shipping Class

Go to the dashboard, right after the option shipping settings you will find the option shipping class.

Then, click on “Add shipping class”.

Once you click on it, a pop-up will appear. You’ll get the following options:

• Shipping class
• Slug(Optional)
• Beschreibung

Now on the shipping class write Free shipping. Then write down the slug and description for it.

Step 3: Add Selected Products in Shipping Class

Now, you need to assign the created free shipping method to your products.

To do that you need to go to the Products section> All Products

Then click on the edit button. then you will get on this page.

Scroll down and on the left panel, You will find the option Product data.

Click on the box and you will find these options. from there select variable products.

Then from the left panel select “shipping”. Then fill in the Weight (kg) & Dimensions (cm) accordingly.

Then in the below dimension box, you will see a dropdown bar named Shipping class.

As you click on it, you will find two options :

• No shipping class
• Free shipping(The one that you set earlier)

Now select the free shipping class and your setup is done.

Method 3: Set WooCommerc Free Shipping for Orders Over a Set Amount

As before, set your shipping zone and region. Then click on the add shipping zone button.

Then, create a new shipping zone or edit an existing one where you want to offer free shipping over a certain amount.

After creating the zone, add the shipping method. For, shipping methods, select Free Shipping. From the list of options, select the option “A minimum order amount”

Set the minimum order amount there and tick the checkbox under it.

Then click on the button Create and Save.

Method 4: Set Up a Free Shipping Coupon in WooCommerce

Now, let’s learn how you can set up a free shipping coupon in Woocommerce.

To set up this method, you need to go to Shipping Zones> Zone> Add shipping method> Free shipping.

From the “free shipping requires” option you will get these options for coupons:

• Valid free shipping coupon.
  
• Minimum order amount OR coupon.
  
• Minimum order amount AND coupon.

Now select a valid free shipping coupon.

To set up further you need to enable the coupon option from general settings.

Step 1: Enable coupon option from general settings

Go to general from the dashboard.

Keep scrolling down, you will find out enable coupon option :

Click on the box and enable the option.

Step 2: Create a coupon

From the dashboard menu select Marketing> Coupons

Click on the button “Create your first coupon”.

Step 3: Set free Shipping On Coupon

Now go to “General” on the coupon page. From there tick on the box of Allow free shipping. Provide coupon expiry date.

Then go to “usage restrictions”.

Fill up the details & data accordingly.

Then move to Usage limits. Now, you just have to set the 2 sections according to your offer plan.

Now click on the publish button. Then, click the Update button.

That’s all it takes to set up a free shipping coupon in WooCommerce.

Practical Tips To Make Your Woocommerce Free Shipping Work

So as of now, you have learned how you can set up Woocommerce free shipping.

While applying free shipping you need to keep in mind certain factors so that you can avoid losses.

Here are 3 practical tips that you can use to make your Woocommerce free shipping work 100%.

1. Hide Other Shipping Methods When “Free Shipping” is Available

When offering free shipping, it’s a good idea to hide other shipping methods from the checkout page.

This way your customer’s focus will be only on the free shipping option.

2. Extend the delivery timeframe in Woocommerce Free Shipping

Since you’re not charging for shipping, it’s reasonable to set a longer delivery timeframe for the free shipping option.

This gives you more flexibility in managing your logistics and costs.

3. Make it for members only

You can make the free shipping offer exclusive to members or registered customers on your WooCommerce site.

If you limit free shipping to members, you can also better control your costs and ensure that the free shipping promotion is targeted toward your most engaged and valuable customers.

Schlussbemerkungen

So, as you can see adding free shipping can be very profitable if you apply it properly. In this article, I gave a step-by-step tutorial and provided provides all the essential information to begin.

Don’t delay – implement free shipping now and watch your WooCommerce store become irresistible to customers.