I Built an Online Store that Accepts Steem and Bitcoin as Payment!

We Need More Online Stores Accepting Steem as Payment - Why Not Make One Yourself?

EDIT: Note that I have had the code referred to in this post updated so that it correctly determines the value of SBD against coinmarketcap.com. This was an issue with the original code given that it was based on the assumption that SBD would be kept as close as possible to 1 US dollar. See the update post for the correct code here.

I spend a lot of time in the #TeamAustralia channel on discord talking about all things Steem. One of the topics that came up one day was about how awesome it would be to have an online store in Australia that accepts Steem as payment. We do have a couple of online stores that accept Steem overseas (@phelimint owns an amazing online store that sells silver and gold for example) but no stores exist in Australia.

So this got me wondering, how do I build an online store that accepts Steem as payment? What products could I sell for Steem? Would people actually buy stuff using Steem?

These questions led me to discover an excellent post by @adept who provided a simple guide to set your Shopify store up to accept Steem as a payment method.

The next question is, what to sell? The answer to this question was staring me in the face. Literally. She was sitting across the table from me while I pondered these questions instead of socialising with the people around me (I think I have a Steemit addiction...). My wife's friend does custom printing on clothing and other items. So, after chatting with her, we quickly realised that I could create some excellent Steem inspired merchandise to sell on my store, starting with Steem Australia T-Shirts.

So, later that night while I was sitting at the kitchen table, I started building my first Shopify store. And Steemit Shop Australia was born.

I thought it might be worth documenting the process here, and include some of the challenges and other findings that I've discovered through the process.

First up is how to get started on Shopify.

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Getting Started with Shopify

If you're building an online store for the first time, then you really can't look past Shopify. There are plenty of platforms available for building online stores. But for simplicity, Shopify is an excellent choice. And given that this is the platform that @adept used and becuase I'm already reasonably familiar with this platform, I went with Shopify again.

To get started, simply hit the "get started button" which will take you to a registration page that looks like this.

Once you've registered your store you can immediately start building it. What is important to note, however, is that your account will only be free for 14 days. So if you'll need to know how quickly you can source your product before you start paying.

The store will cost you about $30 per month after the 14 day trial comes to an end. So Shopify definitely isn't the cheapest option out there. For my purposes though, I wanted a chance to see how popular my shirts and other products would be. So the $30 monthly fee doesn't bother me much at this stage. If the products don't sell well after the first 2 months, then I'll close down the store and take it as one of the many lessons that you learn in life.

Shopify offers excellent tutorials and guides, and will even contact you to coach you through building your store. This is why they are so successful, it is genuinely an easy process to set up a store. So I won't go into detail about how to build a store here. I will mention a couple of things that I never found in the tutorials though:

Under settings - make sure you have your terms and conditions set up properly. You do this under checkout, which many people overlook.

The "generate sample policy" button is an absolute blessing. One warning though, generating a sample policy will import whatever address you provide in your account settings. So if you want your address to remain private, make sure you alter the policy to remove this.

The second thing to familiarise yourself with after building your store, are the apps that you can use to support your store and make it so much better. There are a tonne of Shopify apps out there to choose from. One of my favourites is Salespop by Beeketing. This app is free and simply creates a little pop-up that appears in the bottom left hand side of your screen to display what people have recently purchased. It's drawn from real sales, so if you haven't had any sales, nothing will appear naturally. But that doesn't stop you from buying some things from yourself to get the app started.

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So how do you set your store up to accept Steem and Bitcoin as payment?

This process is quite straight forward. But there are a couple of issues that you should be aware of and one extra payment method that I recommend including, so I'll highlight these below.

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Accepting STEEM as payment

To start accepting Steem as payment for the products on your store you really only need to do a couple of things.

Firstly, you need to set up the custom payment method. Go to settings, and select "payment providers":

From here you need to scroll down "manual payments" and select "create custom payment method".

Under this payment method fill out the fields as I have below:

You can't see here, but I've also made a note in the fields here advising customers not to pay using SBD. I'll explain more about this shortly.

The next thing you need to do is incorporate the code for accepting Steem via Steem Connect into your store. Go back to settings and select "checkout".

From there you'll need to copy the script below under "Additional Scripts" which is found under "Order Processing".

EDIT: CHECK THIS POST FOR UPDATED CODE THAT CORRECTLY CALCULATES THE VALUE OF SBD

<script>
var steem = new XMLHttpRequest();
steem.open("GET", "https://api.coinmarketcap.com/v1/ticker/steem/", false);
steem.send();
steem = parseFloat(JSON.parse(steem.response)[0].price_usd);
window.onload = function () { total = parseFloat(document.getElementsByClassName('payment-method-list__item__amount')[0].innerHTML.replace("$","")); order = document.getElementsByClassName('os-order-number')[0].innerHTML.replace("Order #", "").replace(/\s/g, '');

steemTotal = total / steem;
sbdTotal   = total;

steemitAccount = "yourshopname"\\ this needs to be your shop name

steemURL = "https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/transfer?to=" + steemitAccount + "&memo=" + order + "&amount=" + steemTotal.toFixed(3).toString().split(".")[0] + "%2E" + steemTotal.toFixed(3).toString().split(".")[1] + "%20STEEM";
sbdURL   = "https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/transfer?to=" + steemitAccount + "&memo=" + order + "&amount=" + sbdTotal.toFixed(3).toString().split(".")[0] + "%2E" + sbdTotal.toFixed(3).toString().split(".")[1] + "%20SBD";

instructions  = "<span><button class='btn btn-success' style='display: block;width: 100%;' onclick=\"window.open('" + steemURL + "','_blank')\">Pay " + steemTotal.toFixed(3) + " STEEM</button></span><br><br>";
instructions += "<span><button class='btn btn-success' style='display: block;width: 100%;' onclick=\"window.open('" + sbdURL + "','_blank')\">Pay " + sbdTotal.toFixed(3) + " SBD</button></span>";

if (document.getElementsByClassName('payment-method-list__item__info')[0].innerHTML === 'Pay with STEEM or Steem Dollars —') {
  Shopify.Checkout.OrderStatus.addContentBox(
   '<h1>Select Payment Method</h1>',
   instructions
)};

};
</script>

Copy this script here:

There is one issue with this script that I haven't been able to resolve as yet. The script works perfectly when determining the current price of Steem, however was written under the assumption that Steem Dollars would be valued at 1 US dollar.

Therefore, the script needs modifying to calculate the correct value of Steem Dollars. I don't have this knowledge and haven't yet found someone who can make this change.

From here, save your changes and your store can now accept Steem as payment.

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Accepting other Cryptocurrencies

Accepting Steem as a payment method is awesome, but why stop there? Some people might prefer to pay in Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum or other currencies.

There are a number of service providers that you can use to accept additional currencies on your store. My preference is Coinbase Commerce for its simplicity and user friendliness.

To incorporate Coinbase Commerce into your store select the following:

Under "payment providers" scroll down to "alternative payments" and select "Coinbase Commerce".

You'll need to set up an account with Coindbase Commerce however this is quite straight forward and fast, which is partly why I used them.

Once set up you'll see Coinbase Commerce displayed as an accepted payment provider.

Your store now accepts the following currencies;

• Steem
• Bitcoin
• Litecoin
• Ethereum
• Bitcoin Cash

This is quite an impressive range of payment options.

The final payment method to set up is to accept Fiat (AUD, USD etc.), this is simply done by authorising Shopify payments in your store. This is done under "payment providers" as well:

Now your payments are all set up!

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So what has my experience been so far?

Once your store is all set up and you've taken it online, you'll be chasing customers. On Steemit, this is done simply by letting the community know what you've created.

In such a supportive and friendly community, if people like what you have to offer, it won't take long to start seeing purchases in your store.

What I have found so far is that more people will pay using Fiat rather than Steem. But there are people who will pay in Steem.

So far, about 2 thirds of my customers have paid using Fiat while the remainder have paid in Steem. I'm yet to see payment in other currencies however my store has only been online for 2 days. So, obviously, it is very early days.

What gives me hope though, is that I've already had purchases in the 2 days that my store has been live. Many online stores will go weeks before seeing their first purchase. And this is one reason why Steemit is so amazing. Our little community here is incredibly supportive when they see something that they like.

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Want to get involved in a T-Shirt Design Competition to celebrate the launch of @steemitshopaus? Check out the competition details post here.

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If you have any questions, comments or suggestions let me know in the comments!

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