Setting Up Domains and Languages for Global Markets

When expanding your online business internationally, it’s recommended to create unique URLs and assign appropriate languages for each market where you offer a localized shopping experience. This ensures customers see product information, pricing, and promotions in their local language and currency. It also improves your store’s visibility in local search results and enhances credibility, which can lead to higher conversion rates.

This guide will walk you through the available URL structures and explain how to configure both your domain settings and language preferences for different markets.

Available URL Structures in SHOPLINE Markets

SHOPLINE supports three types of URL structures to help you deliver a localized experience across different markets: main domain, subdomains, and subfolders. Each option determines how customers access your storefront based on their region and how the content is displayed.

• Main Domain: The market shares the store’s primary domain (e.g., yourstore.com). This setup is simple and centralized, but the language options and domain rules will follow your primary market’s settings and cannot be adjusted.

• Subdomain: Subdomains let you assign a unique URL prefix to each market (e.g., jp.yourstore.com). With a subdomain, you can customize the preferred languages to display for that market.

• Subfolder: Subfolders organize market-specific content under the main domain using a path format (e.g., yourstore.com/jp-). This is a good option if you don’t have multiple domains but still want to offer a localized experience. URLs will change based on the language or region enabled.

Setting Up Domains for Your Markets

After creating a market in SHOPLINE, you can configure how customers in that market access your storefront by setting up a domain structure. Follow these steps:

1. From your SHOPLINE admin panel, go to Settings > Markets and click the market you want to configure.

   

2. In the Domains and languages card, click Manage to access the domain and language settings for that market.

   

3. Select one of the following domain options based on your business goals:

• • Use main domain: The market shares your store’s primary domain (e.g., yourstore.com).
  • Use subdomain: Assign a unique subdomain (e.g., jp.yourstore.com) to this market.
  • Set a subfolder: Enter a subfolder path (e.g., yourstore.com/jp-) to localize content under the main domain.

4. Make sure the language settings are configured as needed. For details on setting up and managing languages for your markets, refer to this article section.

   

5. Click Update to save your changes.

6. After configuring the international domain, ensure customers are redirected to the appropriate URL based on their language and location preferences.

Managing Market-Specific Languages

Your language settings are closely tied to the domain type selected for each market. If a market is set to use your store’s main domain, its language settings will automatically follow those of the primary market and cannot be customized individually. However, if you use a subdomain or subfolder, you can tailor the language options to better match each market’s needs.

Understanding Store Languages vs. Market Languages

Before adjusting language settings, it’s important to understand the difference between store languages and market languages:

• Store Languages: These are the languages your store is capable of supporting. SHOPLINE offers approximately 35 language options you can add to your store to provide multilingual shopping experiences. To learn how to add languages to your store, refer to "Adding Languages to Your Store."

• Market Languages: These are the specific languages enabled for a given market. Once you’ve added languages to your store, they become available for market-level selection. You can then enable one or more of these languages for each market based on your business and localization needs. 

Language Settings for Main Domain (Primary Market)

When a new market is created, it defaults to using your store’s main domain, which inherits the language settings from your primary market. If you’re unsure how to set the domain type, refer to the previous section: Setting Up Domains for Your Markets. 

If you decide to continue using the main domain for a market but want to adjust its supported languages, you'll need to modify them in the Primary Market settings. To do this, click the Primary Market link in the Market language section. This will take you to the primary market's domain and language settings page, where you can update its preferences. These changes will then apply to all markets using the main domain.

Language Settings for Subdomains and Subfolders

If you assign a subdomain or subfolder to a market, you’ll have greater flexibility in selecting which languages to support. These settings can be customized to match the preferences of specific regions. To manage market-specific languages for such markets, simply go to their Domain and language settings page, enable the desired languages in the Market language section, and click Update.

You can even change the default language for the specific market. Just click Change default language, select your desired language, and then click Complete.