The console is where you run your store: orders, products, customers, your storefront’s design and your account. This article walks through the frame around every page, the sidebar on one side and the top bar above, so you always know where to find something and how to switch the console to the language and look you prefer.
The sidebar: Selling, Marketing, Storefront, Operations and Administration
The sidebar runs down the side of every page. At its top are your store’s logo and name, and under the name your role, for example Store owner. Pressing the logo or name takes you to the Dashboard, which is always the first item in the list. What its figures mean: Read your dashboard.
Below the Dashboard, the pages are grouped into five sections, ordered by how often a store needs them:
| Section | What is in it |
|---|---|
| Selling | Orders, Products, Customers, Discount codes and Gift cards: what you sell and who buys it. |
| Marketing | Newsletter, Reviews and Messages: reaching your customers and answering them. |
| Storefront | Design, Content, Policy pages, FAQ, Journal and Your domain: what your customers see. |
| Operations | Shipping rates and Delivery providers: getting orders to customers. |
| Administration | Staff, Subscription, Card payments, Settings and Support: set once, then visited now and then. |
The page you are on is highlighted, and the sidebar scrolls to show it when the page opens. When the list is longer than your screen, scroll inside the sidebar: a faded edge at the bottom shows there is more. The sidebar lists only the pages your role can open, so a staff member may see fewer items than you: see When a page says you do not have permission.
A few items can carry a small padlock. A padlock on Discount codes, Gift cards, Your domain, Card payments, Journal or Campaigns means your plan does not include it; Journal and Campaigns still open, on a page that explains the lock. On Design and Content a padlock means your setup list is not finished yet. See Why does a feature show a padlock?. A number beside Support counts your support conversations with a reply from us that nobody at your store has opened yet. See the number beside Support.
Groups that open: Products, Newsletter and Staff
Three items are groups, marked with an arrow. Press one to open it and show its pages, and press it again to close it.
- Products holds Products, Categories and Collections.
- Newsletter holds Subscribers and Campaigns.
- Staff holds Staff users, Roles and Audit log.
The group you are working in opens by itself. A group you opened without going into it closes again when you move to another page, so the sidebar never fills up with open menus.
At the bottom of the list, under Administration, are Subscription (your NoqtaShop plan and billing), Card payments (your own HyperPay account, which your customers pay through), Settings and Support.
The top bar: language, light or dark theme, Help and notifications
Above every page, at the far end of the top bar, sit four controls.
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Language menu | Shows the console’s current language. Press it to switch to English, Arabic or French. |
| Theme button | The moon switches the console to dark mode; in dark mode a sun switches it back to light. |
| Help (question mark) | Search the help centre, Browse the help centre or Contact support. Articles open in a new tab, so your work stays where it is. |
| Bell | Your notifications. The red number counts the ones nobody at your store has read yet. See Keep up with notifications. |
Many page titles also have a small question mark beside them. It opens the help article for that page in a new tab. For more on searching, see Find an answer in the help centre.
Your theme choice is remembered in this browser. The console starts in light mode on a new browser or device.
Right after a sign-up with your email, on the Free plan or a paid one, a banner sits between the top bar and the page: Confirm your email so you can publish your store. It stays on every page until you use the link we emailed you, and it cannot be closed. Until then your store stays closed: you cannot publish it, customers see its Opening soon page, and it takes no orders. See Confirm your email and fix a wrong address.
Change the console’s language
The console speaks English, Arabic and French, whatever languages your storefront sells in.
- In the top bar, press the language menu (it shows the current language, for example English).
- Choose English, العربية or Français.
The console changes straight away. In Arabic every page reads right to left, with the sidebar on the right.
What changes, and what does not:
- Your choice is remembered in this browser. Until you choose, the console starts in your store’s default language.
- It changes the console only. Your storefront’s languages, and what your customers see, stay as they are. To change those, see Set your store’s languages and currency.
- Each browser keeps its own. A staff member can work in Arabic on their computer while you work in English on yours.
- The help centre is written in English and Arabic. With the console in French, the Help menu says so and its articles open in English.
Your account card and Sign out
At the bottom of the sidebar, the account card shows who is signed in on this device: a green dot, your name and your email address.
Press Sign out to end your session in this browser. The sign-in page opens, and the next person to use the device has to sign in with their own account. Sign out whenever you use a shared or public computer.
To change your password, see Change your password. To learn what your role lets you do, see Staff roles: what each one can see and do.
Your store’s address, and how to open your storefront
Your storefront lives at the address you chose when you signed up, in the form your-address.noqtashop.com. That address is permanent. On Starter and up you can also connect your own domain: see Connect your own domain.
There are two ways to open your storefront:
- Type its address into any browser.
- Open Design in the sidebar and press View store at the top of the Storefront Studio. Your live storefront opens in a new tab.
A new store is not public yet, however you signed up: until you publish for the first time, visitors see only your store’s name and logo with Opening soon. Nothing you are still working on is public. Design opens once your setup list is done: see The setup list before your first publish. For a tour of the Studio itself, see Get to know the Storefront Studio.
Tip
In the Storefront Studio the sidebar folds away on any screen, to give your design the full width. Press the menu button at the start of the top bar to bring it back.
When a page says you do not have permission
What each person can open and change depends on their role. The Store owner can do everything. Other roles can do only what their permissions allow, and the sidebar leaves out the pages their role cannot open.
If you open a page your role does not include, from a link or a bookmark, it does not load, and you see You do not have permission to do this. If your role lets you view something but not change it, pressing a button that changes it shows the same message.
Neither is a fault in your store. Ask the store owner to give your role the permission you need. See Staff roles: what each one can see and do.
Some pages show less instead of a message. In Settings, for example, Sales staff see only the Account tab, where they change their own password. A Store manager sees Account and, on Operations, the Search synonyms card, and the line under the page title says so: Your own account and the store’s search synonyms. The rest of the store’s settings are shown to roles allowed to view them. See What a staff member sees when their role does not allow something.
If instead every page is covered by Your subscription isn’t active, the whole console is locked until the plan chosen at sign-up is paid for or you move to Free, which is a different matter. See A payment failed, or your store is locked.
The console on your phone
On a phone or a small tablet, the sidebar tucks away so the page gets the whole screen. The top bar keeps the language menu, the theme button, Help and the bell, and adds the menu button (three lines) at its start.
- Press the menu button. The sidebar slides in over the page.
- Choose a page. The sidebar closes by itself.
To close it without choosing a page, press the X beside your store name or tap the dimmed page beside it. The pages themselves rearrange to fit a narrow screen, so you can check an order or update a status from your phone.
What to do next
Start where your store needs you most: The setup list before your first publish. To be told when an order arrives, see Keep up with notifications.