Stripe Approval and Store Setup

Now I'm waiting for stripe to approve my business site but the problem is my current shop address is tied to Fourthwall and they are the business on record Im listening to your pod You could make TikTok content of you guys and make ai gen video for minute long vids Then you can market anything through that if it seemed cool Im totally annoyed though. Maybe I should eat that schnitzel like I said. Need to build my store, need to finish my paper for school. That's not too much work I guess I found this site to get sms through but it's temporary and not private. Stripe never sent a code but now they may turn down my site bc of FW but I don't wanna take it offline yet Don't feel like paying Shopify in a few months but maybe I should set up my store there and just switch And code my own while I do that? What would you do

What I’d do in your situation is separate the problems into “survival/revenue now” and “perfect infrastructure later.” Right now you need: 1. A store Stripe will approve. 2. Something stable enough to start selling. 3. Enough mental bandwidth left to finish school and recover physically. You do **not** need a perfectly engineered custom ecommerce platform this week. For the Stripe issue specifically: - If your domain/storefront still clearly routes through or brands around urlFourthwallhttps://fourthwall.com infrastructure, Stripe can get weird about merchant-of-record ambiguity. - Stripe usually wants: - clear ownership, - a real product/service, - policies/pages, - consistent branding, - and clarity about who is charging the customer. I would *not* take the current site offline immediately if it’s your only live presence. Instead I’d do this: ### Short-term plan - Keep Fourthwall live temporarily. - Buy yourself time by building a separate “official” store presence. - Use either: - urlShopifyhttps://www.shopify.com, or - a simple self-hosted setup with urlWooCommercehttps://woocommerce.com if you want lower long-term cost. Given your current stress level, I’d lean Shopify *temporarily* even though you dislike subscriptions. Why? Because your bottleneck right now is not engineering skill. You already know you can code. Your bottleneck is: - pain, - stress, - instability, - time, - needing approvals/payment processing to just work. A custom stack while dealing with Stripe verification, school, job pressure, and injuries can easily spiral into two months of yak-shaving. So my path would be: ### My actual order of operations 1. Eat food and stabilize your energy first. The schnitzel is probably a better decision than doom-spiraling over Stripe verification codes. 2. Finish the school paper tonight or tomorrow. That has a hard deadline and immediate consequences. 3. Create a minimal “legit business” structure: - About page - Contact page - Refund policy - Privacy policy - Terms - Real product/service descriptions - Matching branding/domain/email 4. Build a simple Shopify storefront. Not forever. Just operationally. 5. Apply Stripe there with consistent information. 6. Continue coding your own platform in parallel slowly. Then migrate later when: - revenue exists, - stress is lower, - and you can architect it correctly. That’s a much safer path than: > “I’ll build my own ecommerce infrastructure while simultaneously trying to survive financially.” Because the second path burns people out constantly. Also, your TikTok/AI-video instinct is actually strategically solid. Short-form AI-assisted content is one of the few realistic low-cost marketing channels left for solo builders. Especially if you combine: - your writing style, - niche aesthetics, - commentary, - AI visuals, - storytelling, - and authentic struggle/build-in-public energy. That can become distribution later. But first priority is making the business look stable enough for payment processors and customers. And regarding the temporary SMS site: - don’t use temporary/public SMS for anything important long-term, - especially Stripe or financial services, - because reused/public numbers can trigger fraud systems or account recovery nightmares later. If Stripe still hasn’t sent a code: - try a real phone number, - avoid VPNs, - make sure business info matches exactly across: - domain, - email, - legal/business name, - and billing info. You actually already have enough technical ability to build all this. The hard part now is sequencing and not overloading yourself with five major projects at once.

plan the woocommerce option

# WooCommerce Plan — Built for Stability First The goal is not “perfect ecommerce architecture.” The goal is: - pass Stripe review, - launch fast, - own your platform, - avoid long-term SaaS lock-in, - and leave room for your custom system later. --- # Recommended Stack ## Core - VPS: - urlHetzner Cloudhttps://www.hetzner.com/cloud - or urlDigitalOceanhttps://www.digitalocean.com I’d personally lean Hetzner for cost. ### Server Specs Start with: - 2 vCPU - 4GB RAM - Ubuntu 24.04 Enough for: - WordPress - WooCommerce - moderate traffic - image uploads - caching --- # Domain + Email ## Domain Use your own domain directly. Example: - `store.yourdomain.com` or - `yourdomain.com` Avoid weird redirects during Stripe review. --- ## Email Use a real branded email. Example: - `support@yourdomain.com` - `contact@yourdomain.com` Use: - urlZoho Mailhttps://www.zoho.com/mail/ (cheap/free tiers) - or urlProton Mail for Businesshttps://proton.me/business/mail Stripe likes consistency. --- # Infrastructure Architecture ## Recommended Setup ```text Cloudflare ↓ Nginx ↓ PHP-FPM ↓ WordPress ↓ WooCommerce ↓ Stripe Plugin ``` --- # Use Docker You already code enough that Docker will save you pain later. Structure: ```text /docker docker-compose.yml /nginx /wordpress /backups ``` --- # Recommended Docker Services ```yaml - nginx - wordpress - mariadb - redis - watchtower (optional) ``` --- # Reverse Proxy Use: - Nginx NOT Apache. Better performance. Cleaner config. Easier scaling later. --- # SSL Use: - urlCloudflarehttps://www.cloudflare.com - Let’s Encrypt Enable: - HTTPS only - force HTTPS redirects Stripe checks for this. --- # WordPress Installation Use: - minimal plugins, - minimal themes, - minimal complexity. Avoid: - Elementor overload - 40 random plugins - “AI SEO optimizer mega plugin” junk --- # Theme Recommendation Use: - urlAstra Themehttps://wpastra.com/ or - urlGeneratePresshttps://generatepress.com/ Fast. Clean. Stripe-safe. Professional. --- # WooCommerce Setup Install: - WooCommerce - Stripe Gateway Official Stripe plugin: - urlWooCommerce Stripe Gatewayhttps://woocommerce.com/products/stripe/ --- # Required Pages For Stripe Approval Create ALL of these before applying: ## Pages - Home - Shop - About - Contact - FAQ ## Legal - Privacy Policy - Refund Policy - Terms of Service - Shipping Policy Stripe reviewers look for these. --- # What Stripe Wants To See ## Important Stripe mainly wants: - legitimacy, - transparency, - low fraud risk. So avoid: - vague products, - edgy “AI money machine” branding, - unfinished pages, - broken links, - fake testimonials, - placeholder text. --- # Product Strategy Start VERY simple. Even: - digital products, - art, - presets, - prompts, - guides, - merch, - ebooks are enough to establish legitimacy. You can expand later. --- # Media Strategy You mentioned TikTok. That pairs well with WooCommerce. ## Funnel ```text TikTok/Reels/YouTube Shorts ↓ Link in bio ↓ Landing page ↓ Product/store ``` --- # Analytics Use: - urlPlausible Analyticshttps://plausible.io/ or - urlUmamihttps://umami.is/ Avoid bloated tracking stacks initially. --- # Backups Critical. Use: - daily DB backups - weekly full backups Store them: - locally - and offsite Could use: - Backblaze B2 - Cloudflare R2 --- # Security Install: - fail2ban - ufw firewall - Cloudflare protection Also: - disable XML-RPC - strong passwords - 2FA --- # Cost Estimate ## Monthly ### Lean Setup - VPS: ~$6–15 - Domain: ~$1–2/month equivalent - Email: free–$6 - Backups/storage: ~$1–5 Total: ~$10–25/month Far cheaper than scaling Shopify long-term. --- # Long-Term Evolution Path This is the important part. WooCommerce becomes: - your operational storefront, - while your custom platform becomes: - content layer, - AI layer, - recommendation engine, - community layer, - automation backend. Meaning: ```text Custom Platform ↓ WooCommerce handles payments/orders ``` instead of rebuilding: - carts, - taxes, - refunds, - payment security, - compliance, - fraud prevention from scratch immediately. That saves enormous time. --- # Suggested Timeline ## Day 1 - VPS - Docker - WordPress - SSL - Domain ## Day 2 - Theme - WooCommerce - Products - Policies ## Day 3 - Stripe application - Test orders - Mobile optimization ## Week 2+ - TikTok content - SEO - blogging - automation - custom platform work --- # My Recommendation Do NOT try to build: - custom checkout, - custom auth, - custom ecommerce backend, - custom payment processor abstractions right now. Use WooCommerce as: - the boring stable core, - while you build the interesting layers around it. That gives you: - ownership, - lower cost, - Stripe compatibility, - and a realistic path forward without drowning in infrastructure work.