MenuDock turns your menu into a branded online ordering site. Customers order from your own storefront, they pay by card, and the order lands in front of your staff in real time on the MenuDock mobile app. This section takes you from sign-up to taking your first order.
You don't have to read every article in order. If you'd rather just get going, follow the 10-minute checklist below.
The 10-minute checklist
When you first sign in to the admin panel, the dashboard shows a Welcome to MenuDock card. It tracks the same steps listed here and ticks each one off as you complete it, so you always know what's left before you can take orders.
Work through it top to bottom:
- Create your account and choose a plan. Sign up, then pick Starter, Pro or Business. You can change plan later, so start with whatever fits today. → Create an account and choose a plan
- Add your business details. Set your name, address, phone number, currency and time zone. Your currency drives every price and payment, so get it right before you take money. → Business settings
- Connect a payment provider. Link Stripe, Square or PayPal so customers can actually pay you. Without this, your store can't go live. → Start taking payments
- Add your first product. Create a category and at least one product with a price. → Add your first product
- Preview and place a test order. Open your storefront, order something yourself, watch it appear in Orders and on the mobile app, then refund it. → Verify your store
Steps 3 and 4 are the two required ones. The dashboard marks them in red until they're done, and the I'm live button stays greyed out until both are ticked. Everything else (your logo, opening hours, a custom domain, a second branch) is optional and you can add it whenever you like.
What "going live" means
MenuDock has no separate publish switch hidden away in settings. Your storefront exists from the moment your account does, and it starts taking orders as soon as a payment provider is connected and at least one product is on the menu. The I'm live button on the checklist is your own confirmation that you're ready, and clicking it just clears the welcome card from the dashboard.
If you tidied the card away before finishing, it doesn't vanish for good. It shrinks to a slim Continue bar at the top of the dashboard, and clicking that brings the whole list back.
The optional steps shown depend on your plan: a custom domain appears on Pro and Business, and a second location only on Business. On Starter you'll see the core steps without those two.
Related articles
- The onboarding checklist and going live
- Admin panel tour
- Subdomain vs. custom domain
- Plan comparison
Need a hand?
If a step won't tick off and you can't see why, or the storefront isn't behaving as you expect, email us at support@menudock.co.uk with your store name and we'll take a look.