Hey, welcome to our community.
First of all, I would like to mention that ShapeShift charges huge fees compared to regular bitcoin exchanges.
Shapeshift doesn't act like an exchange, but as a broker who takes a large cut on your orders.
Starting up an exchange account is very easy and I don't see a reason for you to use ShapeShift instead of a regular exchange.

I would suggest you to open an account at bittrex, as they support most of the crypto coins, and also limits are large, and they won't ask you to verify yourself in order to trade in their exchange.