From sketch to Shopify App - "Shopins"

Easy to say harder to do. Even hardened data analysts can get lost in a data forest. Not to speak of those who barely read Google Analytics. So I put my Robin Hood hat on and tried to help small to medium eCommerce business owners.

Based on my previous experience where my projects failed because I wasn’t paying too much attention to the business model (which is kinda important). With my next project, I wanted to make it right. So I did decent market research first:

• Is it an evergreen industry? Yes! ✅
• Top 3 problems? One of them: Data & trend analysis! ✅
• Easy to reach the target audience? Shopify Appstore! ✅
• Can you apply a subscription-based business model? Yes! ✅
• Rumours that you can build a profitable app within 2 months. ✅

… 1 year later. The Shopins app was finally listed on Shopify’s app store.

I’ve built a SaaS (software as a service) eCommerce data analysis app, which displays the results in a social media-like feed. I’ve tried to make it much convenient as possible. Data are illustrated as infographics and you can catch up with your store’s data just by scrolling down like you are doing on regular social media sites.

One of the best things that happened with this project is that it was listed for the “Shopify Staff picks” promotion, which gives you free user acquisition for one week.

Numbers were great, and some customers are still using it, but since there was no customer feedback (at all), which gives you a red warning flag because it’s unclear whether you did it right or there are some things that need to be changed.

Lessons learned:

1. Your customers need a hole in the wall, not another drill.
2. If you cannot explain what you have built, you more likely are going to fail in promotions.
3. Go and talk more with your customers. Especially if you are in SaaS business. You can build your app together with your customers.
4. Don’t be shy to ask for more money for your services.