Shopify Audiences

We recently invested in a company that enables creators to be the next-generation sales channels for brands, in a transparent and privacy-forward way. Brands care about a few things: 1) They only want to pay when they’ve acquired a new customer and done so profitably; 2) They want to control who can sell / promote their brand and where; and 3) They... See more

As we discussed in last week’s essay, Instagram is both a blessing and a curse for Shopify. On the one hand, it is the perfect discovery channel for the type of products that are typically sold by Shopify merchants: visually appealing objects you didn’t even know you wanted (fashion, homeware, furniture, etc). On the other hand, too much reliance o... See more

Many have argued that these announcements are related to each other: Shopify needs to build a customer-facing application in order to take-on Facebook, and the announcement of Facebook Shops is why. My takeaway is the opposite: the inevitability of Facebook Shops — thanks in part to a surprising culprit — is precisely why Shopify should not spend m... See more