Compliance. It's the 4PM Friday conference slot that clears the room faster than a fire alarm. But get the right person talking about it and suddenly it's actually kind of fascinating. Elena Tsacheva from ConsentMo is that person — she makes cookie banners and GDPR regulations genuinely watchable, and she's built one of the most sophisticated consent platforms in the Shopify ecosystem to back it up.

We get into why 20 US states now have their own privacy laws (and why that number keeps climbing), what's actually broken about the vibe-coded cookie banner approach, and why Shopify's built-in banner is fine right up until it isn't.

We also discuss

• the Digital Omnibus directive
• why compliance and AI are increasingly at odds with each other
• why the future of consent might not involve cookie banners at all.

Outside the product, we hear about running team brainstorms in a toddler café, dressing for Paris Fashion Week at an e-commerce conference, and getting surprised with a birthday cake by the Zapier team in the middle of the Wide event.

We've put together a Compliance Playbook to go with this episode. Search for The Shopify App Show on Substack. And if you're not already subscribed, do the thing — like, subscribe, share, all of it.

This episode is sponsored by The Support Heroes — dedicated Shopify support agents who actually know what they're doing. Head to thesupportheroes.com.

Checkout Consentmo for your privacy compliance needs, and for Price Tracking compliance, check out one of my apps, Omnibus Owl.

And most importantly, we featured my daughter's cookie business, Sophies Cookies, on this episode.

YouTube Chapters:

00:00 — Introduction

01:29 — Making compliance content people actually watch

03:12 — What ConsentMo actually does (it's a lot)

06:56 — What drives the roadmap — and what gets a hard no

10:02 — Saying no: the art of not shipping everything

13:34 — Will merchants just vibe code their own cookie banner?

16:19 — Why hasn't Shopify just built all of this?

20:35 — Why human support still matters (especially in compliance)

21:32 — What's next: Germany's cancel law and the Digital Omnibus

25:16 — Will cookie banners eventually disappear?

27:00 — Martin's daughter's cookie website makes an appearance

27:38 — The Wide Paris event: fashion week for e-commerce

31:12 — Wrapping up

Subscriptions are the holy grail if you get them right: recurring revenue from your best customers.

Gavin Ballard has spent 15 years tackling the hardest problems in the Shopify ecosystem, founded Disco Labs, and now runs Submarine — the platform powering subscriptions, memberships and pre-orders for some of the most complex Shopify brands out there.

This chat's timely - Gavin just got back from Sub Summit in Kansas City (the only conference dedicated entirely to subscription commerce), and Recharge just aquired Skio for $100M, a massive deal in thhe Shopify Subscriptions space.

We get into why slapping a "subscribe" button next to "add to cart" doesn't work anymore, what AI is actually unlocking (A/B testing your cancellation flows in real time, infinite personalisation segments that used to be impossible), and why you're not just competing with other Shopify subs — you're competing with Netflix, Spotify and every other line on your customer's recurring bill.

If you run a store, build apps, or you're an agency talking to merchants about retention — this one's loaded. Bonus: The Shopify Subscriptions Playbook goes with this episode.

Sponsor: The Support Heroes — trained Shopify support specialists who plug into your help desk, learn your brand voice, and handle your tickets like they actually give a shit. Tell them I sent you.

And one from me — Product Pelican. Audits your whole product catalog, finds the gaps — missing alt text, weak descriptions, uncategorised products, FAQ generation — and helps you fix them in bulk. Free to try or HMU for a demo!

In this episode

• What Gavin learned at Sub Summit in Kansas City
• Why "add subscribe button" isn't a subscription strategy
• You're competing with Netflix, not just other Shopify stores
• AI unlocking infinite personalisation segments
• A/B testing your cancellation flows in real time
• The Recharge–Skio deal and what it means
• Build vs buy your own subscription platform
• Memberships — the Qantas and Costco model
• How to actually get a subscription program off the roadmap

Chapters

Shopify POS is one of the biggest unlocks on the platform, but most merchants are scared to make the move — and honestly, a lot of POS apps are half-arsed. So this episode I'm going proper niche: POS Cafe, built by Carmel and Adam, who run the whole thing out of remote Queensland and service merchants all over the world.

We get into how two ex-agency operators stumbled into a gap nobody was filling (a merchant wanted to open a coffee shop inside their store), why the "do one thing well" advice broke down for them almost immediately, and how they've ended up with what's basically 5–10 apps in one, including an Uber Eats–style online ordering extension.

If you run a retail or food business, build apps, or you're weighing up a POS migration — this one's worth your time. Bonus: I've put together a Mastering the Move to Shopify POS Playbook drawing on this chat plus my earlier ones with Josh Bitossi and Jordan Finneran.

Sponsor The Support Heroes — trained Shopify support specialists who plug into your help desk, learn your brand voice, and handle your tickets like they actually give a shit. Carmel and Adam set night alarms to check their tickets — they could use these guys. Tell them I sent you.

And one from me — Product Pelican. Audits your whole product catalog, finds the gaps — missing alt text, weak descriptions, uncategorised products — and helps you fix them in bulk. Free to try.

In this episode

• How an agency side hustle became a Shopify POS app
• The cafe gap nobody was filling
• Why "do one thing well" didn't work for POS Cafe
• Modifiers, KDS, print servers and online ordering
• Building the "Shopify way" — metafields, metaobjects, draft orders
• Why POS apps have to be stable 100% of the time
• The POS APIs they're still waiting on
• Where Shopify POS caps out (and why they think it doesn't)
• The other niche POS devs worth knowing

Chapters

The Shopify checkout is the one part of the customer journey that's guaranteed — every customer goes through it, no matter how they got to your store. So I've grabbed Blake Waldron, who spent years building Shopify stores and now runs Checkout Components, the app for making that critical moment actually work for you.

We get into what makes a good checkout (hint: stop assuming every customer wants to see the same thing), why an always-on upsell isn't distracting — it's table stakes, and the body shop trick that lifted sale conversions instantly.

Plus we cover ShopPay rendering gotchas, Australia's at 50% ShopPay adoption and what that means for your extensions, and the OpenAI backflip that confirmed checkout is now the only guaranteed touchpoint.

We also get into the basics everyone's ignoring — clean product data, accurate prices, Shopify's product taxonomy — and why getting those right matters more than chasing the agentic commerce hype.

If you run a store, build apps, or you're an agency still treating checkout as "set and forget" — this one's worth your time. Bonus: I've put together a Checkout Playbook to go with this episode.

Sponsor The Support Heroes — trained Shopify support specialists who plug into your help desk, learn your brand voice, and handle your tickets like they actually give a shit. Tell them I sent you.

And one from me — Stork Credit. Dead simple, native-built Shopify app for issuing store credit instead of discount codes. Free to install.

In this episode

• What actually makes a good checkout
• Why an always-on upsell is table stakes
• The ShopPay rendering toggle most people miss
• The Body Shop sale-banner trick
• Honest analytics vs vanity attribution
• Why product taxonomy is the real agentic commerce prep
• What Blake saw at Shop Talk in Vegas
• Where Checkout Components is heading next

Chapters

This is a big one. Shopify Flow has had the biggest glow-up of any feature on the platform, and today we're going inside the mothership to talk to the bloke running it. Paul Nuschke leads Shopify Flow, and he joins me to unpack one of the most insane stretches of shipping in Flow's history - Sidekick integration, and so many other improvements.

We get into what it took to make Sidekick build working workflows without hallucinating itself into oblivion (fact: 40% of new Flows are now created with Sidekick), why Flow has out-shipped Zapier for Shopify use cases, and the apps doing the most interesting things with Flow connectors.

Plus: scheduled jobs vs product update triggers, why Flow doesn't do Git integration (yet), Flow vs custom middleware, and what's coming at Editions and Dotdev.

If you build apps, run a store, or you're an agency still telling clients "Flow can't do that" — this one's going to change your mind.

Bonus: I've put together a Shopify Flow Playbook to go with this episode. Link below.

Sponsor

The Support Heroes — trained Shopify support specialists who plug into your help desk, learn your brand voice, and handle your tickets like they actually give a shit. Tell them I sent you.

And one from me — Stork Credit. Dead simple, native-built Shopify app for issuing store credit instead of discount codes. Free to install.

In this episode

• Teaching Sidekick to build working workflows
• 40% of new Flows are built with Sidekick
• Using Flow templates
• The product update trigger problem (and the workaround)
• Flow as middleware — when it makes sense
• Why there's no Git integration (yet)
• App connectors — who's doing it right
• What's coming at Editions and Partner Conference

Chapters

Store Credit is the most slept-on feature on Shopify. Stores are still running tired discount codes and clunky points-based loyalty — when the tool that replaces both has been sitting in Shopify waiting.

Mat has been solving the "how do I reward customers" problem longer than most — he built Gift Card Factory and DataJet before Shopify even had native store credit, and we've teamed up on Stork Credit, an app that turns store credit into cashback, loyalty, and rewards automation.

Want to put this into practice?
Read The Store Credit Playbook — 10 specific campaigns you can run this week.

This episode is brought to you by The Support Heroes — dedicated support agents who understand the Shopify ecosystem, plugged directly into your help desk. Stop being your own support rep. Head to thesupportheroes.com.

• Stork Credit
• The Store Credit Playbook
• Gift Card Factory
• Omnibus Owl
• The Support Heroes

You can do everything right for your ecommerce business.

But if your inventory isn’t right, it all goes down the toilet and you start flushing money away.

That’s why people like Jordan Finneran, from Pimsical, are some of the most important people in the Shopify ecosystem.

If you care about saving time, money and delivering the best experience for customers, everything we cover in this episode is relevant.

Jordan is on a mission to optimise your operations and streamline your business backend.

In this episode we talk stocktake, omnichannel, POS, warehouses and everything that makes them talk to each other.

We also talk about what Core Web Vitals would look like in a physical store, and why a Garmin integration for Shopify POS could provide some important metrics, so we have a bit of fun too!

Sponsor

Thanks as always to The Support Heroes for sponsoring this episode and for supporting over 100 apps across the world by managing their customer support.

0:00 - Inventory is Cash 💰

1:05 - Meet Jordan Finneran, Operations Optimiser 🛠️

1:20 - Listening to Merchants: Building Back-of-House Heroes

2:29 - Success is Saving Time and Getting Accurate Stock ⏱️

4:36 - The End of Stocky: Pimsicle is Here to Help!

6:25 - Shopify POS: The Best Foundation for Success

7:32 - Playing Catch-Up: Staying Ahead of Shopify's APIs

9:41 - AD: The Support Heroes - Stop Answering Tickets!

10:12 - Retail OS: Bridging the Gap for Larger Merchants 🛍️

16:34 - Optimization & Stairs: Retail's Core Web Vitals 🏃💨

18:18 - A Garmin Integration in Retail OS? ⌚

18:37 - The Future of Retail: Better Forecasting & App Integrations 🔮

21:11 - The Messiness of Integrating Multiple Retail Metrics

23:02 - Sticking with Shopify as You Scale: Beyond ERPs 🚀

27:18 - A Bit of Self-Indulgence: Jordan's Shopify Build Award 🏆

29:34 - Wrap Up: Save Money, Make Money with Better Operations

Links

• Pimsical
• The Support Heroes
• The Shopify App Show

Not every store needs more apps. But every store needs a great front end — and Anne Thomas from Design Packs has spent the better part of a decade making sure Shopify merchants can build one without losing their minds.

Anne co-created Flex Theme, one of the most respected themes in Shopify's history, and now runs Design Packs — a modular sections app that's evolved constantly since launching in 2021. She also runs Shop Critiques, so she's looking at real stores every day and seeing exactly what's working and what isn't.

Martin and Anne cover the vibe-coded app apocalypse, why your 10% off popup is probably doing more harm than good, and why the basics of a good landing page haven't actually changed — even in 2026.

Sponsor
This episode is brought to you by The Support Heroes — dedicated support agents who understand the Shopify ecosystem, plugged directly into your help desk. Stop being your own support rep. Head to thesupportheroes.com today.

In this episode

• Why vibe-coded apps are clogging the Shopify App Store review queue
• Where page builders still win over AI-generated sections
• The 10% off popup problem — and what to focus on instead
• Why metafields are the #1 thing that makes an app integrate well with themes
• The landing page playbook that still works in 2026 (it's boring, and it's right)
• What a good quarterly self-audit of your store actually looks like
• Where Design Packs is headed — design systems, templates, and modularity
  
  Links
• Design Packs
• The Support Heroes
  

CHAPTERS

Not every brand gets Kim Kardashian. But every brand can build a structured, impactful influencer program — and Yash Chavan from SARAL is the guy to learn from. SARAL is the end-to-end influencer OS used by consumer brands, mobile apps, and B2B companies to find, manage, and measure influencer programs at scale.

Martin and Yash cover how to find the right influencers, why Snoop Dogg probably isn't the right fit for your brand, and the real reason your Google Ads suddenly seem to be performing better.

Sponsor

This episode is brought to you by The Support Heroes — dedicated support agents who understand the Shopify ecosystem, plugged directly into your help desk. Stop being your own support rep. Head to thesupportheroes.com today.

In this episode

• How to build your "ideal creator persona" before touching any platform
• The investment barbell strategy for your influencer roster
• The SARAL lookalikes feature — find the affordable version of Snoop Dogg
• Why AI influencers aren't actually influencers
• The attribution problem — why your influencer program gets less credit than it deserves
• How to talk to your CFO about influencer ROI
  

Links

• SARAL — Influencer OS for consumer brands
• How to Prove ROI of Influencer Marketing to Your CFO
• AI Influencer Budget Calculator
• The Support Heroes
  

Chapters

Are customer surveys conversion killers, or are they the secret weapon to understanding your buyers?

In today’s episode of the Shopify App Show, I chat with Jason Zigelbaum, the solopreneur behind ZigPoll—a leading customer survey app for Shopify.

We dive deep into the psychology of why customers actually want to give feedback, the magic of the post-purchase touchpoint, and how even the most "boring" brands can build highly engaging surveys.

Jason also shares behind-the-scenes insights on bootstrapping a SaaS product as a solo developer, how user feedback shaped ZigPoll's UX, and how AI is revolutionizing data analysis and referral attribution.

Whether you're struggling to understand your store's drop-off rates or want to know exactly who is buying your products, this episode is your crash course in collecting and leveraging zero-party data.

• [00:00] Introduction: Meet Jason Zigelbaum and discover ZigPoll, the Shopify app designed to capture feedback at every stage of the customer journey.
• [00:33] Overcoming Survey Fatigue: Why do people actually fill out surveys? Jason explains why context and timing are the ultimate keys to high engagement.
• [01:59] The Magic Touchpoints: Beyond the post-purchase survey—leveraging Exit Intent and Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) surveys based on scroll depth and time on site.
• [03:03] Surveys for "Boring" Brands: Tactics for increasing engagement when you sell unglamorous products, including strategic incentives and psychological question-ordering.
• [05:06] Designing for High Completion Rates: How ZigPoll balances complex backend analytics with a frictionless, one-question-at-a-time frontend experience.
• [07:15] The 3 Pillars of E-commerce Surveys: Jason’s straightforward, no-overwhelm framework for merchants setting up surveys for the first time.
• [09:01] Sponsor Break: A quick word from our sponsor, The Support Heroes.
• [09:50] Fixed Choice vs. Open-Ended Questions: The strategic balance of getting customers to commit with checkboxes before unlocking the goldmine of open-ended feedback.
• [11:52] Sticking to the E-commerce Niche: Why Jason prefers focusing purely on e-commerce rather than branching out into SaaS templates.
• [13:51] Managing SaaS Churn: The reality of seasonal app usage in e-commerce and why starting and stopping data collection is a valid merchant strategy.
• [16:36] The Future of AI in Surveys: Using MCP servers and AI agents to distill thousands of natural language responses into actionable trends.
• [18:39] Changing E-commerce Attribution: How the rise of AI chatbots (like ChatGPT and Claude) is changing how brands track where their customers come from.
• [20:09] The Solopreneur Journey: Jason shares his experience building and scaling ZigPoll as a team of one, and how AI tools have boosted his developer velocity.

• App: ZigPoll
• Sponsor: The Support Heroes