The Unofficial Shopify Podcast

Why Your Creative Strategy Is Burning Cash

"Do you care enough about new customer acquisition? What you care about shows up based off of your actions, not your thoughts or your words." Meta's Andromeda update broke everyone's brain and most brands still haven't recovered. Nehal Kazim, CEO of Ad Pros, argues that the industry overcorrected by wildly overproducing content, burning through budgets on concepts that never receive meaningful spend. His math: you're paying $250-500 per asset for creatives that never get tested. Kazim has spent 13 years running campaigns for brands like Canada Goose and DTC companies doing $10-16 million a month. His solution is a profitability-first framework that tracks new customer contribution margin daily and calibrates creative output to what your budget can actually support. Also discussed: why Meta told him to stop hook testing, and the $25K Cardi B ad he hated that completely crushed. SPONSORS Swym - Wishlists, Back in Stock alerts, & more getswym.com/kurt Cleverific - Smart order editing for Shopify cleverific.com Zipify - Build high-converting sales funnels zipify.com/KURT LINKS * Ad Pros: https://adpros.com [https://adpros.com] * Nehal on Instagram: instagram.com/nehalkazim * Nehal on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/nehalkazim WORK WITH KURT Apply for Shopify Help ethercycle.com/apply See Our Results ethercycle.com/work Free Newsletter kurtelster.com The Unofficial Shopify Podcast is hosted by Kurt Elster and explores the stories behind successful Shopify stores. Get actionable insights, practical strategies, and proven tactics from entrepreneurs who've built thriving ecommerce businesses.

She Sold 250K Shampoo Bars Without Amazon or Ads

Kate Assaraf tried every plastic-free shampoo bar on the market. They sat in her shower like, and I'm quoting here, "tombstones." Failed products. Dead ends. So she decided to make her own. Without Instagram ads. Without Amazon. Without any of the things you're supposed to need to build a business. Today on our program, we follow Kate's journey from beauty industry veteran to the woman who said no to everything, and built a million-dollar company anyway. In this episode, we explore how Kate sold 250,000 shampoo bars in 4 years while refusing Meta ads, Amazon listings, and influencer partnerships. When her contract manufacturer went under, she didn't find a new one—she built her own factory and hired the displaced workers. Now with 400+ retail partners and 7-figure revenue, Kate proves that sometimes the best growth strategy is saying no to growth hacks. GUEST BIO Kate Assaraf is the founder of DIP Haircare, a plastic-free beauty brand that's redefined sustainable haircare without compromising performance. With 20 years in the beauty industry, Kate launched DIP from her kitchen table in October 2021 after discovering that existing eco-friendly alternatives failed to deliver. Her shampoo and conditioner bars compete directly with luxury salon brands while lasting up to a year. By refusing traditional DTC tactics and focusing on local retail partnerships, she's built a 7-figure business that champions American manufacturing and community-first commerce. SPONSORS Swym - Wishlists, Back in Stock alerts, & more getswym.com/kurt Cleverific - Smart order editing for Shopify cleverific.com Zipify - Build high-converting sales funnels zipify.com/KURT LINKS * DIP Haircare: https://dipalready.com/ [https://dipalready.com/] * Find DIP in stores: https://dipalready.com/pages/stockists [https://dipalready.com/pages/stockists] * Kate on Instagram: @kateassaraf WORK WITH KURT Apply for Shopify Help ethercycle.com/apply See Our Results ethercycle.com/work Free Newsletter kurtelster.com The Unofficial Shopify Podcast is hosted by Kurt Elster and explores the stories behind successful Shopify stores. Get actionable insights, practical strategies, and proven tactics from entrepreneurs who've built thriving ecommerce businesses.

What Discounts Actually Make People Buy (Study)

There's this thing that happens when you run an e-commerce store. You know you need to discount, but you're terrified. Terrified of training customers to wait for sales. Terrified of looking cheap. So you do nothing, or worse, you slap WELCOME10 on your popup and call it a day. Meanwhile, the big brands? They're discounting constantly. Just invisibly. Cara Marin from Seguno looked at 162,000 discount code sets. Real data from real stores. And what she found flips everything we thought we knew. The most successful stores discount more, not less. They just do it smarter. With unique codes. With segmentation. With strategies that preserve brand value while driving conversions. The revelation that changes everything: it's not about the discount. It's about the delivery. 20% off might be the magic number, but 10% is secretly almost as effective. Gift with purchase is used 6X more by Plus stores. And those customer service recovery codes? They're turning angry customers into superfans. This isn't theory. This is what actually works. SPONSORS Swym - Wishlists, Back in Stock alerts, & more getswym.com/kurt [https://getswym.com/kurt] Cleverific - Smart order editing for Shopify cleverific.com [https://cleverific.com] Zipify - Build high-converting sales funnels zipify.com/KURT [https://zipify.com/KURT] LINKS * Seguno 2025 Unique Discount Benchmarking Report [https://www.seguno.com/unique-discount-code-benchmarks] * Seguno Bulk Discount Code Bot [https://apps.shopify.com/bulk-discount-generator] * Promo Party Pro [https://apps.shopify.com/promo-party-fgwp] * PostPilot [https://postpilot.com] * Shopify Discount Docs [https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/discounts] WORK WITH KURT Apply for Shopify Help ethercycle.com/apply [https://ethercycle.com/apply] See Our Results ethercycle.com/work [https://ethercycle.com/work] Free Newsletter kurtelster.com [https://kurtelster.com] The Unofficial Shopify Podcast is hosted by Kurt Elster and explores the stories behind successful Shopify stores. Get actionable insights, practical strategies, and proven tactics from entrepreneurs who've built thriving ecommerce businesses.

This Founder Automated Influencer Outreach Completely

So there's this guy, Bora Celik. Software engineer, thirty years in the game. Last year he tells his investors something crazy: SaaS is dead. Not dying. Dead. And here's the thing - he might be right. See, while everyone's playing with ChatGPT, asking it questions, Bora's building these things called AI agents. They don't just answer questions. They do the work. Like, actually reach out to influencers, negotiate deals, send products, follow up. No humans involved. One of his clients, Harney & Sons Tea, they've got agents running their entire influencer program. The agents find people, check their engagement rates, send emails, track who posts. Everything. And the wildest part? The CEOs of these $100 million companies are building their own agents now. Using tools anyone can access. Today, Bora shows us exactly how. SPONSORS Swym - Wishlists, Back in Stock alerts, & more getswym.com/kurt Cleverific - Smart order editing for Shopify cleverific.com Zipify - Build high-converting sales funnels zipify.com/KURT LINKS * N8N Agent Builder: https://n8n.io/ai-agents/ [https://n8n.io/ai-agents/] * Agentic Brand Newsletter: https://agenticbrand.ai/ [https://agenticbrand.ai/] * Agentic: https://a.gentic.co/ [https://a.gentic.co/] WORK WITH KURT Apply for Shopify Help ethercycle.com/apply See Our Results ethercycle.com/work Free Newsletter kurtelster.com The Unofficial Shopify Podcast is hosted by Kurt Elster and explores the stories behind successful Shopify stores. Get actionable insights, practical strategies, and proven tactics from entrepreneurs who've built thriving ecommerce businesses.

Buff Clucks: From Homework Assignment to 7-Figure Chicken Brand

So there's this moment in 2022 where Celia Hatch wakes up from a dream about chicken supplements called "Chicken Spice." She thinks it's ridiculous. Fast forward to today, and she's running a seven-figure business serving America's 13% of households with backyard chickens. The twist is it started as her teenage son's eighth-grade homework assignment. He made $500 selling herbs in craft bags, then quit. Ms. Hatch, a serial entrepreneur with 16 businesses behind her, picked it up and scaled Buff Clucks to seven figures in 18 months using Meta advertising, landing pages, and subscription bundling. This is a story about accidental entrepreneurship, the growing market of premium pet owners willing to double their feed costs, and why sometimes the best business ideas come to you in your sleep. Along the way, Celia reveals why their Shopify store is the "neglected child" of their operation, how a "sneeze warning" became genius marketing, and why she wishes she'd built a proper Shopify store from day one. SPONSORS Swym - Wishlists, Back in Stock alerts, & more getswym.com/kurt Cleverific - Smart order editing for Shopify cleverific.com Zipify - Build high-converting sales funnels zipify.com/KURT LINKS * Buff Clucks: https://www.buffclucks.com/ [https://www.buffclucks.com/] * Buff Clucks Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buff_clucks/ [https://www.instagram.com/buff_clucks/] * Funnelish (tool they use): https://funnelish.com/ [https://funnelish.com/] * SEMrush: https://www.semrush.com/ [https://www.semrush.com/] * Ubersuggest: https://neilpatel.com/ubersuggest/ [https://neilpatel.com/ubersuggest/] WORK WITH KURT Apply for Shopify Help ethercycle.com/apply See Our Results ethercycle.com/work Free Newsletter kurtelster.com The Unofficial Shopify Podcast is hosted by Kurt Elster and explores the stories behind successful Shopify stores. Get actionable insights, practical strategies, and proven tactics from entrepreneurs who've built thriving ecommerce businesses.