OpenStore

Margot James, a performance marketer for a suite of 40+ Shopify brands called OpenStore Support, said the Shop Campaigns have been a valuable tool to bring new customers in. It’s been a place to experiment, she said, at a time when other channels are getting more expensive or underperforming. “It’s a unique way of getting your brand out there,” she said. “It’s such an easy campaign, so it’s like why not use it?” - Melissa Daniels, Modern Retail

Watch the recent Limited Supply episode with Nik Sharma & OpenStore where we shared how we're redefining e-commerce: #shopify #ecommerce #ecom #entrepreneur

We talked TikTok’s new AI influencer tool with Modern Retail and what it means for our 40+ brands running on Shopify: "When you start to bring in AI, and you have someone reading from a script, I think that consumers are a little bit smarter than you think, and I think it may come across as disingenuine, to be honest,” said Rebecca Traverzo, OpenStore's Head of Marketing. OpenStore’s Traverzo said she’s “bullish” on the potential of AI-powered marketing for brands, saying it can help companies work faster and at a greater volume. OpenStore has been using AI to develop ads, particularly still imagery and photography for Jack Archer, its men’s focused athleisure brand. Such ads have performed 300% better in terms of user engagement, compared to regular ads, said Traverzo. That’s because generative AI lets OpenStore take Jack Archer’s “Jetsetter Pants,” for example, and render an ad that shows the product on various models in real-life settings – like the airport or a golf course – so shoppers get a better sense of how the pants look in everyday life. A full creative production that would typically take six to eight weeks can be done in as little as a week or two with AI, said Traverzo. Plus, brands have more options in terms of models and set locations. As for TikTok’s AI-powered influencers, OpenStore’s Traverzo is waiting to see how other brands leverage the technology first, including competitors, and how consumers react to it before testing it out.“ Thank you Modern Retail & Allison Smith for the opportunity to share our thoughts. https://lnkd.in/e-iahZrz

OpenStore is hiring across several teams! 💻 Engineering 💰 Finance and Accounting 📈 Marketing 📊 Analytics 🎨 Design Learn more today at https://open.store/careers

Last month, TikTok said it was rolling out a tool that would let brands create ads of real people powered by #generativeAI on its platform. Influencers, marketers and agencies say they aren't flocking to use this particular tool just yet but that generally, they are cautiously optimistic about AI-powered ads. In this piece by Allison Smith, we speak to Rebecca Traverzo of OpenStore, Krishna Subramanian of Captiv8, Thya Sanders of Bloomie For Creators, Sienna Santer of Buttermilk, and Alessandro Bogliari of The Influencer Marketing Factory - Influencer Marketing Agency.

This July 4th, our team at OpenStore is implementing more Buy X Get Y promotions for more of our brands, based on how these promos outperformed more straightforward promotions like 20% off sitewide discounts during Memorial Day Weekend. Over MDW, one brand that usually sells 1-2 items per order sold 3-4 items per basket. We plan our promotional calendar every quarter, using performance data from the previous year and current trends to determine what promotions we’ll run this year. Two months out from launch, we lock in details such as which brands will have promotions and what the terms will be. At that point, we can brief the creative team on what assets we’ll need. Planning early allows us to be 80% ready so that we can handle any last-minute changes. We keep track of all of your promotional planning on ClickUp, and we use tools like Figma and iconik.io to build promotional assets and align on approvals. When it’s time to launch our promotions, we use our own proprietary promotional engine that our engineering team built, which allows us to set a day and time for each of our promotions to launch weeks in advance. By using our own platform, we can QA everything for promotions ahead of time so that fewer people have to be on call on the day of the launch, which is often a holiday. For the majority of brands, we find that simpler offers resonate better with customers. Offering shoppers free shipping or a free item with purchase can help shoppers get over the line without discounting your products too much. For those of you running your own brands this July 4th, make sure to optimize your offers for high conversion rates and gross profit per site visitor. And have a happy 4th! 

Shop Cash has become an important tool in Shopify's quest to get more people to use its Shop App. In June, when #Shopify hosted its first-ever Shop Week, it generated over $1 million spent in Shop Cash, the rewards program it rolled out one year ago. #retail In this piece by Melissa Daniels, we speak to Anna Decilveo, Margot James of OpenStore, and Noel Reinhold of Front Row.

Our team had an awesome time on Limited Supply last week, sharing some of our favorite tools that power our growing portfolio. A special shoutout to FERMÀT for helping our performance marketers efficiently test new concepts. Watch the full episode at https://shorturl.at/AWGTl

At OpenStore, we rely on a suite of tools to manage our brands’ storefronts. Over the next several weeks, I’ll highlight some of the tools we use and provide best practices we’ve developed while operating 40+ brands. Here’s the customer review tool we use across our 40+ brands: Okendo. Okendo is a great option because it leverages the power of customer feedback in fully customizable and interactive formats that help shoppers make faster and better purchasing decisions. No matter what you use to manage your customer reviews, there are ways you can optimize your reviews process. Here’s my list:   1. Ask for a review at the right time - Don’t ask for a review right after the customer makes their purchase. Time the review request to send once the customer has actually received the product. 2. Moderate your reviews strategically - DTC review apps typically allow you to hide negative reviews on your site. It might seem like a good idea to hide these reviews, but shoppers are smart. They’ll know something isn’t right if all of your reviews are five stars. Instead, publish some bad reviews (defined as 3 stars or lower) and make sure to respond to them. Pro tip: set up an automatic email notification for any 3-star or lower review so that they go right to your CX inbox and you can promptly respond to those publicly. 3. Invest in third-party reviews - Research shows that the majority of shoppers are likely to look at external reviews, in addition to site reviews, when considering a purchase from a brand they’re not familiar with. You can partner with sites like Trustpilot to compile your site’s reviews externally. Articles like these can help boost your SEO and paid search efforts, and improve your brand’s credibility. 4. Stay up-to-date on innovations - Customer marketing platforms are constantly evolving and updating their products to make managing reviews easier. Yotpo, for example, recently launched a feature called AI Reviews Summary, which uses a language model built specifically for summarizing reviews. Shoppers can read a concise summary of all customer reviews that highlight the most relevant, informative content. What best practices do you follow when managing reviews? Let me know ⬇️

🎙️ Just dropped: a new episode of Limited Supply with Nik Sharma featuring our President, Trenton Riggs, and Head of Business Operations, Lukas Judodihardjo. They dive into our unique acquisition strategy, what makes us different from typical aggregators, and the tech we're building to keep up with our growing portfolio of 40+ brands and over 2 million customers. Everything you need to know below. 👇https://lnkd.in/euFn6iYH #business #podcast #entrepreneurship #shopify