Emily Hirsh: Secrets to Startup Growth With Powerful Facebook Ads

Listen to our exclusive interview with Emily Hirsh:

 

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Emily Hirsh is a self-taught marketing guru. Her marketing agency, Hirsh Marketing, specializes in Facebook and Instagram ads. Like many entrepreneurs, her business started out as a one-woman show. But in just two and a half years, she has grown her company to 25 employees serving over 60 clients. She is what we like to call a Facebook Ads ROCKSTAR! In this exclusive Emily Hirsh interview, we share some of her best insider secrets (even if you’re not ready to hire an agency yet) so you can get more Facebook fans, traffic, and buyers! 

Emily’s typical client has an online presence and is looking to implement a holistic approach to their marketing to improve visibility and brand awareness and generate leads and, ultimately, sales — something most new social entrepreneurs can definitely get behind.

And with a client retention rate of over 90 percent, she is clearly doing a few things right.

Not Ready to Bring on an Agency? Some Powerful Facebook Marketing Tips

You might be at a point in your entrepreneurial journey where you’re not quite ready to invest in the services of a marketing agency but you’d like to test some paid ads. If that’s where you find yourself, Emily warns that many people will get ahead of themselves and use paid ads before they have a really solid foundation.

She also emphasizes the importance of knowing exactly who your ad audience is. Ask yourself who that person is so that you can target them on Facebook. Then make sure you have a strategy that you’re confident enough to test since merely boosting posts won’t cut it — it’s critically important to have a way in which you can measure whether your efforts are successful or not. Then spend a bit of cash to get some intel on how effective your ads were.

Marketing always works,” confides Emily, “if you are willing to:

  • go through that process of creating a strategy,
  • create metrics that would measure that strategy success,
  • spend money testing it,
  • get intel to figure out what’s wrong with it, and
  • just repeat the process until it works.

Another option, if you don’t feel you’re ready to work one-on-one with a marketing agency, is to consider taking a course like the one Hirsh Marketing has developed. As a product of Emily’s realization that nothing like it existed, the course serves those people who are wanting to learn how to do it themselves and aren’t necessarily ready to hire an agency. Her team teaches part of the course which also boasts a live support component.

The Importance of Buying Data

No one likes to feel like they’re not getting anything in return for the money they’ve spent, especially when they’re just starting out in the business world. However, Emily stresses that it is common for entrepreneurs to spend money on marketing that just doesn’t work. Sometimes, your messaging just doesn’t resonate with your audience. This shouldn’t be seen as failing. Rather, Emily refers to this scenario as “buying data.” You have effectively spent money and in return, learned what doesn’t work.

This is why it’s important to choose a marketing budget that you hand handle not recouping right away. Eventually, you will — as long as you’re sticking to Emily’s recommendations for effective marketing listed above.

Business Will Decline…and That’s Okay

Emily reports that the biggest lesson she has learned in her entrepreneurial voyage is that it’s okay — and often necessary — for your business to go through a phase where growth slows or even stops altogether. 

Sometimes you have to…go through a phase in your business where you can’t take on as many new clients and you’re not in that acceleration or growth phase.

Emily advises that this downturn is a good time to look back and repair what “broke” as you grew your business. She admits that there is definitely a learning curve when it comes to this process and that she uses it to build out her employee training and expectations so that they are set up for success when they first come on board.

Looking for More Information?

If you’re new to the world of entrepreneurship and need more information to get started on some effective marketing strategies, hirshmarketing.com is a good place to start. Emily also has a podcast she releases twice weekly as well as a monthly Hirsh Marketing Report with lots of behind-the-scenes strategies and information from her team. Lastly, Emily’s book, Ignite Your Impact, which goes hand-in-hand with her course, is a great resource.

 

We also recommend:

 

Transcription of Interview (Transcribed by Otter.ca; there may be errors.)

Announcer 0:00
Welcome. This is the Change Creator Podcast.

Adam Force 0:11
Hey, what’s going on, everybody? Welcome back to the Change Creator Podcast show. This is your host, Adam Force. Hope you all had a good weekend. It is Monday here as we do this. And if you missed the last episode, it was with Maddy Martin. And so great conversation. We talked about, you know, really enhancing your marketing strategy. And you know, there’s money left on the table when you’re not using the latest like AI and messenger technology. So we kind of get into all that stuff and some of the pros, the cons and different ways to go about it. But it’s a really great marketing channel to start exploring. And that could become a whole new revenue opportunity for you. So you might want to check that out with Maddy Martin when you get a chance.

Today we’re going to be talking with Emily Hirsh and she has been blowing up lately. She is a marketing expert. So she’s one of the leaders in digital marketing on Facebook right now. And so, Hirsh Marketing is her company and I’ve kind of been watching her for a while now and we’re doing some work with her, actually. So she has built a team now of 25 plus people — they might be close to about 30 people now. And they have worked on over like, I don’t know, six, seven, I forget how many like hundreds of funnels and stuff for some big players out there — major players, and their ad spend, I believe is over about 25 million, and they had a return on that spend of like 90 million plus. So they really know what they’re doing and they’ve had lots of great success hence they have been scaling pretty quickly.

So we’re excited to talk with Emily. We’re going to dig into the Facebook world and how they’re doing what they’re doing. She is going to share some tips that will help you guys out no matter where you are as early stage entrepreneurs. Last but not least, guys, we just…stop by changecreator.com; we have a lot of fresh content. If you’re into the Shopify…if you have a Shopify store, or if you’re using Magento, we recently put up a lot of content around those things to help you guys out because we’ve been hearing a need for it. And there is a program called Shogun that we…one of our writers did a deep dive on and we got access to their back end to explore the software and stuff. And it’s a Shopify page builder, that is super powerful. It also provides analytics that Shopify does not offer. So when you can start customizing your Shopify product pages and all that stuff, you can really enhance the conversions and things like that. So if you go…it’s spelled S-H-O-G-U-N, Shogun.

So when you go on our website, you could search for Shogun. We have a ton of articles that we talk about to give you guys insights on how that all works. See if it’s the right fit for you. You could start with the Shogun review, and we compare it to a bunch of other softwares and stuff like that. So really valuable stuff and for the e commerce space, so you can check that out. And we’re going to dive into this conversation now. So, one last thing I almost forgot. If you go to changecreator.com, we have…it’s not available on the site but you can get it…I’m going to tell you just through this podcast, there is the…if you want to start…we’re really into storytelling and we believe that you know, this is your number one marketing asset. And it truly, truly is. This is what makes you memorable. It’s what adds value to your products. It’s what connects with people, builds trust, all these things.

So we are helping people supercharge their marketing with storytelling, and there’s some key things we share in a free offer just to give you that first step, give you some insights and ground you in storytelling for your startup, right. It’s all about marketing and sales. And you can go to changecreator.com/storytellingroadmap, and you can grab your free copy, and check that out. I think you guys will get a lot of value out of it. And yeah, we’d love to hear your feedback about it, too. Don’t forget to stop by the App Store, leave us a review. This goes a long way and we very much appreciate it. Let’s dive into this conversation with Emily and see what she has to say.

Announcer 4:00
Okay, show me the heat!

Adam Force 4:05
Hey, Emily, welcome to the Change Creator Podcast show. How you doing today?

Emily Hirsh 4:09
Doing well. Thanks so much for having me.

Adam Force 4:12
Thanks for being here. Excited to talk to you. You know, I’ve been following your team and you for about six months now and it looks like you guys have been doing some exciting stuff. So why don’t you kick us off just letting us know what’s going on at Emily’s world these days. What’s the latest? What’s the greatest?

Emily Hirsh 4:29
Yeah, so I run a marketing agency that specializes in Facebook and Instagram ads. I’ve had my company for really about two and a half years of growing a team and growing an agency but four years in the online industry and helping people with marketing. Like most entrepreneurs, I started out just me and then have grown a team for the last two and a half, three years and now have 25 employees and we serve over 60 clients in specifically the influencer industry. So a lot of people selling digital products, but also physical products and e commerce. But they usually have an online brand, online presence and are looking to have this holistic approach to their marketing to improve that visibility and that brand awareness. And then also, of course, generate leads and sales. So that’s what my team and I do. And I have a lot of fun with the leadership piece of it. And learning how to manage a team has been…is a huge part of what I do now that I’m kind of out of the day-to-day of my business. So, yeah.

Adam Force 5:29
Awesome. I love that you got yourself out of the day to day; it gives you time to go to talk at conferences and do all that fun stuff. I’m curious though, you know, in the earlier years, obviously, we all start out with ourselves a co founder, our small team, and we have to build things up. What has been some growing pains for you, as you do expand the team? I mean, now you have 25 employees. That means you know, you’re working with a larger number of clients and you want to make sure that your values and your processes stay intact. So how did you start managing that as you grow?

Emily Hirsh 6:03
Yeah, I mean, it’s constantly I’m working on it. Honestly, I would say like, every month we have projects around improving our processes and auditing and looking at what we could do better. And I always, my mentor, Alex Charfen always says like, Your business is always broken. And so that’s something that I’ve had to embrace is like, it will never be perfect, but I always can work to be improving it. So, you know, growing a team I had…the biggest thing I learned when I started growing a team is the importance of process. And actually, the importance of slowing down to document and create really solid training materials and expectations so that you can bring somebody into your company and actually set them up for success. I really didn’t know what I was doing when I started growing a team.

Like, I knew how to hustle and grow a business myself. I’ve, like, always been an entrepreneur. I have that blood in me, but I did not know how to grow a team. I had never done it before; no one had taught me. So there’s been a lot of learning around it. And I’d say the biggest thing I learned is that importance and sometimes you have to, like slow down and actually go through a phase in your business where you maybe can’t take on as many new clients and you’re not in that acceleration and growth phase, but you’re in that like stability and “let’s fix everything that broke as we grew, you know, the last quarter or something like that.” And so that’s been a huge learning curve is like that slow down, build out the training, and also expectations for people so that when they come in, they’re set up for success.

Adam Force 7:25
Yeah, I love that. I mean, it totally makes sense. And we always say on our side, slow down to speed up because, right? So like you’re setting yourself up to move forward. And it sounds like you’ve taken all the right steps. So you said you had a mentor. So you found it to be valuable to have yourself surrounded with some people that are helping you out throughout the process.

Yeah, for sure, especially people who have done what I was trying to do and what I am trying to do, you know, finding people who have built bigger businesses or managed bigger teams or done where I’m going like that’s very helpful because they have perspective that I just don’t have. So I really found myself first mentor when it became time for me to grow a team and I kind of call it like when it became time to create a real business and like have a real foundation and real process and employees and all that. That’s when I really sought out a mentor because I didn’t know what I was doing. And so I definitely needed you know, outside coaching and support and guidance around that. And still today, like that’s what I use that mentorship for.

Yeah, it’s pretty amazing when you get into those types of relationships. You don’t realize how valuable it can be until you actually experience it. Like we work with Caitlin Bacher. I don’t know if you know her, and she’s been super awesome. And we just went to one of her like mastermind summits. And, you know, like you said, it’s people that are doing things that you do, and it’s such a significant difference in the experience and the value you get when you do that, right?

Emily Hirsh 8:50
Yeah, absolutely. I totally agree.

Adam Force 8:52
Yeah, it’s powerful. So let’s talk a little bit about you know, Facebook, I mean, that’s your primary focus, obviously Facebook, and Instagram.

Emily Hirsh 9:01
Yeah.

Adam Force 9:01
What got you into, you know, just becoming an expert in that space?

Emily Hirsh 9:06
Yeah, so my story is kind of random. I started as a virtual assistant actually, like five years ago, when my son was born. I’m young, I became a mom at 20. And so I started my company just out of like, Okay, I need to figure out some work that I can do while I take care of my baby. We didn’t want to put him in daycare and we couldn’t afford a nanny. So that was my motivation. And so I kind of fell into then this like online world and found people, you know, creating these digital businesses and courses and influencers. And so at first I was helping them with their marketing, but actually like the systems in the back end and doing more like tactical work as a virtual assistant. And then I had the opportunity to start doing Facebook ads for them.

And so I really am a lot self taught and then the experience of actually like trying something Oh, that works; that didn’t work and then continuing to improve my skills. And even today, like my team, as I’ve grown, like, it’s our experience that is our superpower because we have this like intel and experience. And in marketing, that’s how you learn with Facebook ads is like you try something and like you see if it works or not. And then you can go more that direction or less that direction. And so that’s how I started. And it was just me. You know, it was just a virtual assistant. So I had these clients who are like, “Just try it, you know, like we don’t know are doing and we can’t afford an agency.” That was really, like, the level they were at.

And so I had this opportunity to go in and like do all the ads myself and I would take courses and podcasts. And what’s cool is some of the podcasts I used to listen to to like learn Facebook ads are our clients now. So it’s like, full circle of these huge influencers that we get to work with. But that’s how I started out and then got to a point where that’s all I was doing. And I was full time I had like, 10 clients that I was managing on my own and then I had to decide, okay, do I want to stop here? Do I want to grow a team? And I decided, you know, I definitely want to grow team and keep growing and that was kind of the start of the agency.

Adam Force 10:55
Yeah, I mean, it’s a big decision, right, when you’re at that pivotal point and you decide to…because you you know, expanding into an agency format is very different. So it sounds like it’s been, it’s been pretty interesting for you, and how are you feeling about it now at this point?

Emily Hirsh 11:09
Yeah, I mean, I love it. I love where I’m at now, not in the day to day because I get to have just a different perspective. You know, we have team meetings with my whole ads team where they talk about, you know, strategies that are working and not working. And when you have 60 clients, and we manage about a million dollars a month in ad spend, it’s really cool, the intel that we get, you know, we have and I get to kind of sit at the top and be like, Oh, that’s cool. And you know, know these strategies, but I’m not necessarily like loading ads and doing that tactical work, which is fine, but you know, you can’t grow a huge company doing that.

So I really enjoy…I…my brain definitely naturally thinks in a marketing sense, and I have a very unique way of looking at a funnel or a customer journey that’s really about like relationship building and value for your audience and customizing it for your audience. And I think that’s one of the reasons my company’s done so well is that like natural ability I have to view marketing in that way. But I love it. And then the team building is a challenge. But at the same time, one of the best things I do, because it’s also the most rewarding to see a team working so well together and coming together to do great things.

Adam Force 12:18
Yeah, that’s awesome. And how do you translate what you are very good at when it comes to testing ads and the process to your team now to stay consistent?

Emily Hirsh 12:31
Yeah, so we have a really extensive training program for anyone new who comes on our team. It’s actually built like in Click Funnels, like a course that they go through. So yeah, we have a…first of all, a very extensive hiring process. They have two interviews and a test and they go through like a lot of steps to even get to be hired. So that’s like the first thing we built that was very important for us. And then we have a training program they go through. It’s like a whole course. It’s like a 30 page workbook. They spend the first couple of weeks, like just doing that training program. And then they go through a shadowing, like test exercise portion. So we have a really huge system, which I think is why I’ve been able to scale. I have almost 10 ads managers now, so, two like full ads teams. And my…the same mentor actually said to me a couple years ago, he said, like, you know, you’re in the business of marketing and serving clients, but you’re also in the business of like, creating really good ads managers. And the faster that you can do that and do that well, like the better your business will do. And that was like a really eye opening moment for me because I realized a lot of my priority actually needs to go into how do I train?

How do I bring people in, teach them my systems, and then spit them out on the end that they can go serve clients? And the faster and more efficient I can do that, the better I can grow my business and serve clients. And so that like became my focus and so we’re constantly updating our training and building it out and like, we’re actually going through a revamp of it right now. So I’d say every three to six months we have to update it and then we obviously have ongoing trainings for our existing ads managers, too. [Unintelligible] monthly, keep them up to date. And also collaboration is super important. Like I said, like these ads managers have so much intel and experience that they don’t even realize. So leadership’s job in my company is to bring them together to be like talk about it and help each other out based on what you’re doing. And so we do that weekly on the team, too. That just brings like strategy ideas.

Adam Force 14:30
Yeah, I love that and I just love the steps they’re taking in that pivotal moment of you need to build quality ads managers, that is an eye opener when you start just kind of shifting that perspective and that says so much for where the business can go, right? So the better they are, the better the business will be, right?

Emily Hirsh 14:49
Yeah, exactly.

Adam Force 14:50
Yeah, that’s pretty cool. So I guess I’m curious you know, we’re on the line and people listening are you know, in their first few years of business, and everybody starts to play with Facebook ads. I mean, at some point, when you’re ready to scale to a certain level of income and revenue, you kind of need to get into the paid ad space. And I’m just curious, you know, not everyone’s ready to bring on an agency team just like when you were VA. I’m curious, what are just some ideas of, you know, I think people get really lost in all the options out there and even just starting with like, you know, making sure like you’re targeting the right person or group of people, how many interests, and ya know, how many tests do I run on different images? How much is…do I run $50? $1,000? Like, all these things, and it just kind of like, paralyzes you.

Emily Hirsh 15:40
It’s super overwhelming, for sure. Yeah. And there’s no…and the problem too, is that there’s no like, here’s the formula and if you do this, it will work. Like it’s going to vary for a lot of businesses and then their audience and then their offer. So if you’re in that place where you’re not ready to bring on an agency, but you know the next step is to test some paid ads, I definitely have some advice, which the first one is that people always jump to that paid ads before they have like a really solid foundation. And so make sure that you’re like very clear on who you’re targeting, and not just, you know, interests like targeting on Facebook, but like, Who is that person? And do you have that idea of that person? So you can speak to them and target them on Facebook? And then do you have at least a strategy that you’re confident enough to go test? Because you don’t want to just start boosting posts, right?

And like, Okay, let me see how this works. Like you actually need to have something that you can measure if it’s successful or not. And then you can spend some money and get intel back, was it successful or not? And one thing I always say is that, you know, marketing always works if you are willing to go through that process of you know, create a strategy, create metrics that would measure that strategy success, spend money testing it and then get that intel to figure out what’s wrong with it and then just kind of repeat that until it’s working. And as far as you know, budget to start with, like and targeting, you know, there is no one…that’s the problem is there is no one size fits all advice that I can give. But I do have some…I mean, if you can get 100 people through your funnel or you can, you know, get at least some metric that’s above that even, you’ll be able to get that data and then make decisions.

And I think you also have to be okay with failing, like, you will spend money and lose it. And that’s okay. And when that happens, you have to just know like, I’m actually on the right track because I now know that that doesn’t work or that that messaging didn’t resonate with my audience that I put this out and that’s, you know, that’s actually like part of the process so don’t see it as you’re failing. See it as I’m just going through that process. And I’m trying, you know, getting to the other side.

Adam Force 17:54
Yeah, and I think that’s important. That was a tough lesson we learned, you know, a few years ago is, you know, when you have a new offer you have to pay for data. So you know, you might put in, you could end up spending several thousand dollars just to keep iterating and getting data and it sounds like you’re saying the same thing.

Emily Hirsh 18:11
Yeah, I call it buying data. Like in the first 30 days of testing and offer like you don’t know, you have to choose a budget that you’re okay if you don’t make the money back right away, basically. And then you go do that, and you see how it works. And then you go fix the holes and you do it again, and then you just keep repeating that until it’s working.

Adam Force 18:28
Yeah, yeah, exactly. You know, just a little feedback, something I did hear you say once. I don’t remember where I heard you say it, but it’s stuck in my brain. It is that more…it’s not a matter of if marketing will work; it’s when.

And I always loved that little tagline and I think it’s such a powerful statement because people, including myself, I’ve done this where you get you get panicked and stressed out and you get anxiety when things aren’t working for you. And just like you said, you have to look at it as you’re buying data, you just learn something. So like when you get into those panic modes, it’s like if people turn everything off, and they then they stop, right?

Emily Hirsh 18:43
Yeah.

Emily Hirsh 19:09
Yeah. Yeah. And and really just viewing it as a process instead of, I’m just throwing this out there and hoping it works like, it is a process. And if you look at marketing as those steps of like, I buy that data, I see how it works. And then I figure out what’s not working, and then I fix it, and I do it again. And you just keep doing it. It is a matter of just when will it work for you not if. It will always work as long as you’re willing to go through that process as many times as it takes to get it there.

Adam Force 19:35
Gotcha. Gotcha. Ya, I know, 100% makes sense. And I’m curious now since day one, do you know have any idea of how many clients and total that you’ve worked with over the years?

Emily Hirsh 19:45
I don’t, but I do have a metric that we’ve run traffic over 900 funnels, we do track that metric. And I think we’re at 18 million total ad spend managed and over 90 million of revenue generated so we track that monthly. But it’s definitely over 100 different clients as we have almost 60 active right now. So, over the years, probably 150 plus clients that we’ve worked with, over the last four years if you count me. But we do track the other metrics of funnels, and then ad spend managing revenue generated every month and a report that I put out.

Adam Force 20:21
Yeah, yeah. Now, tell me a little bit about you got two other exciting things going on as far as Facebook. Why did you create the course?

Emily Hirsh 20:31
Yeah, so I, obviously there’s a lot of people who are not ready to work with us yet one on one as a client with our agency. And so I wanted to for a year to create this course because I feel like we have such amazing resources, from tracking sheets to audience insights to you know, swipe files of copy. And then of course, our strategies. I knew I wanted to create something that really doesn’t exist because we’re in the trenches doing it and teaching it, you know. And there’s people who just teach it, but then they kind of lose sight of it because they’re not doing it anymore. And so I knew we could create something powerful. And I sat on it for a while, because my agency wasn’t in a place where I could put all that time and energy and attention into it, and build it and build the funnel.

And like, you know, focus is very important. So it took me a while to create it. But I wanted to have something out there that could serve those people who are more at that level of, they need to learn how to do it themselves and buy that data, and they’re not ready to hire, you know, necessarily an agency yet. And so that’s why we created the course. It’s very driven by my team and what we do every day for clients. So my team teaches part of it. There’s a live support component of it that my team, you know, goes to weekly calls to answer questions. People come and screen share their ad account to get advice on it. And so it’s just a level of support like down the step from one-on-one clients that I needed…I wanted to build because I felt like we had resources that nobody else had out there to be able to share.

Adam Force 22:03
Interesting. And are you planning on staying focused on the Facebook, Instagram space? Are you planning on trying to break through some other social media platforms?

Emily Hirsh 22:11
Yeah, I definitely want to expand, I just haven’t been able to make the decision to have the bandwidth to do it. But probably Google or YouTube at least in our agency side, I would like to expand to offering that service and building out a department that can do that. So it’s in the plan when we can do it without breaking everything.

Adam Force 22:30
Yeah, I mean, that’s, I guess it’s a pretty big step, considering what you’re doing just with Facebook. It’s like building another company.

Emily Hirsh 22:38
Yeah. I mean, it’s like it would be a whole new department. So it’s also an investment too, because you got to build out for the training and everything. And, you know, I knew how to do Facebook ads, but I’m not a Google and a YouTube ad expert. So it’s a little different experience than how I built this arm of the business because I built all the training and everything you know, so it’s on the radar. It probably will be towards the end of this year or next year, when we do it.

Adam Force 23:02
Interesting. So tell me a little bit about just strategically, again speaking for our audience here who’s kind of playing around with these things and something like your course might be really valuable for them as well. And I’m just curious, you know, if people are testing out ads and things like that, is there anything about Facebook, they should know? Meaning, like you want to give it like, several days before you really call it a test. Like what qualifies it as a statistically relevant test?

Emily Hirsh 23:31
Yeah, I mean, a few like with just an ad itself, usually 24 to 48 hours will give you a lot of data on that ad in terms of like, Is it getting clicks? Is it getting action on the actual ad? But then with a funnel, like if you’re looking at your entire strategy, I usually say at least 100 people need to go through it. So you have a webinar or something, you need 100 leads to really go through and that’s still in the lower end. That’s like minimum. But you know, if you have something that’s 1000 dollars that you sell an average sales conversion is like one to 2% of total people who sign up for your webinar. So unless you get 100 in, you’re not even gonna really know if you got a sale and if it’s converting.

So for your whole strategy, that’s usually what I say. I mean, if you can get 1000, like, that’s way better, but that usually takes a little bit; it depends what you’re running traffic to. But the more people you can get in the whole funnel, in the whole journey is actually like more important than the ads. The ads, you can tell within a couple days. Are they getting clicks, you know, what are those metrics? And what do I need to fix about the ad itself. But the funnel is actually the harder part to get that to convert.

Adam Force 24:36
Gotcha. And I mean, so people…and I like the big picture of looking at the entire funnel. But if you’re trying to figure out ads that are for you know, a lead magnet to the funnel or direct to the webinar or [unintelligible] whatever it is, I mean, is it…do you qualify something in the sense of like, I put $50 on it for two days, and I could just see if it’s being picked up or not, or do you need at least $100. I mean, I know every category and audience is different but I think people get stuck on, Right, I’m going to do a $5 tests and I’m like, I don’t know that that’s going to tell you much.

Emily Hirsh 25:07
No $5 won’t tell you much at all. I mean, I think 50 to 100 you could at least see if you’re on track like that will give you at least a cost per click. Like, is the ads getting clicks? And did it get some conversion to a lead magnet or a webinar? Your goal should be like for a lead magnet we see an average of like one to $5. It depends on the industry. And then webinar we see from like three to $8. So, a lead or a registration. So you can look for that and you know, spending 100 you should at least get some [unintelligible]. So you know if you’re at least on the right track with audiences and your ad copy, and those components.

Adam Force 25:46
Listen, you get us to $3 for a webinar registration, you’re going to be my new best friend.

Emily Hirsh 25:53
Yeah, I mean, it we’ve got some even lower but I don’t you know say it because then people think that’s the standard. It all depends on your industry.

Adam Force 26:01
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And I think that entrepreneurs…I’ve noticed like some people are like, Oh, yeah, I had someone in our mastermind group. They’re like, Oh, yeah, I’m getting a 40 cent conversion on, you know, a lead magnet. It’s like for a very specific [unintelligible].

Emily Hirsh 26:17
Yeah, or a lot of times, like the health and wellness industry will convert really cheap lead magnets, but that doesn’t compare when you’re targeting business owners. It’s, it’s different. Yeah.

Adam Force 26:27
Exactly. Exactly. I mean, it gets way more expensive. I was super pumped when we were at like, $6 for lead magnet conversion.

Emily Hirsh 26:34
Yeah, no.

Adam Force 26:37
Awesome. Well, yeah, I think one of the…I had another question on the top of my mind. I just lost it. It was about where you were going with things. It might come back to me. We’ll see. So I guess right now you have this book that came out and I was just curious. I want to just hear a couple thoughts on you know, your…I’m actually curious in two things: One, just tell me a little bit about what the books about and why you created it. But two, I’m always curious when people create books in the entrepreneurship space, how long it took and what your process was like?

Emily Hirsh 27:08
Yeah, yeah, you’ll like this. So yeah, I wrote…my book is called Ignite Your Impact. It’s written for the audience that buys the course, that’s really who I wrote it for, because a lot of our higher level clients won’t read, you know, necessarily marketing books. They have it hired out. So we, I mean, some will. But it was written with that in mind, for people for the course. And it’s in depth about our…my process basically, is the core of the book, The Hirsh process, which is five steps. And I’ve always wanted to write a book, but I actually end of last year, joined a program where the goal was to write a book and it was a really cool process. So I actually wrote…the actual writing piece was two and a half days. So I wrote it all like very fast. I went to Hawaii with my friend and we both wrote our book during that time, so super fun. And the way we were able to do that was we pre planned everything.

So that was kind of the key is we had a very clear idea of like, who we were writing for. We had all the chapters planned out and the content that was going to go in them. So then you just sat down and you wrote. And you, you know, got through like three or four chapters a day, and you just had this schedule. And so I was able to get it done pretty quickly from when I decided I was going to do it to being done. And then obviously, it had to go through publishing and creating the cover. We self published so there’s a lot of steps you don’t know about, like, formatting a book and like an ISBN code, which I didn’t know what that was until, like a couple weeks ago. So you know, we added to that, but, you know, I wrote it to get my process out in another way for people to be able to consume it through reading it.

Adam Force 28:43
Yeah, I mean, that’s exciting. I see all your puzzle pieces coming together. So I hope it feels good. I mean, it looks good.

Emily Hirsh 28:51
Yeah, it does feel good. I can’t…I actually haven’t gotten a hardcover of it or a paperback of it like it’s coming. But I can’t wait to actually have that because that will be cool. It’ll be holding, you know, finally, a published book.

Adam Force 29:01
Yeah, it’ll be a feather in your cap. And so congratulations on all the progress and things that you have going on. I think one last question that people might want to hear, especially for the entrepreneurs in our audience who are, you know, six figures, and maybe they do want to hire out Facebook ads. I know I sure as hell don’t like managing Facebook ads. So the question is, you know, maybe just tell people a little bit about the process and like, how do you validate people? And are there companies that sometimes you don’t take on for any reason? Like, how do you know someone will have success with you or not? Because I’m sure you want to make sure anyone you work with that [unintelligible].

Emily Hirsh 29:40
Yeah, we…yeah, I mean, you’ve been through it. Our application and talking to our team, like we do have a pretty extensive process and of just getting people through just the application and then talking to our team about their business. We won’t take anyone on who doesn’t go through that process because like you said, we want to make sure that we can help you. And so people that you know wouldn’t be a fit is one…like the level…like if they…let’s say that they’re at a place where they’re like I can spend $1,000 a month ad spend. I mean, it doesn’t make sense to hire our agency and pay a management fee and then only spend that much like on ad spend because we can’t make you the money back, right?

So that’s one thing we’re looking at. And also, how much have they sold of their offer? Are they clear on who their audience is? Are they clear on the messaging piece, because we help with the strategy and we create great messaging. I mean, I have a creative team, but we have to… they have to have a solid idea of who they’re trying to go after and what they’re trying to sell that person to, before we can come in and do our job. We have a couple different packages. So we have like people who come in and they’ve already sold a ton and they’re at a higher level of business. And then we do have one that’s like for testing and buying data, but still done for you. So we have those options, but really they have to have a very clear offer. They have to be able to spend…the minimum is two to $3,000 a month in ad spend.

And then pay our management fee to make it worth hiring us, basically. So those are the big things that we’re looking for is like, do they have that clarity so we can do our job. We also really look for collaborative people, because our like, team takes over everything, but we’re working with influencers. And so we need you to be willing to do content and willing to show up for your audience and put out that value for our job to be the best that it can be. And so we’re looking for those people who are like, want to have a partnership and want to be collaborative and want to have like a holistic view to their marketing. And so they’re willing to show up on their organic social media, or maybe it’s like podcast or whatever. And we pair that with paid ads, and that’s when it works so well. And so we’re looking for that, too.

Adam Force 31:47
Oh, yeah, that sounds cool. I like that, too. And if you don’t mind me asking, and if you’re not comfortable answering you don’t have to, but I’m curious of…as people go through their, you know, three months or whatever the package might be that they work with you on to get the data and testing, what your retention rate is for clients these days.

Emily Hirsh 32:08
Yeah, so we track that daily. And it’s over 90% is our average every month. It fluctuates. Sometimes it’s 85, one month and 95 and other but at 90% is our average for the whole year of 2019. And we have…I’m like huge on that metric. We actually put it in our daily huddle on our team to track every day.

Adam Force 32:28
That’s awesome. Yeah, that’s a amazing number. I will let you know that when I was at the summit in California, just this last week, I was talking to Ally Ball and some others in Caitlin’s you know, mastermind program, and lots of nice things were said about Hirsh Marketing.

Emily Hirsh 32:45
Oh good. I’m glad. That’s an important piece with your…like any business, you gotta pay attention to your delivery because otherwise it catches up to you and that’s been a huge focus of mine is the actual client delivery and satisfaction and I I think that’s a huge contributing factor to my success for sure.

Adam Force 33:03
Absolutely. I could see the word of mouth doing its job. People were getting excited. Oh, really? Yeah. And you know, I’ve been following her and then they hear referrals, basically. So yeah, I’m just wanting to let you know, because I thought it was pretty powerful.

Emily Hirsh 33:15
That’s awesome. That makes me feel good.

Adam Force 33:18
Good, good. Good. So all right, listen, where I want to be respectful of your time. So we’re going to wrap up here, but I want to give you a chance to just let everyone know where do they find you? How do they learn more and see in what capacity maybe they can work with you?

Emily Hirsh 33:32
Yeah, I mean, honestly, my website is probably the best place to go: hirshmarketing.com because then you can kind of check out our agency services or check out our program or check out my book if you just want to go that route. I also have a podcast I release twice a week that sounds like yours — like short, a lot of value in it so people can consume it. And so I give away a lot of value because my ideal client is somebody who doesn’t want to necessarily do it themselves fully. So I give away a lot on that podcast, like I’m very transparent and strategic. And so yeah, that comes out every…twice a week. So that’s another option. And then we release also what I call the Hirsh Marketing Report every month, which has a lot of behind the scenes strategies and intel and data from my team, from what we’re seeing from what we do. And we release that every month in a PDF.

Adam Force 34:23
There you go, guys, you got a ton of information. I’ve listened to it. I’ve scoped it out. There’s a lot of value in there for sure. Emily, our team is sick of Facebook ads so that’s why we spoke to you guys. And we really appreciate you just taking the time here today to you know, share these ideas, share your story. It’s nice just to see how you’re developing things and the success that you’ve had. So appreciate your time.

Emily Hirsh 34:49
Thanks so much.

Announcer 34:51
That’s all for this episode. Your next step is to join the Change Creator revolution by downloading our interactive digital magazine app for premium content, exclusive interviews, and more ways to stay on top of your game available now on iTunes and Google Play or visit changecreatormag.com. We’ll see you next time where money and meaning intersect right here at the Change Creator Podcast.

 

Susan Meier: Electrifying Your Brand Strategy to Amplify Your Impact

Listen to our exclusive interview with Susan Meier:

 

Subscribe to this show on Spotify  |  iTunes  |  Stitcher  |  Soundcloud

Susan Meier is a brand strategist, a visual artist, and the owner of Susan Meier Studio. Her past clients include Unilever, PepsiCo, Kellogg’s, Mars, Samsung, and Novartis. She has extensive experience in the field of branding and she shares some of her wisdom with us in this podcast.

Currently, Susan is working mostly in the health and wellness space. As a staunch advocate for people taking the reins when it comes to their own health, she works with a lot of clients who deal with technologies that facilitate patient interactions with their healthcare providers. Her ultimate goal is to help people improve their healthcare experience.

A Customized Approach for Every Business

For most projects, Susan takes what she refers to as a portfolio approach. She helps larger corporations with their sales and marketing teams, generally looking at branding during a week-long project with a set scope and phases of work. For smaller, early stage companies — especially those with a smaller budget — her approach generally focuses more on innovation, usually in workshop format. In this way, she helps young businesses capture their culture once they know exactly what they stand for but before they grow so much that this sort of thing gets a little out of hand.

In her nine years of helping companies build their brand identity, Susan has always set aside a portion of her portfolio for these smaller projects despite them being less lucrative for her. The payoff? They inspire her and she learns a lot from them. She enjoys contributing to entrepreneurs who are just starting out. That aha moment when the small, independent professional who has come to her for help realizes what their true identity is, who their audience is, and how they empathetically connect with them is something Susan finds truly rewarding. She refers to these elements as the three pieces of branding.

What is Branding?

Ask ten different business owners what branding is and you’ll get ten different answers. For Susan, branding refers to who it is you want to be in the world. What do you stand for? What are your values? What do you bring to the party that’s different from what anyone else is bringing?

It starts with identity and really kind of authentically thinking about who you are and who you want to be.

Language is also key, stresses Susan. Finding the right terminology when establishing your brand will make all the difference.

It All Starts With Self-Reflection

Thinking about who you are and who you want to be is the first step in the branding process, according to Susan. She explains that it’s okay to experiment with ideas and find that they don’t work. However, she also stresses the importance of constantly questioning whether it is truly you. Ask yourself if this is truly who you want to be. Is it who you are? Is this brand idea leveraging my uniqueness? My creativity? She goes on to explain that as an entrepreneur, you will not be able to create that groundbreaking idea when you’re just not feeling it. There needs to be a purpose for everything.

It needs to be mindful; it needs to be intentional. It can’t just be pretty.

The Pitfalls of Social Media

Susan warns that there is a distinction between branding and building a presence on social media. While building an online presence is important, she cautions that it skips over the step of figuring out who you are before figuring out how to get as many followers as possible. She adds that newer entrepreneurs who haven’t been through a branding process assume that their brand is synonymous with their social media presence which it is not. While branding is the basis of who you are, your social media presence is more of an execution tactic.

Advice for Early Stage Entrepreneurs

When asked for some advice for entrepreneurs who are just starting out, Susan recommended the first step to be one of self-reflection. Take a moment and think about who you personally are, what you are building and why, and what your motivations are. Make a list of your values. Secondly, think about where you would like to see yourself and your business or brand in ten years. 

Another effective approach for early-stage entrepreneurs is to write a mission statement and then think about who you are serving, whether you have an audience, whether you have one customer or many, and then connect the dots between all those things. Take a good look at who you are serving, how you are serving, and what your promise is to them.

Lastly, Susan makes reference to the holy grail of branding: that you’ve thought through what you stand for and what you do before deciding how you will express your brand. 

 

We also recommend:

Transcription of Interview (Transcribed by Otter.ai; there may be errors.)

Adam Force 0:11
Hey, what’s up and welcome back to the Change Creator podcast show. Hope you are all doing really well and your week is off to a great start. It is Tuesday the 28th here as we speak. And if you missed the last episode we spoke with Peter Montoya. He’s a really…has a really impressive background and we spoke about transformational leadership, which is so important in today’s digital marketing climate, and leading good teams, good cultures, and that’s a great conversation. So if you didn’t get to listen to it, swing back, check it out. I think you’ll get some good nuggets out of there.

This week, we will be talking to Susan Meier. Now Susan is a brand strategist and a visual artist and so she’s done — she has a lot of great experience in this space and she has her own company right now called Susan Meier Studio. And and historically she’s worked with brands on this stuff including people like Unilever, you know, PepsiCo, Kellogg’s, Mars, Samsung, you know, some big players in the health space like Genentech and Novartis, so a lot of great experience to share. And we’re going to talk a lot about branding and user experience and things like that, because, well, one, that’s an area that’s really important to your business for, you know, visual, you know, communication. But also, this is an area that I nerd out on. I love branding and user experience. So I’m excited to have this conversation, I think you’ll get a lot of good stuff out of it. So stay tuned, we’re going to dive into that in just a minute. If you haven’t been to changecreator.com in a while, swing through there and pick up your Three Skills That Every Entrepreneur Must Have to Grow and Impact Business.

So many good insights in there. We’ve had lots of great feedback and I think you’ll enjoy that blueprint, basically. It’s right there on the homepage when you get there. So check that out. And I think you guys will get a lot out of it. And if you are on our email list or in our Facebook group, the Profitable Digital Impact Entrepreneur, I want to let you know that we do have a challenge that our team — myself, Amy, Danielle and Solene — are putting on. And that is actually kicking off today the 28th. So if you haven’t got the email sign up for the challenge. It’s called the Story Powered Marketing Challenge. We really want to start helping people understand how to harness the power of storytelling in today’s digital marketing world and why it’s so important, and what it means to your business — all that good stuff. So we’re going to start setting you up with those steps, and it’s going to be a lot of fun. So that’s kicking off today. So if you’re in the group, you probably got the invite or if you’re on our email list. If not, you can jump in at the last minute here or maybe you can catch us on the next time around. Alright guys, that’s about it for today. We’re going to kick this off with Susan Meier and start talking about some brand strategy.

Announcer 2:46
Okay, show me the heat!

Adam Force 2:51
Hey, Susan. Welcome to the Change Creator Podcast Show. How are you doing today?

Susan Meier 2:55
I’m great. Adam, how are you?

Adam Force 2:56
I’m doing amazing. The sun is shining. Actually, it’s pretty hot out here today. I’m in Miami. Remind me where you are.

Susan Meier 3:03
Lucky you. I’m in New York and it is freezing. The sun is shining, though.

Adam Force 3:06
I do love New York though, so cold or not. Yes. So listen, you know, I’m a big fan of branding and UX and all that fun stuff. So I think branding is such a important part of, you know, the personality of a company and who is behind it and all that kind of stuff. So tell me a little bit just about like what you have going on these days. I like to get the latest and greatest and then we’ll get a little bit on how you got there.

Susan Meier 3:35
Oh, sure. So, I have been for the last few years. fielding mostly work in the health and wellness space. And I find that really exciting because I’m a big advocate of helping people take more control over their own health journey. So I work a lot with clients who work in the technology space enabling, you know, sort of patient interaction with their healthcare or doctor interaction via new technologies. And I think we’re living in a time, in a world, where there’s so many new opportunities opening up through technology and through innovation that’s going to really improve our health — much needed — improve our healthcare experience. Yeah, so that’s been pretty exciting.

Adam Force 4:23
Okay, and so right now you’re doing a lot of consulting with companies. And I think you mentioned that you might be doing some, some new testing to work with individuals, yeah?

Susan Meier 4:33
Yeah, so my, in my business, I have a kind of a portfolio approach. So I work with larger companies, larger brands, corporations, helping their sales and marketing teams, generally, think about branding, and that usually looks like a, you know, sort of multiple week long project with set scope and phases of work, right like a traditional consulting model. Then I also run workshops, which is typically around innovation. But also I’ve done that for a very quick, quick brand positioning, sort of get my brand off the ground, put a stake in the ground around my brand. And that’s usually for earlier stage or smaller companies who don’t necessarily have the budget, but they do have the need, particularly when they’re early stage and are just about to grow, needing to sort of say, Let’s capture this great culture that we have now what our brand really stands for, before we grow and you know, the sort of things have the potential to get out of control.

So I’ve been doing this for nine years, and I’ve always saved a portion of my mental portfolio for those projects, even though they’re not as lucrative for me, right? But they’re very inspiring, and I really enjoy doing that work. And I learn a lot from it. And I like to think I contribute, you know, something as well there. So I enjoy that. And then what we were just chatting about is that in the last couple of years I’ve had individuals, so entrepreneurs, independent professionals like doctors, lawyers, consultants, people in those kinds of industries, where they’re an individual shingle. So it’s a professional brand, but it’s really the brand is them. And they’re sort of at a moment where they’re thinking about what their path forward is going to be, sort of how they want to show up in the world in a consistent way. And so I’ve been doing one-on-one work with a number of people using the same tools around, you know, what’s your identity? Who’s your audience? And how do you empathically connect with them? And how do you manage your messaging? Those are kind of the three pieces of branding, or at least they are for the way I approach it.

And, and so those are relevant for individual business owners and entrepreneurs as well. And this year going to be launching a brand new product, which I’m really excited about, which is a series of workshops where, which makes it a little bit more accessible and affordable for people who can’t necessarily pay the fee for a one-on-one, full-day session. where, you know, it’s a handful of people, maybe five or 10 people that come together in a room for that day-long session, do those same exercises, and share with each other inspiration, insights, as well as you know, my facilitating.

Adam Force 7:31
So sounds like you have a lot going on and some exciting stuff coming down the pipeline with the workshops. Can we just level set on how you’re defining branding?

Susan Meier 7:43
Sure.

Adam Force 7:44
And then tell us a little bit about your process.

Susan Meier 7:48
That’s a great question. And I’m so glad you asked it. I feel like so many of the things that I do for a living and that I talk about — branding, strategy, creativity — are all words that are just a little squishy, and people use them to mean so many different things, right? And none of those definitions is wrong per se. But for me, branding is really about Who do you want to be in the world? You know, what do you stand for? What are your values? What do you bring to the party that’s different from what anyone else is bringing? And so that’s why when I think about branding, and the process that I take my clients through, it starts with identity, and really kind of authentically thinking about who you are and who you want to be. I usually do like a values…I always do a values exercise, and we often will do a mission statement coming out of that.

Because I think it’s really important to self reflect, right? Before you sort of go, Oh, well, I want to be who my customers want me to be, which is not unimportant. It’s important to understand your audience and think about how you can deliver on their needs, of course. But first, you have to be true to yourself. And so then the second part of the process is, you know, you are providing a service or product, so you need to obviously think about who is on the other end of that product. And so depending on…I’ve worked with clients who were really in touch with that, and I’ve also worked with clients who aren’t so in touch with that, not because they’re bad people, or they’re not empathetic, but because it’s typically in spheres where it’s like a new technology.

So, they’re either scientists who are developing, you know, a new drug, or engineers who are developing a new technology or developers who are developing a new technology that’s really exciting. And it’s kind of all about the science of what they’ve created. And it’s this new breakthrough thing that everybody knows is new and breakthrough and haven’t quite yet thought about how it’s going to be used or how it’s going to be understood by the audience or even who the audience might be. And so that’s not a wrong way to innovate. It’s just a way where they need a little more help kind of thinking about things from the outside in.

Adam Force 10:03
Yeah, I mean, we see this a lot, too. And it’s like, you know, people are great at what they do. But they’re not necessarily experts at how to position it, how to get the world to understand it, and how to express what they’re doing, because that’s just not their skill set. Right? So they lean into people like yourself to learn how to do that part of it. And I think, you know, strategically like you make some comments on your website and stuff about kind of joining forces of creativity and strategy. And I completely agree with that. And I think that it’s really important for people, they don’t need to become branding experts, but they have to understand the strategy about what…how to like, think about it, right?

Susan Meier 10:44
Absolutely. And we can’t all be experts, nor should we be experts in everything. I don’t know how to code. And I’m not going to learn and I’m so grateful to those who do. So, yeah. So I bring sort of my skill set, as you do and as we all do. But yeah, I think the combination of creativity and strategy is very core to my ideology. It’s kind of core to who I am. I am both a brand strategist and a visual artist. I do that not just as a hobby, but also professionally. I show and sell my work and that’s been a part of me for as long as I can remember — actually, longer than I’ve been…much longer than I’ve been a brand strategist. And so I bring that perspective to the strategy work I do and what I find, you know, in my own life, but I also hear this when I’m talking to people about their careers and their paths — that to the extent that they can bring whatever their creative spark is, whatever creativity looks like in their life, into their so-called real work or into the work that requires them to have their analytical logic brain on, the more electrified that work can be, right?

They’re going to be more innovative. They’re going to be more engaged. It’s gonna be more fun. So I think the combination of those two things. And the other thing I think is super interesting, as I’ve read a little bit about this, the neuroscience actually supports this, we talk a lot about in popular culture about left brain and right brain. And I think we’ve actually begun to believe that we have these two separate halves of our brains that govern different functions. And it’s actually just not true from a neuroscience perspective. The two sides of the brain work together on everything, you know, certainly Language Center might be located here versus there. But you can’t speak without using both sides of your brain. And so I think there’s a kind of a pretty poetry in that.

Adam Force 12:39
Yeah. I mean, I would imagine that we’re not just — that the whole brain is being used. And it’s not just these little compartments that they kind of make it out to be. It just doesn’t make much sense. And I think you know, there’s a misunderstanding. When you hear branding people are like, Oh, my logo and my colors.

Susan Meier 12:59
Yeah, I’m glad you raised that. So it’s not that that’s not branding. That’s an important component of branding. And in my experience that’s often referred to as brand identity. Although that can also be confusing, because I just use the word identity to mean something else. So language is tricky. By the way, that’s a big part of branding: finding the right language. But yes, so yeah, so your logo, your name, your tagline, your colors, your fonts, your website, your podcast, all of that is part of your brand. I think of that as the expression of your brand. So the company I actually worked for before I started my own company — I was the Director of Strategy, but my title was Director of Vision.

There was a Director of Design, but her title was Director of Expression. And I thought that was so genius. I was really inspired by that. By the way, it’s the best title I’ve ever had: Director of Vision. It was so much cooler than strategy because really, that’s what strategy — if you would ask me the question about what is strategy that’s a whole longer another long answer. But really, it’s vision, right? You’re looking forward into where you want to go, and how you’re going to get there. And similarly, you know, the design and expression is really a great word for those visual components, or those succinct verbal components of how you come out into the world. That’s how you express your brand.

Adam Force 14:33
Yeah, yeah, hundred percent. You know, and it’s funny because, you know, I’ve done my fair share with some of these things. And I would, you know, I always read this research because you hear people talk about, well, you got to be this color because of this psychological reason and that’s like [unintelligible] reason.

Susan Meier 14:49
Yeah.

Adam Force 14:50
And one of the things that we do teach in our own program when it comes to just like, you know, helping people understand the basics around their website and stuff like that is like, you know, You can get hung up on the psychology of color. And I’m bringing this up just curious to see how you feel about it. And I would always say, listen, there’s probably some truth to some of these things, no doubt with some of the data and the tests. You could find conflicting information all over the place. At the end of the day, I would say like, Okay, if I told you, you’re going to go to the Harley Davidson website, and you think about in your mind automatically from preconceived information, bikers, black leather coats, all that stuff, and you went to their website, and it was all pink with flowers, it would probably not make sense to you. So to me, great branding is when someone thinks about, like, where they’re going, and then they get there and it makes sense.

Susan Meier 15:42
Yes, you’ve got to have a reason for what you’re doing. Now, there’s in your, for example, in your example, if you had a motorcycle brand and you got to their website, and it was pink, and there was some compelling reason for that, that they were able to explain, that was part of their brand DNA and their brand story, that could also be genius, right? Because everybody else goes right and they go left. So you can’t rule anything out. But I think the point, that is exactly the point you’re making that it needs to be mindful, it needs to be intentional. It can’t just be pretty. It has to be in service of some. And that for me is the holy grail of branding. That’s why branding is important is that you’ve thought through what you stand for, and why you do what you do before you make those expression decisions.

Adam Force 16:34
Exactly. And I like that you use the word intentional. I mean, I think that’s just such a big part of just everything we do as entrepreneurs is to make sure we’re acting with intention. You know, and I spoke to Jay Shetty a while back and one of the things he mentioned was a story he was with his art teacher, and he would go through this process there: Alright you guys, I want you to draw x, y&z. And you can do the best drawing, the most beautiful drawing just like he said. A beautiful website. And he would say, Well, why is this here? Why did you do that? Why’d you use this color? And if you didn’t have good reason, you fail. But you could have the ugliest drawing in the world and as long as you had a really specific intention for why you did certain things, you would get an A.

Susan Meier 17:15
Yeah, that’s a that’s a good teacher. That’s a good crit, as they call it. You know that you have to defend your work.

Adam Force 17:21
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So let’s talk a little bit. Now we kind of touched on strategy, we touched on branding. And you know, you say that in a lot of ways people think that these are at odds. So let’s just talk about that and explain how they’re not at odds.

Susan Meier 17:39
Well, I think there’s a bunch of myths that we grow up with, and it’s not necessarily that they’re in the front of our mind, or that we actively believe them if we were asked, but they’re so prevalent that somewhere they’re lodged inside our brains, like the starving artist, for example, right? Or in the same way that you might say, the absent minded professor. So this idea that people who are highly creative are somehow not, then at the same time, efficient or productive or organized. And it’s just not true because those who are highly creative and are successful in executing their creativity are extraordinarily efficient and productive and organized.

Everyone has their own way of doing that. Maybe they surround themselves with a team, maybe they have different tools than you or I or somebody else uses. But that tension that I think we set up as a society, starting with this idea of left brain versus right brain is just a myth. And in fact, if you’ve heard the expression freedom within a framework, I think there’s actually a sort of a confluence of the two sides. Not only is there not attention, but you need that stability and order in order to be creative and free and innovative. right? You need those two sides together.

Adam Force 19:10
True. Yeah, very true. Yeah, I think that makes sense. And there are so many myths. I mean, I guess we all have so many years of just different kinds of conditioning and messages. And you know, I always say today, it’s like, you know, we have this internet thing now. And there’s so much information out there where accessibility to become an entrepreneur, to live the life you want, is there. However, it’s also saturated with so much, just, misinformation because there’s a lot of people out there that really, they are trying to be something that they’re not, which means they’re not acting with true authenticity and intention, because they’re hungry to seize an opportunity. And all of a sudden, you have just flawed information, right? And I think a lot of that plays a part of this, right?

Susan Meier 19:57
I think it always comes back to self reflection, or should always start with self reflection if possible, right? Like thinking about who you are, who you want to be.

Adam Force 20:08
Yeah.

Susan Meier 20:08
And that’s also not always that easy, especially, you know, let’s say you’re 18 years old. It takes a moment to figure out who you are and who you want to be. And it’s okay to experiment with stuff and find that it doesn’t work. But that process of constantly looking back in the mirror and saying, Is this me? Is this really who I want to be? Is this really who I am? Is this really leveraging my unique stuff, my special sauce, my creativity, I think is very important. And you’re not going to really be able to make that impact, to create that groundbreaking idea in a sphere where you’re just kind of not feeling it, where it’s not the right fit for you. And so it’s always kind of that, you know, I think in the beginning of your career, you’re bouncing back and forth. Well, let me try stuff because you got to try stuff. That’s fine, it’s fine to sort of try something and you know, either fail or just discovered that it’s not right for you. But you kind of have to keep coming back to that core, that mindful intention of like, Who am I was this right? Why wasn’t it? Okay, let’s try something else.

Adam Force 21:15
Hundred percent. Yeah, it’s true. And that is those are steps I think that people believe they already know in their head like, yeah, yeah, I know who I am. I know what I love and all that stuff, and I know what I’m about. And they take them lightly and it’s kind of like the analogy I usually use is it’s like the one of the three little pigs building their house out of straw. And then you’re gonna have to keep going back and at some point, you’re like, why aren’t I connecting with the audience? Like why am I not making sales? Like why can’t I get anyone to pay attention to me? And then you’re like, then I gotta go back and like re sharpen my saw rebuild my house out of bricks now.

Susan Meier 21:50
Yeah, absolutely. I’m still doing that all the time.

Adam Force 21:54
Exactly. And that’s why I was going to do the house and I was like, you know, I said, resharpened the saw because we all have to go back and look at that sometimes because it strengthens what we’re doing just to like, sharpen it up again.

Susan Meier 22:05
Yep.And I think if we can think of it as a process, that it can actually be fun. And I think that goes back to where, you know, if you think about things through a creative mindset, then this becomes not, Oh, I had a goal, and I failed. And now I have to retool, because that thing failed. That’s a terrible story to tell yourself. Why would you tell your story that way? I mean, it’s, you know, it’s so much cooler to think, Oh, I created something. And now I need to resharpen my saw, create something else. And look, I made a hat out of something that used to be a dog. That’s much cooler!

Adam Force 22:43
True. And you put your scientific hat on, right? So here you are, you’re building a brand and you’re trying to see what works and what doesn’t. And you have to look — can’t tie emotion to it. So things take time. You put some effort in and you look at it as Yeah, you have a million ways of doing something and if the first one kind of flops, you cross it off your list and you move on to the next one. And it’s exciting; the story should be: Great, now I know that one’s…that’s one less I have to test out. Let’s move on to the next thing, right? So, in my mind, I’m always excited. I mean, yes, there are points of stress when you spend $10,000 and you’re not getting the results that you want.

But, you know, one thing we’ve learned, and you know, not to go off of branding too much, but, you know, you have to be willing to put in the time or the money one way or the other to get the data.

Susan Meier 23:31
That’s right.

Adam Force 23:31
You know, you’ve got to get the data. And I think that’s a hard lesson for people and they say, I don’t have the time and money to waste. And that’s the wrong word: waste. You’re not wasting it.

Susan Meier 23:41
It’s invest. It’s invest. For sure.

Adam Force 23:42
Yes. Exactly.

Susan Meier 23:44
Yeah, I think back to in college, there was a guy who lived on my hall who was two years older, and he was going through corporate recruiting, you know, where the companies come to campus and they recruit the best and the brightest students. And you send in your resume and then they send you back an acceptance letter or a rejection letter. And so this guy put all of his rejection letters up on his door. So you would walk by his door every day. And there would be, you know, three letters, five letters. This guy got rejected by like, 30 companies, and he owned it like a badge of honor. And he told me, I feel like those rejection letters aren’t failures. They’re like, look at the work that I put in here. And I am one rejection letter closer to landing that job. And I remember that my whole adult life; I thought that was such a cool way of looking at it.

Adam Force 24:39
Yeah, I mean, that is a mindset that you want to have. I mean, that is, yeah, it’s great to see that kind of stuff. And it’s funny because everybody thinks differently and you know, you find out in business that a lot of times, it’s not that you’re not doing the work or putting in the time. Like that’s all…everybody can do that. It’s really, How are you thinking about things? And you know, we talked about the conditioning. So how do you look at branding that maybe you’re not taking the right steps because you don’t see it the right way. Your perspective is not right. And there’s a lot that contributes to that. So, you know, having someone like yourself, like, as a guide, and somebody that’s been down the road many times, you know, this is where, you know, it is helpful to invest. Because a lot of times, you know, you need help on how to think about these things.

Susan Meier 25:22
Yeah. And I think just on what you just said…you know, I sort of read about what people are writing about when I think about personal branding. And I think that this is a little bit one of the pitfalls of the prevalence of social media, because so much of what I read about personal branding goes straight in for: How do you build your presence on social media? which is not an unimportant thing. But I think it skips over that step of figuring out who you are, before figuring out how you, you know, get as many followers as possible. And I think that a lot of people think about, you know, if you haven’t been through a branding process, a lot of people think about their brand as almost synonymous with their social media presence. And it’s not, you know, it’s not…it’s the basis of who you are. And then your social media presence is kind of an execution tactic.

Adam Force 26:15
Yeah. But contextually or content wise, I think would be a reflection of your brand expression, yeah?

Susan Meier 26:23
Exactly. Exactly.

Adam Force 26:25
Yeah. So I mean, there is a level of consistency. And, you know, we have to trademark this but we call it a digital conversation. Because, you know, you’re basically like…we teach storytelling for marketing and how to apply that to your digital, you know, business, right? And we’re not going door to door anymore. We’re not sitting down and having a one hour conversation where you can hear feedback and give a direct story or give insight that helps with the conversation. But we have all these bits and pieces around the internet that serve different purposes, and they tell different stories at different times, depending on who you’re talking to, right? So, you know, it’s that consistency. And people start doing different things in different places. And the whole narrative gets — which is basically part of the branding — gets messed up.

Susan Meier 27:08
Somebody told me the other day that in their company, they sort of forced themselves to come up with three messages and three messages only: What are our three messages? And then they put them up in the common area. And everybody had to be thinking about those three…and if what they were doing at that moment wasn’t in service of one of those three messages, they shouldn’t be doing it. I thought, wow, that’s tight. That’s great, you know.

Adam Force 27:33
Yeah, I mean, that’s true. That’s a great way to think about it. I mean, some people leverage the mission statement or whatever it might be, and there is a part of, I guess, leadership to keep the brand, you know, in line, I guess, and maybe I want to say, but just to keep everybody inspired and going in the right direction. Like, this is what we’re about. This is why you’re here. And so as you do anything, you need to be thinking about this because I’ll tell you, you know, after all my years, there’s many crossroads of like temptation to do things that might go off brand, because it might be more financially, you know, abundant for you, or whatever it might be. And it’s easy to go down those roads.

Susan Meier 28:14
It’s easy as an individual, and then think about how easy it is when you’re not thinking about a large organization. In fact, I have had a large number of clients who have gone through the branding process with them. And then they’ve asked me to stay on for six months to a year in what we call brand stewardship. You’re just sort of making sure that those branding principles were executed consistently by everyone. Everybody actually understood what we had done and why we had done it, and how it would appear in the world through those different channels of expression. That’s, that’s…it’s not easy.

Adam Force 28:52
No, it’s not. And it’s great that you’re working with individuals, smaller companies now because I think getting in on the ground floor like that to set up your culture and become a leader from the earlier days is a lot easier than trying to make a culture shift when you’re already 50 people deep. You know?

Susan Meier 29:10
Definitely. And the other thing is that, you know, most startups that I’ve seen, they have a delightful and unique culture that comes about from those three, four or five founders, right? And then they grow to like 10 or 15 people, and they still have this really true specific culture. And then all of a sudden, they grow or they’re about to grow to 30 people or 40 people, and that’s the moment when it’s easy to forget that culture. And to or to dilute that culture because those people weren’t there and it’s not their DNA. They need to be taught the DNA, you know, offered the DNA.

Adam Force 29:54
They need to be, I guess what is like a little training program.

Susan Meier 30:00
Onboarding.

Adam Force 30:00
Onboarding, that’s the word I wanted. You know, I don’t know if you know TOMS, like TOMS shoes. So I interviewed, in one of my past conversations, Blake Mycoskie, and I asked him, if he went back and started TOMS again, is there anything that he might do differently? And at first he’s like, No, not really. And then he’s like, actually, you know what I would do differently. He goes, I would go back and I would…when we were hiring our executive team and upper management and stuff like that, he goes, I would be more careful about who we brought on, because they come with all their past experience and it could be baggage. Because now they come in, and they might be a great salesman, or whatever it might be, but they’re good at where they were and they have their own ways of doing things that now they’re going to bring to the company, which could be completely in the opposite direction of your culture.

Susan Meier 30:47
Yeah. Yeah. It’s so true. I think we’ve all worked with a person at some time or other who starts their job and every third word out of their mouth is, Well, at my old job we used to…

Adam Force 30:58
Exactly, exactly.

Susan Meier 31:00
It’s, I mean, it’s easy to do, right? Because you’re trying to leverage your experience.

Adam Force 31:04
Well, yeah, I guess our takeaway here for everybody listening is really, you know, getting set up with the right strategy, understanding yourself, kind of building out the brand to reflect this expression of all that consistently. But then figuring out as you scale the business, how do you maintain that and don’t lose touch with it, right? So you want to have that stuff thought out and make sure you’re paying attention to it. So we’re going to wrap up here in a minute. But let’s just recap…if there’s any recap, you want to give about just a couple key takeaways about the branding process for early stage entrepreneurs that you think might be helpful, let’s just recap that real quick now.

Susan Meier 31:40
Sure, I think my advice would be, first of all, self reflect. Take a moment, take a pause wherever you are in the process and think about who you personally are — what it is exactly that you’re building and why, what your personal motivations are, what your aspirations are for your company, what your aspirations are for yourself professionally. All of those kind of self assessment questions, just a snapshot. And then think about, you know, where you would like to see yourself, your business, your brand, in 10 years.

Make yourself a list of values that you stand, you know, we believe…I believe…I stand for…that kind of thing. Or write yourself a mission statement, something that puts a stake in the ground that you can then go look back at or share with other people. And then think through Who am I serving? You know, do I have one audience? Do you have one customer or consumer, or are there are many constituents to what it is that I’m doing? And then you connect the dots between those things, right? So, you know, who am I uniquely in the world and who do I want to be? Who am I serving? And so therefore, how am I serving like, what’s my promise to them?

Adam Force 32:55
Exactly. I love that perfect, perfect.

Susan Meier 32:59
So those are the Cliff Notes.

Adam Force 33:00
I like the Cliff Notes. Yeah, just a little recap. We touched on a bunch of stuff. So that’s helpful. And listen, if people want to learn more about what you’re doing, maybe connect with you, work with you, where do they go? Where can they find you?

Susan Meier 33:14
I think it’s easy to start at Twitter where I’m @susanhmeier, and then all my other information — website, etc. — is there. And also there you can read my thoughts on what I’m thinking about and what I’m following.

Adam Force 33:30
Okay, so that’s @susanhmeier. Everybody, Meier is M-E-I-E-R. Okay. Awesome, Susan. Really appreciate your time today. That was a fun conversation.

Susan Meier 33:42
Thanks so much, Adam.

Adam Force 33:43
Alright. We’ll talk again soon.

Susan Meier 33:44
Take care.

Announcer 33:45
That’s all for this episode. Your next step is to join the Change Creator revolution by downloading our interactive digital magazine app for premium content, exclusive interviews, and more ways to stay on top of your game available now on iTunes and Google Play or visit changecreatormag.com. We’ll see you next time where money and meaning intersect right here at the Change Creator podcast.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

3 of Best Magento Page Builders: Create Stunning Pages for Your Store

Want to build a great looking page for your eCommerce store? Our guide to the best Magento page builders can help.

Having a visually appealing website can make a big difference to your conversion rates. A great-looking page not only showcases your products, it also encourages customers to stay for longer – and can drive your visitors along the path you want them to take.

You might think that creating pages is complicated, or that you need to know HTML or CSS to do it. Thankfully, there are Magento extensions out there that turn what could be a headache into an easy, smooth process – with no coding knowledge whatsoever.

Today, we’ll be looking at three page builders for Magento, looking at their features, user reviews, and pricing, to help find the right 3rd party extension for you.

First, let’s take a quick look at some of the features you should look for when choosing a page builder.

What to Look for in a Page Builder

There are a few things to keep an eye out for:

The Page Builder

How does the page builder work? A drag-and-drop builder is best for those with no coding knowledge – it’s such a simple way to build a page. What content can you create using their page builder? Can you add images and videos easily? How easy is it to add product information?

Templates

If you don’t want to build a page from scratch, check that your chosen Magento extension has premade templates that you like the look of.

User-Friendliness

Building pages can take a long time. You want to try and find an extension that is easy to navigate and intuitive to use, to save frustration and headaches.

SEO

It’s important that your pages are optimized for SEO. How can the extension you’re looking that support you in this? Do they offer built-in SEO tools? Do their pages have fast loading times?

Extra Features

Some extensions have extra features, like scheduled posting or integration with other platforms. The more features you have, the higher the cost tends to be, however.

Real-Life Examples

Finally, you might want to see if a page builder is any good, check out some websites that have been built using that platform (you can usually find links to examples on the extensions’ own website). If you like what you see, you will probably be able to create something similar using that extension for your own pages.

3 Best Page Builders – an Overview

Name of Feature DragDropr Shogun Page Builder by Magezon
Page Editor Drag and Drop Drag and Drop Drag and Drop
Pre-made templates No Yes Yes
SEO tools No Yes Yes
Custom page elements Yes Yes Yes
Fast page loading Yes Yes Yes
Extra features None Split testing, page scheduling, analytics suite Built-in color palettes

 

 

Logo gallery with over 900 logos

Pricing From $14.90 per month for single use, up to $198 for multiple clients From $49 per month $199 one-time payment, plus optional $79/$129 service agreement for extra support

DragDropr Visual Page Builder

DragDropr is a great example of how an extension can help you to build a page, even without any coding or technical knowledge. It has a drag-and-drop interface, so all you have to do is point and click – it’s super easy to use.

It has a bunch of great features that will make your website both attractive and easy to use. The ‘add to cart button’ widget is really useful, plus you can add new products simply by dragging and dropping it onto the page. It has over 200 content blocks to choose from, so you should be able to create the page you have envisioned.

You can even enable or disable product elements including images, names, and descriptions – all within the DragDropr interface.

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You can create Magento landing pages, articles, and blog pages.

Antoher great feature is the ability to save your content as a HTML file. This allows you to edit your page at a HTML level if you’re that way inclined, and you can also import a new theme with just one click.

Plus, the page you are editing shows changes to your page in real time – so you’ll be able to see exactly what your page looks like as you go.

In terms of mobile and tablet devices, DragDropr generates content that automatically adjusts to the screen size of the person browsing. You can also check to see what it looks like on different devices, to make sure it looks great on every screen size.

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You can create great looking pages with DragDropr – however, it doesn’t seem to have pre-made templates to choose from. If you’re happy to work with the layout your current Magento template provides, this might not be a problem, but it’s something to be aware of.

One of the aims of DragDropr is to be ‘efficient’ – which it certainly is. If you’re looking for a drag-and-drop editor and nothing else, it could be a really great choice for you. However, it does lack some features that other page editors have, like analytics, for example. It also doesn’t give you much guidance in terms of making the most of your pages, so if you want to find out how to improve your SEO or conversion rates, it’s not going to walk you through it.

However, that being said, it comes at a low price point – so if you’re on a tight budget, and you’re willing to forgo some of the extra features another page builder might offer, it could be a decent option for you.

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There isn’t a huge amount of information on the DragDropr Magento FAQ page, which is a shame. This could be a great resource on how to use the platform to your advantage if it had more articles and guides. However, the DragDropr staff are knowledgable and users say they are extremely helpful (but more on that in a moment).

Main Features

  • Intuitive drag-and-drop editor
  • Over 200 content blocks to choose from, including videos, text, images, buttons, and dynamic content
  • Easily add products from your Magento store
  • Enable and disable product elements
  • Create an ecommerce website that looks good on every device
  • Live preview allows you to see how it looks as you go along

User Reviews

Users enjoy how easy the DragDropr interface is to use, even for those who have never built a website before. They also report that the team offer great support for when things do go wrong. They even reported that the team were able to provide them with CSS that allowed them to add drop-down content to their page, which is helpful.

It has an average rating of 4.8 out of 5 stars.

Pricing

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The extension itself is free to download in the Magento extension store. However, you need to have a DragDropr account to use it. There are three price plans:

  • Single Account – $14.90 per month paid annually

This is great for users who only have one online store.

  • Agency – $118 per month paid annually

This is a good plan for those who have clients they want to build websites for – it allows for up to 30 clients.

  • White Label – $198 per month paid annually

This is for bigger brands and gives you up to 50 clients and unlimited custom domains.

You can find DragDropr on the Magento extension store here

Frequently Asked Questions

Is DragDropr compatible with Magento 2.3?

According to their page on the Magento extension store, it is not currently compatible with 2.3 – but they’re working on it.

Can I add custom fonts to my pages?

You can – this involves tweaking the CSS a little, but they have a tutorial on their knowledge base.

Will my pages load quickly?

According to DragDropr, pages should load quickly as they use pure HTML code.

What happens if DragDropr goes down – will my content still be live?

Yes – your content will still be live as it is saved in your own Magento system.

Shogun

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Shogun is another great example of an extension that can help you to build websites with no technical knowledge – again, with a simple to use drag-and-drop page editor, you can simply choose from a range of page elements, drop them onto the page, and then fill them with the content you require.

Shogun is a very visually pleasing platform, which is helpful if you’re spending hours at a time working on your website. You can add a range of content to your pages, including:

  • Text blocks
  • Images
  • Videos
  • Headings
  • Buttons
  • Sliders
  • Social media buttons

It also has a range of content options for your Magento products. You can add a buy now button, product description, product images and videos, and more. All of this can be dragged and dropped where you would like it to go. This makes it really easy to build product pages that look exactly the wat you want them to.

You can also create custom HTML elements, if you have the skills to do so. At any time, you can view how your page will look on different devices, and the templates are responsive, meaning they work well on any device.

The pre-made templates are great – there’s quite a lot of them to choose from, and they all look stylish and easy to navigate. If you don’t want to use a template, you can create a page from scratch, building the basic shape using page elements and then adding content afterwards.

But what makes Shogun stand out is the extra features. As well as offering SEO tools like the ability to edit meta titles and descriptions for each page, and lazy loading/image compression for faster loading times, it also has more tools to help you to make the most of your pages.

You can schedule page uploads as part of a marketing campaign, allowing you to measure their performance using the Analytics Suite. This will give you detailed analytics in a range of categories including clickthrough rates, bounce rates, and abandoned cart rates. You can even compare two pages to see which one is performing better in any of the given categories. This is a great feature – the more knowledge you have about how a page is doing, the better chance you have of creating pages that work really well.

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It also has A/B testing. This is a great way to optimize your pages to reach their full potential – simply create two different versions of the same page, and Shogun will run the test, automatically choosing a winner after a certain period of time has passed (or you can choose to review the results yourself). Creating two versions of the same page is very simple.

All in all, it’s an excellent platform with plenty of extra features to use.

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However, like DragDropr, the FAQ page is quite sparse – it would be good to see more tutorials and videos, although the main Shogun FAQ does have a bit more to offer in that respect.

Main Features

  • Drag-and-drop editor allows you to add blocks of content
  • Stylish premade templates
  • Page scheduling
  • Analytics Suite
  • Split Testing
  • Built-in SEO tools

User Reviews

There weren’t any reviews to look at on the Magento extension marketplace. However, looking at other reviews online, users seem to enjoy using the Shogun interface, finding it very user-friendly and intuitive. They also found the support to be good, with Shogun representatives quick to respond to queries.

Pricing

The Shogun app is free on the Magento marketplace, but you will need a subscription to Shogun. Prices start at $49 per month, but the price does rise if you want some of the extra features, like AB testing. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I save a page as a template if I want to use it again?

Yes – you can easily save a page you like as a template using Shogun.

What is a page status?

The page status is a quick way to show you what each page is doing. ‘Published’ means the page is live, ‘Draft’ means you haven’t published it yet, and ‘Outdated’ means you have made edits that haven’t been published to the page yet. If a page says ‘running test’ it means you are currently running an A/B test on it.

Can I add my own page elements to Shogun?

Yes, you can add custom elements and HTML elements using Shogun.

Page Builder by Magezon

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If you want to create great-looking pages, Page Builder by Magezon could work really well for you. Again, no coding skills are required – just time and creativity. There are more than 50 elements available in this drag-and-drop editor, all of which can be customized to create the exact look you want. It works well with all common Magento themes including Porto and Ultimo.

However, there’s one thing to note right at the start – there are actually two page building extensions by Magezon. One is the Single Product Page builder. This allows you to change the structure of a product page for your Magento store – it does not allow you to add content. It works in a different way than the Magezon Page Builder extension, even though they look similar – just something to keep an eye on when you’re browsing the extension marketplace.

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When it comes to elements, you have a lot of choice, including text blocks, images, videos, product sliders, and buttons – all of which can be tweaked. You can set borders, padding, margins, and background colors – plus, it comes with color palettes, which help you to stick to the theme of your website. It also comes with access to a library of over 900 icons – so you should be able to find icons that match your theme perfectly.

Like the other platforms, at any time, you can view and edit how your page will look on different types of devices. The templates are responsive and load quickly on any device.

If you like, you can choose from a range of beautiful templates – or you can create one from scratch. You can even save pages as templates – meaning you can use them again and again.

The pages are SEO friendly, too – fast loading speeds are emphasised here, and it states that every line of code created is SEO optimized – this means you don’t have to worry too much about SEO to start with.

It’s a really intuitive interface, simple to use – but it also allows you a great deal of control and customization, including being able to use your own custom CSS. The pages you can create have the potential to look stunning:

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As with any platform, it does take some time to learn, but the interface is pretty easy to use.

It’s compatible with some useful plugins – including some email marketing services like MailChimp, social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and more.

In terms of features, it’s kind of in the middle of DragDropr and Shogun. It doesn’t have the excellent split testing or analytics offered by Shogun, but it does have more features than DragDropr provides. The standout points for us are the SEO optimization and emphasis on fast loading speeds.

It also has the advantage of having great user guidance. There is a user guide that covers every (and we mean every) detail of the platform – but if the idea of reading through it doesn’t thrill you, they also have a YouTube channel offering video tutorials.

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Ideally, we’d like to see more guides about how to create high-converting pages, but still, it’s a useful feature.

Main Features

  • Drag and drop editor allows you to choose from over 50 elements
  • Beautiful templates
  • Built-in SEO optimization
  • Integration with other plugins
  • Creates fast, responsive pages
  • Useful knowledge base

User Reviews

User reviews are great, with users happily reporting that the platform is very simple to use, and that they were able to create amazing pages with it. They also said that the customer support is great, and that the support combined with the ease of the drag-and-drop editor means that even with little-to-know website building experience, you can still build a great page.

It has an average rating of 5 out of 5 stars.

Pricing

Page Builder by Magezon costs $199 (this is a one-off payment). You can choose to add a service agreement, however, which gives you extra support – you can get six months for $79 or twelve months for $129.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I get a free trial of Page Builder by Magezon?

Not at this time, no – they do offer free demos, however, which you can find out more about here.

Do I get free updates?

Yes, you won’t have to pay to get updates.

Should I buy it from Magezon’s website or the Magento extension marketplace?

You can buy it from either place.

Does Magento work with WordPress?

Yes, there are plugins that you can use to integrate Magento with WordPress. You can even integrate your Magento theme and your WordPress theme, and create an easy blog-to-cart experience.

In Conclusion – Which is the Best Page Builder for Magento?

All three options are great. However, you do get what you pay for. Although DragDropr is a great budget option, it does lack some of the features that Shogun and Magezon have to offer. It is brilliant for businesses with a small budget, however.

Magezon represents a good middle-ground. You can create amazing looking pages with Magezon, and it has the advantage of a one-off payment – although if you don’t have $200 to pay upfront, it may put you off.

Shogun is our top choice for a few reasons. Although the price can add up if you want the extra features, they are appealing. Split testing and access to detailed analytics can have a real impact on your business if used wisely. Plus, it’s easy to use, the templates are beautiful, and the built-in SEO tools can make a big difference to the visibility of your pages. Although it does cost more than DragDropr, we think the tools it provides makes it worth the investment.

Further read:

23 of the Best Leadership Podcasts You’ll Love [New 2022 Picks]

change creator podcasts

As a leader, the success of your organization greatly depends on your personal qualities.

You need to keep improving yourself continuously so that you can be in a position to improve your team as well.

Listening to podcasts is a great way to work on yourself even when you are on the go.

1. Take Command – A Dale Carnegie Podcast

Dale Carnegie is famous for his book, “How to Make Friends and Influence People”. It’s legendary. Now, you can listen in on A Dale Carnegie Podcast, where they uncover what leadership means in today’s world. Hosted by Joe Hart, CEO of Dale Carnegie, they will be talking to diverse leaders across various industries to help unlock your potential for success. Sharing real-life insights into leadership—which in turn can help spark the next level of your growth as a leader.

2. At The Table – Patrick Lencioni

Any book you read by Patrick Lencioni will make you a better business person. Books like Getting Naked, 5 Temptation of a CEO and so many more are absolute game-changers. You don’t want to miss this podcast.

Hear real conversations and practical advice for everyday leaders. Sit across the table from one of the foremost experts in leadership and business. In his simple and approachable style, Lencioni tackles every topic related to the world of work (and some that aren’t). From culture to teamwork to building world-class organizations, he brings his wisdom, humor, and insight together to provide actionable advice for leaders everywhere.

3. Coaching for Leaders – Dave Stachowiak

Dave believes that nobody is born a leader. In this podcast, he teaches leaders teaches the basics of leadership, leading by example, and how to bring the best out of the people you lead.

4. Dose of Leadership – Richard Rierson

Dose of leadership has interviews with leaders from all areas of life including military, business, and even faith-based leaders. The show aims to teach leaders and aspiring leaders how to develop themselves and the organization they lead.

5. Engaging Leader – Jesse Lahey

As the name suggests, the show centers on communication as the basis of modern leadership. Jesse and his interviewees discuss the various tactics you can use to communicate with your team effectively for improved productivity.

6. Accelerate – Andy Paul

Paul started off quite badly as a salesperson but he managed to turn his fortunes around and become a leader in the field of sales. In Accelerate, he combines his experience and that of his guests to teach you how to become build successful teams for your organization to prosper.

7. The LEADx Show – Kevin Kruse

Kruse’s guests include some of the best leadership and business experts in the world. They will share with you tips on how to manage your team successfully and also how to advance yourself in different at your workplace each day.

8. Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast – Carey Nieuwhof

Carey wants to help you move from an average leader to a great leader by embracing change and personal growth. Although many of the interviews may be faith-based, the content will help you become a better leader even in your business organization.

9. This Is Your Life with Michael Hyatt – Michael Hyatt

Hyatt wants you to lead your life with passion and focus and his podcast teaches just that. He will also talk you to on how to harness that passion and apply it in your area of work to become a focused and influential leader.

10. The Entreleadership Podcast – Ken Coleman

Some of the best entrepreneurial minds in the world have been Coleman’s guests. They discuss tips that will help you achieve success as a leader and business person.

11. Women’s Leadership Podcast – Sabrina Braham

The podcast’s prime target is women but anyone can benefit from the tips. It discusses ways you can achieve success and become a leader in your niche by living to your potential.

12. Awesome Office – Sean Kelly and Sean Spear

Awesome office interviews great leaders from whom you can learn how to create a strong culture in your organization.

13. Leadership Biz Café – Tanveer Naseer

Your organization and the employees need you to be a strong and influential leader. If you can become that leader it becomes much easier to achieve the organization’s goals. Naseer and his guests will guide you on how you can become the leader that your team can look up to.

14. Eternal Leadership – John Ramstead

In this faith-based show, the discussion focuses on building your legacy in the organization you lead. You will learn how to ensure your legacy in leadership outlives in business you while following God’s teachings.

15. The Look & Sound of Leadership – Tom Henschel

If you wish the people you lead to perceive you in a certain way, this is the podcast for you. It teaches you to project the leader that you want your team to perceive in you.

16. The Go-Giver Podcast – Bob Burg

Based on an international best-seller, The GO-Giver, the show discusses ideas you can use to become an influential leader and lead a fruitful life.

17. Beyond the To-Do-List – Erik Fisher

This is a show for business leaders who have tried to lead by the book but the productivity does not reflect the effort. Erik and his guests will discuss how you can boost your personal productivity as well as your team’s productivity.

18. The ONE Thing – Geoff Woods

Learn how successful people approach various aspects of their lives such as productivity, time management, business, health and habits to achieve extraordinary success.

19. The Tony Robbins Podcast – Tony Robbins

Listen to this Tony Robbins as he teaches how you can become an extraordinary leader. The show also discusses how you can let go off what is holding you back, nurture your team and manage your most important resource – time.

20. Achieve Your Goals – Hal Elrod

Achieve Your Goals is all about taking your life to the next level. Elrod will sometimes host guests while other times he does a solo show. Either way, the show will help you set goals for your team and strategize on how to reach them.

21. Authentic Brand Mastery Podcast – Adam Force

Ready to take a lead on building a meaningful brand that sells? The Authentic Brand Mastery Podcast is brought to you by Change Creator and is hosted by branding and design expert, Adam G. Force. Listen in on these compelling discussions to learn how you can build an authentic brand that people love and drive more online sales with smart design.

Great podcast for those looking to make a difference

“Adam covers an important part of the entrepreneurship space – making a positive impact on the world through our business. I really like how the interviews get into real-life struggles and cover the moral or ethical decisions that owners have to weigh against business performance. I also enjoy learning about other cultures, the challenges of creating lasting social change, and even the unexpected negative effects that we can contribute to as we seek this change.”

22. Master of Scale — Reid Hoffman

From the co-founder of LinkedIn comes this informative, yet zany and fun podcast that will set your 2019 on fire! One of our favorites is Tristan Walker’s Beauty of a Bad Idea episode — who hasn’t had one of those? As leaders, it’s up to us to take the ‘bad idea’ risks and attempt the impossible, even when those around us think we’re crazy!

23. Without Fail — Gimlet Media

When we asked our audiences what they needed more of from our content, we got a lot of responses about ‘failure stories’ — people that have failed (and lived to tell us about it). It can be so tough when you’re in the weeds of your business, on the ground building something of value and face failure. Yes, lots of people talk about failure as a nicety, but so many people gloss over these lessons in their past! Well, we recommend listening to these truly inspirational podcasts from Gimlet Media — all with a focus on failure. Hey, we can learn from others’ failures too!

We’ll keep updating the list when we find more 2019 that we fall in love with!

Frequently Asked Questions

Can podcasts make you smarter?

Yes, listening to any kind of podcast will help make you smarter in the same way that reading does! However, you can also expand your knowledge on history, science, entrepreneurship or any other topic that you are interested in.

How can podcasts make you a better leader?

Above you can find a bunch of podcasts that will present to you, and help you develop, the skills and tools that a leader needs. As well as inspire you towards a healthier life and being a more empathetic leader by listening to the words of other leaders.

Conclusion

As a leader, you are often expected to know your way around but sometimes you get stuck. Or you are in new territory with challenges that you are finding hard to overcome.

During such times or when you want to move your leadership skills to a new level, a talk show or two might do the trick.

With this list, you have a variety of shows to choose from to learn more about leadership and lead your team to greater success.

You might also enjoy:

Best Shopify Stores in 2021: Best Sites to Learn from and Start Selling More Now

Sugar. Spice. And everything nice. These are the ingredients the following online stores choose to create some of the best Shopify stores. There’s no shortage of top ecommerce website examples and strategies to attract, engage, and convert online buyers from what we saw scouring through hundreds of Shopify sites for this guide.

Now, consider this: The Shopify ecommerce platform now runs 800,000+ ecommerce stores worldwide, powers 430,000+ websites, and is the third-largest ecommerce platform on the planet.

It is clear why you need to create a unique ecommerce store to attract and keep interested customers and wade out the competition in 2020 (and beyond).

Like a high-converting physical store, you’ll want to create online experiences that highlight your brand personality and make your online store memorable. The reward: Buyers can find you by name again and again.

The best converting Shopify stores of 2020 will almost certainly take up the largest piece of the retail sales cake.

And that cake is predicted to grow to about $3.9 trillion in 2020 and 17% of all U.S. retail sales by 2022.

That’s one cake party you don’t want to miss.

Also, keep in mind that more and more customers are willing and able to buy stuff from overseas. So, you can target those markets as well instead of worrying-sick that your local market share could be charmed off your Shopify cart and checkout page.

From stunning UX design to on-point copy to bold branding to seizing storytelling, these Shopify online stores will inspire your new store or next ecommerce website redesign.

And that can mean attracting and keeping a community of loyal buyers that rally even more highly qualified prospects with sweet referrals to you.

Sounds like something you’d rather do right now?

Here are the best Shopify store examples to inspire action, creative success, and the competitive gene in you.

  1. Not Pot

When you know your target audience may have some reservations about trying new hemp gummies, what do you do?

Joke about it and assure them it is not what it looks like. That’s what.

Tell them you sell lab-tested CBD gummies, the kind they can enjoy stress-free, knowing they’d pass any drug test after chewing a boatload of those.

Go as far as naming yourself accordingly. And adopt an unmistakable slogan.

Then design your vegan CBD gummies to look like harmless polar bears, complete with strawberry and apple pectin in them.

And square it all off by revealing why CBD gummies are everything they’ve been missing in their life.

It is no wonder Not Pot is a top Shopify store to take cues from.

2. So Worth Loving

What better way to instantly connect emotionally with visitors than to instill that sense right from the homepage?

But it can feel like So Worth Loving is trying too hard to some. So, the big “sincerely” in the middle works well to assure the visitor that they mean it.

It’s a simple, every-day design that feels like a personal friend recommending the best rather than a profit-churning machine out to get your cash.

To top it all off, each product has its own short story followed by a clear call-to-action. And look at how they capture emails:

So worth loving!

3. Beardbrand

Grooming facial hair can be a pain.

Beardbrand knows so and chooses to offer value upfront.

By offering a quiz to find out the best beard style for their visitors, right on the homepage, Beardbrand smoothly grooms the visitor to the recommended style and products with a clear call-to-action button to view beard products.

And then tons of beard grooming wisdom:

The navigation buttons drop down to reveal neat categories and insights on kits, tools, and products.

You get the vibe they know their stuff, and that’s the kind of place to buy.

4. Haus

Home goods seller, haus, blends clear navigation tabs with a clean, modern look to match the contemporary look and feel of their products.

Shoppers can go straight to a category, such as brand, from the menu on the left, and even search a favorite product from there — no complicated paths to nurturing visitors here.

It helps that the furniture and accessories show out in big, beautiful photography—some in their ideal setting.

5. Kylie Cosmetics

Super-influencer, Kylie Jenner, knows her strongest suit, her lips.

Kylie makes it vivid how good the eye, face, and lip colors would look and feel by displaying stunning pictures of herself wearing the different colors available. Just hover on a product, and it flips to reveal Kylie wearing it.

The gorgeous colors, easy-to-browse, and candy-like illustrations make it all the easier to buy and keep coming back to check what’s new.

And which fan won’t want to email with Kylie Jenner?

6. Studio Proper

There’s a quote on their site by one Mark Parker; “Everything starts with design.” That is exactly what Steve Jobs would say.

And boy, doesn’t it fit for a store that’s designed with simplicity and elegance cues from Apple’s store and website. So, when Apple die-hards get here, the store feels extremely familiar.

They feel at home.

From the sleek, aluminum-finish iPad mounts to the iPhone cases to its wireless charging hubs, they all look Apple-ish.

Add to that Studio Proper’s 12-month warranty, free delivery, ability to “pre-order”, and clean layout and it’s hard not to convert.

7. Ksubi

Apparel store, Ksubi, keeps it minimal and clean. No endless categories to distract visitors. Just a clear call to click on either Shop Mens or Shop Womens.

Instead of displaying a grid of apparel photos, the store uses high-quality photos of models donning Ksubi’s collection, making you imagine how the outfit would look on you, too. That’s a good start.

At the very top of the homepage, Ksubi declares they do offer free global shipping—so anyone anywhere can buy on Ksubi. A huge market right there.

8. Tluxe

Unlike Ksubi, Tluxe adds a lead generation twist by offering a bunch of benefits right when visitors land on the homepage:

  • Clean, easy-to-navigate store
  • Free shipping on international orders over $300
  • 20% off your first order over $200
  • And they give the impression you’ll get all that plus timely updates on new arrivals when you submit your email address

Now that’s how you build an email list to nurture casual browsers into repeat customers.

9. Quad Lock

It doesn’t take four seconds before you know what the store is all about. There’s a GIF video background to demonstrate how to fix their smartphone mounting gear to your cash dash, motorbike, bike, and limbs.

Immediately after, Quad Lock manages to sneak in some high-quality use-case photos right above the fold so visitors know exactly what to do next before they can even scroll down.

Scroll down once, and the store convinces you they know their stuff with social—the top publications they’ve featured in, including Engadget, Mashable, The New York Times, and Forbes.

That’s when FOMO strikes hard if you don’t hit that “Get 10% off” tab.

10. Chaos

Chaos manages the chaos many stores find themselves in when they attempt to use splashes of color and big, bold fonts while exuding unmistakable individuality—all on one page.

It’s playful, unique, and creative, which rhymes perfectly with its personalized accessories theme.

Talking of playful…

11. The Candi Factory

The Candy Factory homepage lets you know they don’t take themselves too seriously as they sell custom leggings and underwear.

Well, and perhaps their patriotism to Canada, which we think is a nod to selling high-quality products.

The store is clean and exudes a fun aura to boost.

Every click leads visitors deeper and deeper into the sales funnel. It’s tough to recover and bounce away after a few.

12. Tessemae’s All Natural

Tessemae’s All Natural is top Shopify store for 2020 for a bunch of delightful reasons:

  • Stunning food photos that’ll make anyone drool—and reach for the Buy Now button
  • Offers value upfront by providing weekly, monthly, and keto meal plans
  • 15% off for joining the Tessemae’s email list
  • Featured recipes mean fans keep coming back for more—and buy recommended products while at it
  • The five slides plus the vivid drop-down menu tabs make it easy to navigate the store from the homepage
  • Maintains a variety of products that feel exciting instead of overwhelming
  • Tessemae’s All Natural publishes fan photos, which helps make the community feel recognized and develop loyalty

We love the entire structure, color scheme, and fan engagement going on here. Definitely one of the best food stores on the Shopify app.

13. Biko

Biko takes the noble cause route right on the front page by letting visitors know 20% of each pair sold is donated to fight breast cancer through RETHINK.

It feels like joining a movement against a life-threatening, common enemy of Biko’s target audience; women.

And right below the fold, Biko lets visitors know it’s not all gloom and doom by showcasing “Trending Now” jewelry they can spoil themselves to right away.

To boost engagement, Biko suggests featuring customers who tag them on Instagram.

Then it lets you know how chic you’d also look in your new pair by displaying quality photos of models sporting the goods. You just have to click “Shop Now”.

14. Hiut Denim Co.

The store’s homepage doesn’t feel even a bit salesy. Rather, it gives off a classic, print magazine vibe.

Close shots display the brand’s denim in three different use scenarios, so you know they are made to complement your preferred life and style.

Scroll under the fold to meet this:

“Denim Fit for A Duchess”.

The bold statement subsides to reveal a 4-minute video, showing you how Hiut Denim Co. turns materials into denim masterpieces.

Click the “shop” buttons on the menu bar, and you are off to catch lots of photos with models stunting different styles.

That helps show how a pair would fit, so buyers that are uncomfortable with making returns are more likely to shun their inhibitions and click “Buy Now”.

15. WP+Standard

Why make noise when you can make a statement, huh?

The WP Standard landing page exudes dignity and sophistication, wrapped up in a clean, minimalist, and succinct charm.

Buttons are limited to just five with lots of free space all over to ensure the main focus is on clicking that centered “Shop Now” button.

The brand engages fans and secret admirers alike by integrating their Instagram feed at the bottom.

16. Hardgraft

The personality-filled statement declares Hardgraft is the place to be for contemporary, luxurious accessories that don’t go over-the-top.

And no matter where you are, the brand says you’ll receive your order as if it came from the town down the road.

The colors marry the down to Earth mantra. Products are displayed right on the homepage so you can get to what you want in a click or two.

Hover your mouse on an item, and more details will show out.

Simple does it on this top fashion Shopify store in 2020.

Yet, a clever mind knew how to ask you to sign up to their mailing list while assuring everyone Hardgraft doesn’t do spam.

17. Happiness Abscissa

Ha gives visitors the sense they are on a cheerful page that’s easily contagious.

Happy Abscissa doesn’t play it safe with straight lines and conventional image placement on the front page. And still, it works to jolt curiosity among visitors.

There are no more than four clickable buttons to distract, with lots of white space. This is one minimalist approach to conveying a cheery vibe. It works to make Ha one of the best Shopify stores for perfume lovers.

18. Tattly Temporary Tattoos

Permanent tattoos are forever. Fun, except you don’t get to see how a tattoo will look on a real person in advance.

Tattly’s approach to tattooing gets some crucial conversion killers right:

  • Click on a product to see how it looks on a real person before risking the purchase
  • Video tutorials show you how to apply the tattoo on yourself like a pro even if you are a complete beginner
  • Temp tattoos mean you can Themefy an event or party and still get rid of the “ink” look hassle-free (especially convenient for kids)
  • Email signup form encourages repeat purchases with a “20% off next purchase” promise

Just click the drop-down icon next to the Shop tab and access everything right from the homepage.

19. Frank Body

Frank Body wins a podium finish in the best cosmetics Shopify store contest for its delightful, personal, and “for ordinary-people” vibe.

It is written in first-person, building rapport between the brand and potential customers.

The beautiful pink color scheme, cute packaging, and tongue-in-cheek marketing convey a charming feminine feel that’s sure to keep the target audience looking in all the right places.

There’s more:

  • Beautiful photos of next-door women happy to use Frank Body coffee scrubs encourage the hesitant browser
  • A loyalty program to encourage repeat customers
  • A limited-time “Win-a-Bedroom” contest to boost conversion goals

No doubting that Frank Body goes all the way!

20. Chubbies

Chubbies lets you know what they are about in an 8-word statement on top of a pile of colorful, reversible fleece jackets.

And you’ll know the trunks and bathing suits they sell are meant for men because they say so right above the fold—and in their interesting mantra below the fold:

It also manages to keep the menu lean enough not to overwhelm, considering the boatload of products they have on there.

Last but not least, Chubbies manages to charm with high-quality photos of their shorts and outerwear, which flip into pics of models wearing them when you hover on each.

21. Revival

Instead of a typical hero shot, Revival Rugs shows you a video background, taking you on a Moroccan journey to reveal the dedicated process each rug has to pass through to get to your doorstep.

Each piece is hand-crafted.

Revival is also so confident you’ll love their rugs that it supports free returns—the 700+ positive customer reviews notwithstanding.

Visitors just need to hover on the drop-down navigational buttons to see everything and get to what they want in a click or two.

We also love how Revival demonstrates rug sizes and how it’ll look in a room with illustrations and real photos, so buyers have fewer objections to converting.

22. Destination Towels

What happens when a professional photographer decides to help people take their destinations to their favorite destinations?

Destination Towels happens.

Choose among 61 destinations and have your favorites infused into your custom, sand-repellant, quick-drying beach towel.

Each piece has its destination’s unique coordinates printed on it.

Plus, the towel ships internationally, complete with a lightweight backpack to carry it with you wherever you go.

To emphasize the personalized experience, Anthony Glick, the Shopify owner and photographer, replies to queries himself.

Now that’s how to do personal touch in 2020.

23. Veestro

This health-conscious meal subscription service uses stunning organic food photography and visual language to get you hungry.

“Imagine devouring delicious, healthy meals daily without as much as lifting a pot”.

That’s a yummy proposal a whole lot of people are ready to make happen in real life. And especially so when the meals are chef-prepped, restaurant-quality, and come in at under $10 a pack.

Veestro then goes ahead to offer a selection of three meal plans, in case you are not sure what to pick right away.

Or, in case you are the adventurous type, want to try something different for a change.

24. Boon Supply

Boon Supply has a fresh take on fundraising.

Instead of laying out your palm for donations, the brand takes on a sustainable ecommerce approach to giving or raising funds for a worthy cause. That’s up to 40% off all merch purchases sent to your choicest course.

The CTA on the homepage makes it crisp clear where you are, what the brand does, and why it does it.

They explain how the process works right below the fold, followed by acres of white and pink space. Not sure whether that’s intentional or if it’s because there isn’t much else to show out.

But the store looks and feels and clean, easy-to-navigate, and to take the right action—whether you are a fundraiser or shopping to help.

25. Twelve Saturdays

Twelve Saturdays is a clothing Shopify store that dresses college football fans for the big days.

Instead of sporting the ole shirts and all, the brand’s copywriters cheerfully encourage fans to spot custom apparel to support their favorite teams in style.

It also employs a gray background, which they overlay with gorgeous, colored photos of models in their products. The result is a simple yet beautiful play on texture.

Shots of cheery young fellows in pairs, supposedly headed to a game, soothe the message in with precision.

And to find out the size of a cloth item, zoom in and out, as well as see back-shots of the same, just hover your mouse on a model’s picture, and the site will do its thing.

Fast. Fluid. Easy.

26. Pipcorn

Pipcorn recently rebranded.

So, their current USP reassures loyal and potential customers who’ve heard about them that they are the same crunchy, munchy snacks store they love and trust.

It adds high-res photos of their different flavors, happy people enjoying Pipcorn, and social proof about how five celebrities swear by Pipcorn snacks.

You’d think the product is not made out of normal corn.

Well, it’s actually non-GMO, gluten-free, vegan, and whole-grain popcorn. Only Pipcorn chose to prioritize how it tastes, a conversion prompt that works for them.

27. Cuppow

Fresh and clean like the food they carry, canning jar brand, Cuppow, goes all out to redefine the meaning of full-package.

That, while striking a clean and minimalist store, so buyers only see what matters: the sustainable canning jars.

You can turn the glass travel mug into a lunch box, clean it up, and refill with fresh juice on the go.

When you receive your order, you’ll get a brochure letting you know just how important your purchase was in the fight against environmental destruction.

That and more makes Cuppow canning jars undeniably memorable and rallies environmental conservation buffs onto the repeat customers log.

28. Litter

Litter knows a photo speaks a thousand words. So, they’ve dedicated the entire homepage to close-up shots of models wearing the store’s custom accessories.

It gets other things right, too:

  • Just three menu items guide potential customers to the right pages to boost chances of a conversion
  • Lots and lots of stunning photos of models sporting the jewelry so you can see yourself wearing the goodies as well
  • Hover on a model’s photo to see the name and price of the worn accessory. Click for more details and to purchase.
  • Gift cards and exclusive deals for subscribed fans

29. Sugarfina

Sugarfina comes through as playful, thoughtful, and sweet—just like you’d imagine a candy store to be. And all without overdoing it given their serve an adults’ market, too.

It also uses thematic selling, including offering a special discount, free shipping, and special flavors for your theme if you order by their recommended time.

See?

The store also earns points for engaging potential buyers by offering the option to create a custom candy box and see how it’ll look when it ships and the option to visit their physical store for that Chocolate Factory feel.

30. Henkaa

If you sell convertible dresses online, Henkaa is a top fashion store on Shopify to learn the tricks of the trade from.

Here are some things that work in its favor:

  • Gallery of elegant model shoots bring out the best in the dresses and make it easy to see how a dress style, color, and accessories can fit you too
  • A “Mystery Bag” tab nurtures curiosity among first-time and repeat visitors
  • The shop gifts “Under $100” CTA can help boost multiple item purchases
  • Elegant store design blends perfectly with the content

Henkaa is determined to grow an engaged community of loyal customers, too. The “Try It On” menu button lets visitors find a local store to try the dresses on.

Potential customers can even find events they can attend that are ideal for the Henkaa brand of sophisticated dresses.

Henkaa also goes full-throttle on content marketing, updating its blog with posts their target audience loves, such as the Henkaa 2020 Wedding Trend Report.

That’s going the extra mile right there.

31. BioLite

At first glance, BioLite does three things right:

  • The USP, “Try A Campfire Without the Smoke”, is spot-on—for people who prefer a more modern campfire solution than the classic wood, smoke, and ash experience.
  • Highlights the BioLite Mission, complete with photos of power projects they run in sub-Saharan Africa. A worthy course.
  • All products are accessible from the drop-down menu
  • BioLite manages to include its “Shop…” CTA buttons above the store’s fold. So, visitors don’t have to scroll down, unsure where to click to buy an item they love.

Well, maybe that’s four things that BioLite gets right.

32. Socco Designs

Witty copy. That readily available reviews tab inspires trust. And the powerful call-to-action in the form of the help popup on the bottom-right corner pulls visitors in with a 10% off promo code for new customers.

The site’s colors look and feel soothing and exotic, a smart design that blends beautifully with its products.

Also, you’ve got to love the crisp photos of the leather products; it makes them look so real that you can see yourself having one, a powerful buying motivator.

33. Spacing

The minimalist space above the fold says all you need to know about Spacing.

It chooses clarity over everything; to make a statement by stating the basics.

We love the drop-down style navigational buttons. Just hit the icon and choose which category you want to shop.

Or, if you prefer to shop at the physical store, scroll down. There’s a map you can use to find your way to the nearest Spacing store. Open and close times are displayed on the right.

Notice how Spacing uses the store’s header to announce new products as they come out. You can grab that idea and implement it on your Shopify store by updating your community about new arrivals, what’s restocked, and so on.

34. Nectar Bath Treats

This creative brand makes bathroom products that it packages to look and feel like sweet treats.

From almond oil bath bombs to milkshake bath soak to cupcake soaps, everything looks yummy except that it is supposed to go into the bathtub—not in a mouth.

It doesn’t help that the bath treats come in edibles form and flavors, too. So, you can grab a Donut soap or Herbal Bath Tea. Macaron soap, anyone?

There’s more:

  • Products are hand-made with plant-based ingredients
  • All bath treats are sulfate-free and paraben-free
  • Stunning visuals that’ll make any grown human drool

The brand’s Instagram feed, which you can view at the bottom of the page, rivals that of the best cupcakes store on Shopify.

From the store colors to product packaging, Nectar Bath Treats is a wonder of the Shopify stores world.

What’s not to like!

35. Wine Wholesales

It is not hard to see why Wine Wholesales has won a bunch of awards in its category.

It does manage to get a couple of things right and offer an immersive wine buying experience.

Those include:

  • The wine-red color scheme adds to the immersive feel of the store
  • A beautiful background showcasing stacks of classic wooden crates decorated with respected names from the 19th century
  • Responsive menu tabs that help visitors get what they want in a click
  • Despite stocking over 1,500 wine selections, complete with quality photos, the store loads fast, which ensures potential customers have fluid experiences and reduce instances of cart abandonment
  • Latest Products section highlights the newest selection for experimenters
  • Best Sellers of 2019, Wines Under $30, Trending Now, and Most Popular Searches sections let fans keep up with the latest and greatest in the wine industry right from the homepage.

Wine Wholesales does offer free shipping on purchases over $600, which you can pay for securely on the site.

36. BlackHairandSkinCare.com

The organic haircare store may not seem to have the slickest Shopify store design on this guide.

But what it doesn’t make in site design it more than compensates with conversion-focused widgets and a good understanding of its target customers.

It is a simple store with easy-to-figure-out navigation cues.

Three organic haircare products prominently show out at the center of attention.

It might not immediately seem like it but, that’s not a static hero shot. You can slide to the left to view before and after photos of customers who have used the product to regrow and rejuvenate their hair and scalp.

Another genius touch is the nudging progress bar that popups at the bottom of the screen to encourage you to “Spend $99 to get free shipping”. Neat.

37. Triangl

Swimwear store, Triangl, does a bunch of things right:

  • A slideshow of vibrant photos right on the homepage grabs and keeps browsers’ attention
  • Using crisp, real-world photos makes it natural to see yourself enjoying their swimwear with friends
  • Adding social media handles of their models adds a personal touch that feels authentic and easy to attain—by buying their products
  • Handy size guide helps visitors get just what they want for their ideal look

The clean interface and close-ups help direct attention where it matters most: the swimwear.

38.The Home Shoppe

The Home Shoppe treats you to indoor and outdoor home furniture and accessories with eye-candy-good photography. It’s hard not to envision the furniture in your own pad or yard vividly.

The “Month’s Specials” and “New Arrivals” tabs help keep customers coming back to find the latest and trendiest. Add to that the uncluttered navigational tabs—for a store with loads of items—and it clear why it’s a top Shopify store to learn from.

39.Norwegian Rain

This fashion brand makes it on this guide for its stunning visuals combined with fast-loading speed, and the promise of top-quality cloth items for the rainy day. Literally.

Like other neat online stores featured here, Norwegian Rain presents an uncluttered homepage with just five navigational tabs.

Its aesthetics and copy appeal to the sophisticated customer, which is what it intends to do. You can tell this is a place to meet high-end tailoring. And the full, pixel-perfect sloths and waterproof shoes’ photos don’t disappoint.

The models range in age, to illustrate Norwegian Rain’s target customers as well, which helps demystify who the brand is looking to serve.

40. Act and Acre

The haircare Shopify store sets itself apart in several ways we couldn’t miss for the world:

  • The header lets every visitor know there’s free consulting, free returns, and free shipping to take advantage of.
  • Instead of adding a typical USP, the brand showcases positive mentions in big, respected publications such as Vogue to instantly build credibility
  • It centers “Our Method” so you can click through to find out what’s so special about their hair care and scalp health products
  • Each content page ends with a selection of items you can click on to buy, increasing the store’s chances of making a sale without being intrusive

Interested store visitors can click the “Press” tab to learn what’s new and why it matters.

It may also be a good thing that the site doesn’t stock a ton of products. The products’ page looks neat and loads fast, which is great for a page with high-quality photos.

So, what goes into building the best Shopify stores in 2020?

Secrets of the Best Shopify Stores for 2020

Now, you’ve probably noticed how all the top sellers on this inspiring guide have unique ways to attract, engage, enchant, and convert their browsers.

Different target audience tastes and needs mean diverse ways to build your online store with Shopify.

Yet, four factors are consistently based on the top Shopify sites samples featured here:

Shopify store design

 Think simple to bold to outrageous ecommerce store designs and elements to having just a few, fast-loading pages to make the buying process less arduous.

Also remember to apply classic and latest online sales tactics such as countdown timers, retargeting, niche-branding, and discount coupons.

Shopify ecommerce Strategy

Some took the influencer route, engaging their active and loyal fans on social media to buy direct from their branded Shopify store.

Others used captivating storytelling to counter the rising cost of ecommerce ads, create relatable brands, and attract customers organically.

Some of the bestselling Shopify stores rally their visitors towards a noble course, such as feeding a hungry child for every item you purchase. Who says charitable can’t make bank?

Copy and Content

You do not want to be forgotten. The best climax witty copy and funny demeanor to build a relatable, memorable, and attention-keeping brand personality.

Yet, others are always updating their inventory with custom, hand-made items, so customers are always visiting to see what’s new.

Lots of white spaces. Less text and more stunning and relevant images. Decluttered product pages.

Best Shopify Store Structure

The pros make navigating their online store so easy that knowing the next step to take and purchase a favorite item is a no-brainer.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are Shopify stores successful?

Yes, as seen in the list above, many Shopify stores are successful! Just to give you an idea, last Shopify Black Friday (2019) weekend Shopify merchants sold $2.9 billion in worldwide sales. Also, Shopify provides you the opportunity to access over 1 billion people that buy from Shopify stores. However, you might want to consider using a Shopify page builder so that your store stands out.

What can I sell on Shopify?

You can sell almost everything on Shopify, from pets products, digital products, shoes, services, classes, event tickets, etc. There are many options for you to start your own business but remember finding the right product is only the beginning. After that, you have to find the right tools and figure out how to market to be successful. Take a look at our guide on the Essential Shopify Apps and Integrations for Your Ecommerce Shop!

Which is better: Amazon or Shopify?

Most customers agree that Shopify is one step ahead of Amazon. The main reason is because on Shopify you can create a unique brand/product identity, whereas with Amazon you have tons of competitors (including Amazon). However, be aware that with Shopify you are fully responsible for promoting and building your brand/products.

How to Find the Most Visited Shopify Stores in 2020

We promised to pump the competitive gene at the start of this guide, and we plan on keeping that word so you can create one of the most successful Shopify stores

Here’s a nifty little secret to finding the top Shopify stores to give you ideas for your own store in under 3 minutes:

To create a stunning Shopify store, you can use top page builders such as Shogun – this will make the design work easy for you, even if you’re a beginner.

Now, over to you.

Which top Shopify store examples appeal to you the most? And when are you going to take action and make your ecommerce platform shine and convert better?

Further read:

10 of The Best Magento Extensions to Boost Sales

If you run an eCommerce business using Magento, you’ve probably seen the huge amount of extensions available to you. With thousands to choose from, it’s easy to think you need all of them – and looking at the Marketplace can be pretty overwhelming.

In our guide to the best Magento extensions, we’ll show you some of the best extensions you can get, covering some important areas that need attention – like language translation, fraud prevention, delivery management, page design, payment, and advertising. Each extension has features that may improve your Magento experience for you and your customers – hopefully landing you more sales!

For each extension, we’ll show you their main features. We’ll also give you the price of each one, as we know that buying extensions for Magento can quickly add up.

Let’s take a look at some of the best extensions out there.

Best for Translation – Language Translator

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If you want to increase your sales, you could consider a language translator. Language Translator uses Google Translate, making your store more accessible to a wider range of customers. With over 100 languages, the great thing about this extension is that it can translate products, CMS page data, static blocks, and product reviews using the Mass Translation feature.

Although it’s on the higher side when it comes to pricing, if you think you can make more sales by offering translation into different languages, it’s definitely worth the investment – especially if you own a bigger store and you want to make more sales worldwide.

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Main Features

  • Backend admin control – you can decide which parts of your store you want to translate
  • Translate product information like name and description, meta details, page title and content, and reviews
  • Search string – you can search for a specific string and translate it to any language you wish
  • Mass translate – you can choose to translate everything into your preferred language in a few clicks

Pricing

To use this extension, you will require a Google API Key, so you’ll need to bear that in mind when working out the cost. At the time of writing, the price of a basic translation API is around $20 per million characters.

The extension itself costs $149. You can also choose to have a 6-month service agreement at $59 and an installation service at $39, but these are optional.

To find out more about Language Translator, click here.

Best for SEO – MageWorx SEO Suite Ultimate

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We all know the importance of a good SEO strategy, and you can find extensions for Magento that make managing SEO a lot easier. SEO Suite Ultimate will give you a range of tools, including tools for optimizing categories, product reviews and navigation pages, tools to help you avoid duplicate content issues, and tools to help you improve internal and external cross-linking. It can also help you to create redirects for deleted products.

One of the best things about this extension is that it allows you to create SEO templates for various categories (for example, products), which helps you to streamline your work processes, saving you time.

You also get comprehensive reports, so you can see the difference your SEO strategy is making in a very real, easy-to-understand way. SEO Suite Ultimate has a lot of features to offer – it’s well worth checking out if you don’t know where to start with SEO, or you just help to manage your efforts more effectively.

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Main Features

  • Advanced SEO Templates – cut down on time spent on manually managing meta data – instead, create SEO templates that automate the process, saving you tons of time. You can create templates for products, categories, and pages
  • Optimize SEO for Product Reviews – create custom URLs for product reviews and set canonical tags
  • Improve Layered Navigation – using dynamic titles and meta descriptions
  • Set Indexation for Search Engines – control this on the backend using Robots.txt editor
  • Improve Cross-Links – set up a well thought-out internal linking structure
  • SEO Redirects – redirect customers to desired pages when they encounter deleted products
  • SEO Reports – receive detailed reports so you know if your SEO strategy is working

Pricing

SEO Suite Ultimate costs $249, with an optional installation service at $49. To find out more, click here.

Best for Page Creation – Shogun

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If you want to easily create and manage the look and feel of your Magento storefront, Shogun is a great extension (they also offer apps for Shopify and BigCommerce, too). Using a drag-and-drop editor, you can create beautiful landing pages, blog posts, product pages, and ‘about’ pages.

It’s a really intuitive platform, and it gives you full creative control of how your store will appear to customers without the hassle of coding. It also allows you to create an easy, memorable shopping experience for your customers.

It has slick, professional pre-designed templates to choose from, or you can build your own pages from scratch simply by dragging and dropping the elements you want to include on each page. The page builder is really easy to use, so you don’t have to worry about a big learning curve when it comes to learning a new platform.

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It also has some great extra features, including the Analytics Suite, which allows you to directly compare your pages to see how well they are performing. It also has split testing, which will help you to optimize your pages to their fullest potential – you can easily create two slightly different versions of the same page to test how they perform against each other.

Main Features

  • Easy to use drag-and-drop page builder
  • Beautiful pre-made templates
  • Analytics Suite gives you detailed information about clickthrough rates, add-to-cart rates, and more, and even allows you to compare one page against another
  • A/B testing allows you to publish two slightly different versions of the same page to see which one performs the best

Pricing

To get Shogun, you’ll need to subscribe. Prices start from $49 per month, but you have to pay more to unlock some of the features like split testing. To find out more, click here.

Best for Managing Deliveries – FedEx Shipping Manager

If you use FedEx, the FedEx Shipping Manager is the obvious solution to your shipping problems. You can create and print FedEx shipping and return labels, either automatically, in bulk, or manually. The system then inserts tracking numbers into shopping information, and sends it to the customer by email so they can track their delivery (saving you a lot of time and effort).

One great thing about this extension is the ability to automatically calculate packages based on the product dimensions – again, saving you time and effort. You also have the option to manage international options and print International Paperless invoices.

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If you want to keep on top of your shipping and manage everything in one place, automating some of the more annoying and time-consuming tasks that come with running an online store, this extension is a good choice for you. It may not be the most exciting extension out there – but it has the potential to make your life much easier!

Main Features

  • Create and print shipping and returns labels automatically, manually, or in bulk
  • Send tracking numbers to your customers so they can track their deliveries
  • Manage international shipment including taxes and invoices
  • Automatically calculate packages based on product dimensions

Pricing

FedEx Shipping Manager costs $199 with an optional $150 installation service. You will need a FedEx account and have FedEx credentials in order to use it. To find out more, click here.

Best for Custom Product Creation – AppJetty Product Designer Tool

There are a lot of product designing extensions out there for Magento, but we think this is one of the best. If you have a printer you would like to use to create customized products, this could be a great business idea that your customers will love. This clever tool allows your customers to create their own products, including mugs, t-shirts, pen drives, stationery, skins for gadgets like mobile phones, and more.

The Product Designer Tool will give your customers an array of high-quality clipart images to choose from, as well as text editing, backgrounds, images and templates. (Some product designing extensions look a little basic or dated – that’s not the case with Product Designer).

This means they can create the exact product they desire, including customizing each element, through your own store. Once a customer has completed their design, the tool will present you with a high-quality, ready-to-print file, exactly the way the customer would like it.

Main Features

  • Designer tool gives your customers access to high-quality clipart, text, images (including the option to upload their own images), backgrounds, and more
  • Items can be printed onto mugs, t-shirts, phone cases, and more
  • Customers can save and re-use their designs
  • Dynamic pricing allows you to set the pricing of different elements, so the price can be calculated for your customers in real-time
  • Creates a high-quality file ready for printing

Pricing

This extension costs $1,499. It’s a pricey one, but if you want to run a customizable product business, it’s definitely one of the best ones out there. Click here to find out more.

Best for Social Media Marketing – Instagram Integration

Instagram has over 1 billion users, making it an incredibly important platform when it comes to social media marketing. This extension helps you to make the most of your Instagram account in a unique and useful way.

You can create dynamic galleries for your pages, featuring pictures from your Instagram feed, which will not only create a beautiful display of products, but will also help your customers to easily identify them – hopefully making the shopping process much more simple for them.

You can include call-to-action buttons whilst hovering (for example, a ‘shop now’ button). Using a ‘pinning’ system, if you have a picture that includes more than one item for sale, you can drag and drop call to action buttons to show your customers which item is which. You can do this for up to 5 products in a single Instagram post.

You can also show your customers more details, including links to product pages, likes, comments, and social sharing buttons – this can all be fully customized.

Once you post a picture to Instagram, the extension collects the information of the photo and displays it in your store – saving you the legwork of uploading photos multiple times.

The extension also includes reporting, so you can see how customers are interacting with your Instagram posts.

Features

  • Create beautiful, eye-catching photo galleries using images automatically pulled from your Instagram account
  • Add details to each picture, including product links, descriptions, social sharing buttons, and more
  • Reporting allows you to see which of your Instagram posts are performing the best

Pricing

You’ll need an Instagram account to use this extension (free at the time of writing). The extension itself costs $149. Click here to find out more.

Best for Advertising – AdRoll

AdRoll is an advertising platform used by businesses to create advertising campaigns. With the Magento extension, you can easily create high-performing ad campaigns for your store. Once you install the extension, your store will be tagged with the AdRoll pixel – this allows you to collect site visitors to serve ads to. A product feed is automatically generated, too – this allows you to run dynamic product ads to catch your customer’s attention.

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You can also segment your audience, which allows you to specifically target certain types of customers with ads based on how those customers interact with your store. It tracks customer purchases, too, enabling ROI tracking across your campaigns. You have to set up an AdRoll account to get started, and there’s a bit of a learning curve if you’ve never created an advertising campaign before, but you could see a big difference in visits to your store (and hopefully sales!) if you try it out.

Features

  • Create dynamic ad campaigns for products in your Magento store
  • Segment customers so you can target them with specific campaigns
  • Track customer purchases

Pricing

Signing up for an AdRoll account is free, and installing the extension is free. However, you have to pay for each ad campaign, which can vary depending on which type you choose. You can set a budget for each day for each campaign – for example, if you want to launch an introduction campaign on social media, they suggest a budget of $55 a day.

Essentially, you can spend as much as you want to. To find out more, click here.

Best for Payments – Stripe Extension

If you want to offer more payment options for your customers, Stripe integration is key. Stripe is a global payment gateway, allowing you to accept payments from customers using their debit and credit cards, Apple Pay, Android Pay, and more.

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There are a lot of advantages to using Stripe. It improves abandoned cart rates, as customers will be able to use their preferred payment method. It enhances conversion rates, as it allows customers to stay on the page to checkout rather than go to a separate page. It also allows you to personalize payment methods, including setting up a Credit Card Vault function – this saves customer card information for future purchases, hopefully encouraging them to return again in the future. Although you have to pay a small transaction fee, it’s worth having Stripe to make the shopping experience easier for your customers.

Features

  • Integrate Stripe payments with your Magento store
  • Improves card abandonment rates
  • Allows your customers to save credit card details for future purchases

Pricing

You’ll need to set up a Stripe account to use this extension. To see Stripe’s pricing, click here (they take a small percentage of each sale using Stripe). The extension itself costs around £249. To find out more, click here.

Best for Security – Fraud Prevention

As an eCommerce business owner, you may be at risk of malicious customers – for example, customers who won’t pay, or customers who fraudulently claim that their orders haven’t arrived to get a refund. It’s uncommon, but not unheard of – and it’s important to take steps to protect yourself and your business.

Fraud Prevention has a ton of features for your Magento store, allowing you to mark orders that haven’t been paid as ‘suspicious’ to create a Fraud Suspicion Record. This helps the extension to automatically detect and block future orders that may be fraudulent.

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It also allows you to create custom blacklisting rules – this allows you to blacklist customers based on attributes like name, address, zip code, or IP address. This prevents fraudulent customers from being able to make future orders. You can prevent the extension from blacklisting customers after one fraud suspicion – so if it turns out they are a genuine customer you can whitelist them again.

Main Features:

  • Create custom blacklisting rules
  • Manage and track suspicious orders
  • Block fraudulent orders before payments can process
  • Prevent credit card chargebacks to save money and time

Pricing

Fraud Prevention doesn’t have any additional monthly fees. It costs $115, making it one of the cheapest extensions on our list. To find out more, click here.

Best for Reporting – AheadWorks Advanced Reports

If you want detailed reporting about the performance of your store, this is the place to get it. Advanced Reports creates visual charts and data tables, so you can quickly see how each product is doing. You can get a general sales overview, track each product’s performance, split sales by categories, look at sales in more detail, and track sales by coupon code, payment type, manufacturer, and product attributes.

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You can also check abandoned cart rates, track sales by location, segment customers, and look at traffic and conversions. Having this information could help you to grow your business, so it’s really worth investing in an extension like this.

Features

  • Presents data in a visually appealing way
  • Check each product’s performance
  • Check sales by coupon code, manufacturer, and more
  • Keep an eye on cart abandonment rates and traffic

Pricing

This extension costs $499. To find out more, click here.

Frequently Asked Questions

Want to know more about Magento extensions? We might have the answer you’re looking for.

What is the Magento Marketplace?

Magento Marketplace is where you go to buy extensions for your Magento store – you can find it here.

How do I install a Magento extension?

In the marketplace, click ‘add to cart’ on the extension you want, then go through the checkout process. It will then connect you to Magento to start the installation process.

Do I have to pay for Magento extensions?

Most of them, yes. Others are free and allow you to integrate with outside platforms (like email marketing platforms), but most of them require a one-off payment

Can you have too many Magento extensions?

Technically, no – you can run as many extensions as you like without any issues. However, it’s important to choose wisely, as a badly coded extension can cause you problems later down the line – it’s a good idea to check reviews before you buy.

Can I buy themes for my Magento store on the Marketplace?

Yes – you can buy premium themes on the Marketplace as well as extensions. Themes range from $29 all the way up to $499, so you should be able to find one to suit every budget.

Can I uninstall a Magento extension?

Yes – but it does require a bit of effort. You have to go into the root of your Magento installation and disable them manually – there are tutorials explaining this online.

Conclusion

We hope this has helped you to narrow down your choices when it comes to buying Magento extensions. Magento is a powerful platform, loved by many – but it can definitely be improved using the right extensions.

You can use extensions to optimize the shopping experience for the customer at every stage of the process – from finding you on social media or through advertising, to navigating the layout of your store, to safe payment, to shipment – creating a shopping experience that will, hopefully, keep them coming back for more.

Of course, there are many more Magento extensions out there – but these are some of the best. Hopefully, they can help to improve your online store, and make your life a little easier in the process.

Further read:

How to Build a Shopify Product Page – With or Without Apps!

Product pages make up the main content of your Shopify store. A product page has to work hard – after all, it needs to entice potential customers into buying. With crisp images, a clear layout, and a bit of personality, you can create a page that will make customers fall in love with your product.

The question is, how do you do this in Shopify? In our guide on how to build a Shopify product page, we’ll show you how much customization Shopify gives you and how to find the code for your product pages. We’ll also take a look at some Shopify page building apps, giving you an example of how apps can help you to build the product page of your dreams – and to (hopefully) grow your eCommerce business in the future.

First, let’s take a look at how you can build a product page without apps.

How to Build a Page Without Apps

You don’t necessarily need an app to customize your Shopify product pages. Shopify do have a selection of themes to choose from that look great, and they allow a certain amount of customization – let’s take a look at how much we can achieve using Shopify’s basic settings.

Step One: Upload a Product

Firstly, make sure you have a product uploaded.

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This sounds obvious, but it’s easier to see how the product pages will look when it has your own products on it, as opposed to example products.

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The information you input here will make up the content of your product page. So, if you want videos, images, or detailed descriptions of your product, this is the time to do it. Shopify gives you a bit of customization here, with a choice of fonts. Clear images and a well-written product description will make a huge difference here, so it’s worth putting time and effort into this stage.

Once you’ve added your first product, it’s time to look at themes.

Step Two: Pick a Theme

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Next, head over to Online Store > Themes > Theme Library. You can choose a free theme or pay to unlock a paid theme.

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Your theme will determine how your entire store looks, not just the product pages. Whether you want to pay for a theme is up to you. Here’s a quick idea of the types you can get:

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Free Themes

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Paid Themes

You should be able to get a good idea of which theme will best fit your brand, based on the demo stores that Shopify provide for you to look at.

Step Three: Basic Customization

Go to Online Store > Themes > Current Theme.

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Click ‘Customize’ to bring up basic theme customization. At the top you should see a button that says ‘Home Page’. Click on that to bring up a drop-down menu of pages for your store and choose ‘Product Pages’.

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Our product page looks like this:

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The bar on the left represents the amount of customization you can get at this stage. You can play around with a few things here.

Header

This section allows you to customize the header which will appear on each page, including your product pages. You can upload a logo, customize the menu, add an announcement bar, and add social media links to your page.

Product Pages

This is where you can play around with your product pages. As you can see, the changes you make will apply to all your product pages, and there’s not a huge amount you can do here:

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You can change the image size and customize a few small things, like whether you want to enable zoom on your images or show variant labels. There’s not a lot more you can do here.

Product Recommendations

This allows you to turn ‘dynamic recommendations’ on and off (dynamic recommendations will automatically show your customer similar products that they might be interested in).

Footer

This will appear on the bottom of every page in your store. Here, you can add payment method icons, add quick links, add some text, insert a newsletter sign-up form, and add social media buttons.

It’s worth noting here that you cannot edit each product page individually – any changes you make apply to every product that you upload to your store (unless you get a page building app – but more on that later).

As you can see, there’s not a huge amount you can do here – unless you know how to code.

Step Four: Further Customization with Code

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Returning to the Theme page, clicking on ‘edit code’ will bring up this screen:

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Shopify uses Liquid, HTML, CSS and JavaScript – so you do need to be at least a little familiar with some of these coding languages before you begin.

Scroll down through the templates on the left to find product.liquid, which is the file you will need to work on:

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This will bring up the code for your product pages:

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You can click here to find out more information about how to customize your product pages using Liquid. You can play around with the ‘add to cart’ button, variants, and add product page features.

Always remember to make a back-up copy of your theme before you begin to edit. You can do that by going back to ‘Themes’, clicking ‘Actions’ and then ‘Duplicate Theme’:

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Of course, if you don’t know Liquid, you might be feeling stuck at this point (although there are some tutorials online if you want to learn, it’s a pretty time-consuming process).

The other option you have is to use Shopify apps to customize your product pages – this is a great way of unlocking further customization without having to have in-depth technical knowledge.

How to Build a Page Using a Shopify App

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Shopify has many great apps which will allow you greater control and customization of your ecommerce store. There are a few page building apps to choose from with a variety of pricing options, so you should be able to find one that suits your budget.

We’ll give you a few recommendations and give you a look at how one of the apps, Shogun, can help you to customize your product pages.

Step One: Pick an App

In the main menu on the left of Shopify, click ‘Apps’, then ‘Visit the Shopify Appstore’:

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In the Appstore, you click ‘Categories’, ‘Store Design’, and ‘Page Builder’:

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This will bring up all the page building apps.

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Here are a few we can recommend:

  • Shogun – from $39 – $199 per month
  • PageFly – from $0 – $29.95 per month
  • GemPages – from $15 – £59 per month
  • Page Studio – $14.95 per month
  • HyperVisual – from $9.95 – $49 per month

All of these are good options, offering you much more page customization than Shopify alone can give. (If you want more details about them, try our guide to the Best Shopify Page Builders, or our PageFly vs Shogun comparison.)

Take a look at the features each one can offer – you might want a basic page builder, or you might want to take advantage of extra features, like detailed analytics or SEO optimization. Many of them offer free trials, so you can play around with them before making a decision.

To install the app, click the ‘add app’ button. You’ll see this:

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Click ‘install app’, and you’re ready to start customizing!

We’ll be using Shogun as an example here. Each app functions differently, so the following steps will only be applicable to Shogun. However, it should give you a general idea of how apps can give you more possibilities when it comes to customization of product pages.

Step Two: Create Your Product Page

A screenshot of a cell phone Description automatically generatedYou should be able to choose which type of page you want to create. Usually, these include standard pages (like ‘about’ pages), blog posts, product pages, or collection pages. Obviously, we’re looking to create a product page.

You can search for the product you want to build a page for:

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With Shogun, you can create a new layout for your product page or choose the existing layout to further customize it.

Creating a Page from Scratch

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Shogun will import your product – this will take a few moments.

You will then see this:

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It looks a little daunting, but thanks to the drag-and-drop system (PageFly and GemPages also have similar drag-and-drop editors) it’s easy to use. Just grab a page element and drop it onto the page where you want it. For example, ‘Product Box’ will bring up the following:

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Find the product you want, and then click ‘confirm’.

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You can then drag a Product Field Element onto the page (for example, a product image). You can add:

  • Product Title
  • Product Image
  • Product Price
  • Product Variant
  • Product Quantity
  • Product Add to Cart
  • Product Reviews

Each section is fully customizable – for example, you can change the font and size of the product title, adjust the size and alignment of the product image, etc. It allows for so much more customization than you can get with Shopify alone. You can also add more elements to your page:

  • Images
  • Videos
  • Headings
  • Text
  • Buttons
  • Icons
  • Countdowns
  • Separators
  • Forms
  • Maps
  • HTML

You can play around with the structure of the page using structural blocks. For example, if you wanted to add a carousel of images and text, you can pick ‘Slider’ and drag it onto the page, then edit each ‘slide’:

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This will create a rotating carousel to which you can add images and text.

However, if all this seems too daunting, you do have the option of just editing the product page you already created using Shopify.

Customizing Shopify Product Page

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Back on the Shogun homepage, click ‘import’ to find your product. You can pick from two options.

Use Existing Layout imports a product page that you already created on Shopify and keeps the content exactly the same. It does allow you to add new page elements above or below the content you already created.

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Use Custom Layout allows you to start again from scratch with your existing product page.

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Shogun shows you exactly how your page will look on different types of devices – you can switch between device type using the options in the middle of the purple bar at the top of the screen.

Step Three: Publish Your Page

Clicking the three dots next to ‘Publish’ on the right-hand side will bring up a small menu:

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On the higher price plan, Shogun allows you to schedule the publication of your pages, duplicate pages and run split tests. As we’re testing out the basic plan, we don’t have access to those. You can see, however, where you can find page settings, which brings up this menu:

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Here you can edit basic information about your page, including page name, page path, and meta description. These basic steps will improve your product page’s visibility on search engines, so it’s important to spend a little time here.

Once you’re done with this, you’re ready to go!

Click ‘Publish’, and your product page will go live.

Going to Shogun’s dashboard will give you an overview of your pages:

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Clicking the three dots next to your product page will bring up a few options:

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Clicking ‘preview’ will bring up your product page, so you can see how it looks to a potential customer. If you’re not completely happy with it, you can go back and edit it at any time.

Other page building apps work similarly – it’s worth checking them out if you want to be able to customize each product page individually.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Shopify make your products?

No, Shopify is a platform that allows you to create your online store and sell almost anything you want, from personal care products to services and even tickets. This means that you need to have a previous business plan or at least an idea of the kind of product/service you want to offer.

How do I customize my product on Shopify?

One of the many tools that Shopify offers is the possibility to customize the products that you are selling. Keep in mind that after the product is published, you can only customize it in the Shopify admin. There you can change the product title, description, product type, vendor, collections, tags, images, and variants. Check out our guide on the best page builders to customize your store!

Conclusion

As you can see, much of the work that goes into creating a product page begins at the ‘add product’ stage. The images and words you use to sell the product to your customer will make a big difference. Shopify have a great range of free themes to choose from, and the product pages included in these themes are great – crisp, clean, and well-designed, they’re simple to navigate and allow the product to speak for itself.

However, if you do want to be able to fully customize your pages, but you don’t know code, a third-party app is a great idea. Being able to drag and drop page elements wherever you like allows you total control over each product – which Shopify alone doesn’t give you. So, if you want to have more customization, paying a little extra each month for an app like Shogun could be a great choice for you.

Either way, it’s pretty simple to set up a product page using Shopify. Good luck!

Further read: