Company

The early bird gets the worm—or in the entrepreneur's case, any lucrative opportunities that exist in an emerging market.

Taron Lizagub was at home watching a conference where Google unveiled their cardboard VR headsets. His gut told him this was going to be a hot trend and he knew he had to act fast.

But before he went all in, he tested the market with a scrappy splash page. To his surprise, he very quickly pre-sold 500 of these items and went on to make $2.9 million in 2015. Learn all about it in this episode of Shopify Masters.

Influencer marketing has become the hot topic on many marketer’s lips, and when you think about the potential, it’s not hard to understand why.

With its community of over 400 million active users, including many incredible content creators, Instagram has become a top visual marketing platform all kinds of businesses—start-ups and huge global brands alike.

The latest algorithm update by Instagram, (posts are now shown based on engagement rather than in chronological order) means that paid advertising and influencer marketing have become more important than ever before.

Influencer marketing has become the hot topic on many marketer’s lips, and when you think about the potential, it’s not hard to understand why.

With its community of over 400 million active users, including many incredible content creators, Instagram has become a top visual marketing platform all kinds of businesses—start-ups and huge global brands alike.

The latest algorithm update by Instagram, (posts are now shown based on engagement rather than in chronological order) means that paid advertising and influencer marketing have become more important than ever before.

You need to spend money to make money.

That's the mindset of growth-oriented marketing. But what many entrepreneurs learn is that this investment can take on less conventional forms that turn out to be a smarter way of spending those marketing dollars.

For Frank Rabinovitch of Impact Mouthguard that meant giving away some of his custom mouthguards to generate buzz and educate consumers.

In fact, these giveaways proved so effective the company wants to give away over 500 more this year. Learn more on this episode of Shopify Masters.

Finding the perfect price point for your products can be an unforeseen challenge for some entrepreneurs. 

Between your manufacturer and your consumer and all the logistical costs incurred in between, there's a lot involved in putting just the right price tag on your products.

On today’s Shopify Masters, you’ll hear from Vlad Dragusin of Candylab Toys, maker of wood toy cars inspired by the American automobile of the 60s, about the unexpected cost of fulfillment he encountered after raising $118K on Kickstarter, and what he recommends you look out for.

If you want to create repeat business and minimize returns, you need to color correct (aka “color grade”) your product images to represent your product as accurately as possible and match your chosen ecommerce color palette.

No matter how careful you are or how beautiful your shot, there are always improvements that can be made in post-production.

Color correcting isn’t a complex task. It can be done fairly easily provided you have the right software—like Adobe Lightroom—and you integrate it into your product photography workflow. 

Read more to learn how.

The Airstream, with its iconic riveted aluminum shape, trends in cycles like history’s best fashion pieces – bomber jackets, wide leg denim, classic kicks. It’s on the upswing, enjoying a healthy resurgence in popularity thanks to wanderlusting millennials with vintage leanings. Airstream’s simple, timeless vessels began to undergo extreme makeovers, emerging as luxury apartments on wheels.

A gutted Airstream is a blank canvas, and businesses were getting wise to its potential as a flexible pop-up shop or a moving showroom.

This is the second post in our two-part series about Shopify merchants running businesses from the road. Last week, we shared the story of a serial ecommerce entrepreneur, boondocking off the grid. This week, our subjects are two makers glamping and retailing their way across America’s pop-up circuit in a renovated vintage Airstream studio.

David Wolfe and Jaime Diamonstein are no strangers to the world of business. So when they cofounded Leesa, a quality mattress designed for sleepers of all kinds, they were able to bring together skill sets and experience that complemented one another.

In this episode of Shopify Masters, you’ll hear how these two entrepreneurs partnered to take on a $14 billion industry and win Shopify's Build a Business competition.  

You don't need to sell to everyone to build a successful business. 

All you need is a passionate community and a way to resonate with them on a level that none of your competitors are doing.

That's where content marketing becomes a powerful strategy. 

Ben Petraglia shares with us what it was like building Solé Bicycles, a direct-to-consumer bike company that has harnessed niche content marketing to achieve 100% growth year over year

In this podcast you’ll learn from Jeff Graham, a B2B entrepreneur who sells his services through Shopify.

Jeff runs Civil Estimator one of the most well-known and respected freelance estimation providers for construction companies all around the world. And he does it by selling these services as digital products.

The Kickstarter community might be patient when your product launch gets delayed. But they're not so forgiving when your launch goes horribly wrong.

On this Shopify Masters podcast, you’ll learn from an entrepreneur who disappointed 2,500 Kickstarter backers and the story of how he made it all right. 

Find out how Gareth Everard salvaged his Kickstarter campaign for Rockwell Razors, adjustable and super affordable shaving razors, in this episode of Shopify Masters.