Shopify Merchant Fit, Determining, and Sales Segments

**Determining merchant fit** ---------------------------- Shopify has a lot to offer, but how do you determine if there's a good fit for the prospective merchant? The first step is to research the prospective merchant. Understand as much as you can about the company and the people you're reaching...

**Determining merchant fit** ---------------------------- Shopify has a lot to offer, but how do you determine if there's a good fit for the prospective merchant? The first step is to research the prospective merchant. Understand as much as you can about the company and the people you're reaching out to. This could be through publicly available information like their website, social media, recent news, or third party tools. Through your research you can learn more about their product, their brand, and their revenue. Use this information to gauge the probability of them adopting Shopify. Having a grasp on their revenue will also help them be placed in the right band to avoid over or under quoting later in the process. ### **Indicators of good merchant fit** - - - - - **Sales market segments** ------------------------- Merchants are sorted into one of three market segments based on their size. Some common business priorities and challenges extend across all segments, while some tend to come up more frequently as a business grows and expands. ### Mid-Market - - - - - - - ### **Large Accounts** - - - - - - - - ### **Enterprise** - - - - - - - - - Conducting early discovery with a prospect is vital to identifying pain points, uncovering areas of opportunity, and understanding their goals. If done well, a good discovery process will enable you to not only confirm merchant fit but provide valuable insight to the product positioning that will best suit the prospect's needs. We discussed how you can begin the discovery process by researching the prospective merchant before you have even met them. That sets the stage for a meaningful discovery conversation face to face that allows you to go from vague and abstract to specific and tangible. Digging into the merchant's specific business needs allows you to move beyond just a high-level features discussion. You can focus on what the specific business needs, and not what they think they need, by digging into the prospective merchant's workflow to gather as many examples as possible. **What to look for** -------------------- Strong prospects are likely showing some signs of momentum or experiencing barriers to growth. During discovery, look for these indicators that Shopify is well positioned to help with. This will highlight areas where Shopify's value proposition can directly address the merchant's needs. - - - - - - - - - - - Having a clear picture of the prospect's current challenges and priorities will help to pitch Shopify and our solutions more effectively. **What questions to ask for** ----------------------------- Think back to what information you'll need to determine market fit and how you can get answers to those questions through the discovery process. Some of the larger questions you'd want to uncover during discovery for every prospect include: - - - There are many ways to get to the answer of these larger questions. You should adapt your questions in discovery conversations to what you know about the prospect, what they sell, and how they sell it. While you're not pitching a solution at this stage, you can still ask questions related to the direction you think will be most useful for their specific use case. Here are some example questions you may ask based on an area you think will be of particular interest or benefit to the prospective merchant. ### **Customer acquisition** - - ### **Checkout** - - - ### **Automation** - ### Unified commerce - - ### **Retail** - - **Consider the competition** ---------------------------- There are a lot of options in the commerce market, each with their own tradeoffs. We know that Shopify is uniquely positioned as a leader in the space, and can use that to direct conversations with prospects. The primacy competitor of the deal could be their current solution if they're deciding if it's worth it to switch. Or it could be another solution who'll also be trying to uncover the prospective merchant's challenges and needs. Utilizing what you know about Shopify and its competitors can narrow the focus of discovery questions. In direct conversations with prospective merchants, you can provide detailed insight into how Shopify differentiates itself. It's always great to use stats and metrics whenever possible to add credibility to the discussion. Focus only on factual comparisons, and lead with Shopify's strengths, not with the competitor's weakness. We want to highlight how Shopify adds value without disparaging others. Be confident about the value Shopify can offer but do so humbly and respectfully. You can leverage additional resources outside of this course to prepare for competitor discussion in the future. While every conversation with a prospective merchant is different, there are common objections you can be prepared for going into a meeting. ### **Common Mid-Market objections - "Is it worth it?"** - - ### **Common Large Account objections - "Can you handle us?"** - - ### **Common Enterprise objections - "Can you meet all our needs and make it worth our while?"** - - - When objections come up during the discovery process, they're a great opportunity to dig further into understanding any doubts a prospective merchant has so they can be either addressed in the moment or inform how you want to tailor your pitch later on.