How Smart Founders Use Shopify Analytics to Make Creative Decisions

The Metrics Founders Overlook—and How to Interpret Them

Useful analysis connects a metric with a clearly defined question. Before drawing conclusions, check what the report measures, which visitors it includes and whether the tracking is reliable.

Product-Level Performance

A product receiving traffic but generating few purchases deserves investigation. That pattern does not establish whether the issue is demand, presentation, price, availability or customer expectations.

If you calculate a product-level conversion rate, define the denominator. Purchases divided by product-page views measures something different from purchasing sessions divided by sessions that viewed the product. Use consistent definitions when comparing products.

Investigate:

• Whether visitors arrive from relevant searches or campaigns.
• Whether popular variants are available.
• How clearly the page explains the product, price and delivery terms.
• Whether images answer practical questions about size, materials or use.
• What customers ask before buying or mention when returning the product.

These findings can support a design hypothesis. They do not automatically justify replacing the photography or rewriting the page.

Landing-Page Performance

Review important landing pages by traffic source, device and campaign. A page receiving visitors who already know the brand may convert differently from one introducing it to a new audience.

Ask:

• What did the visitor see before arriving?
• Does the page fulfil that expectation?
• Is the next step clear and functional?
• Are visitors reaching an appropriate product or offer?

Prioritize pages where customer impact, traffic volume and a plausible improvement opportunity overlap. High traffic alone does not make a page the best testing candidate.

Cart and Checkout Progression

Examine where visitors stop progressing: before adding a product, between cart and checkout, or during checkout.

Shopify’s behaviour reports include a conversion breakdown using sessions with cart additions, sessions reaching checkout and sessions completing checkout. Check the report’s denominator and funnel settings before interpreting differences between stages.

Possible explanations include unexpected costs, delivery restrictions, payment problems, comparison shopping or a purchase postponed until later. Customer uncertainty may contribute, but the funnel does not identify it on its own.

Test the journey and review support feedback before choosing a response. Clearer copy cannot resolve a payment failure or an unavailable shipping destination.

Repeat Purchasing and Customer Retention

A low proportion of returning customers does not prove that your brand lacks an emotional connection.

Consider the product’s expected repurchase cycle, how long customers have had to return, stock availability and the balance between new-customer acquisition and existing-customer sales. Durable goods and replenishable products need different expectations.

Compare groups of customers acquired during similar periods and allow an appropriate time for repeat purchases. Use cancellation, return and support feedback to investigate whether the issue involves the product, service, communication or purchasing frequency.

Turning Insights Into Creative Strategy

Use Product Evidence to Improve Storytelling

If one product performs better than another, investigate the differences before copying its page structure across the catalogue. Pricing, reviews, availability, audience and promotional support may explain part of the result.

Use customer questions to identify gaps in the content. For example:

• Uncertainty about scale may justify photography showing the product in use.
• Confusion about suitability may call for clearer specifications or a comparison guide.
• Questions about quality may require evidence of materials, production or testing.
• Difficulty choosing a variant may suggest better labels and selection guidance.

A useful product storytelling approach connects the product’s value with concrete details customers need to make a decision.

Let Customer Tasks Guide Homepage Priorities

Homepage changes should help visitors understand the offering and reach the right destination.

Review navigation behaviour, search queries, campaign entry points and usability feedback. Decide whether visitors need faster access to a category, a clearer explanation of the business or stronger evidence supporting a claim.

Low scrolling alone is not a reason to rearrange the page. A visitor may find a useful category link near the top and leave the homepage successfully.

How Founders Use Scroll Depth to Inform Design

Scroll tracking indicates how far a visitor reaches on a page. It does not show whether they read, understood or were persuaded by the content.

The distinction between tools matters:

• Shopify reports help assess store activity and purchase journeys. Standard reports are not a section-by-section scroll heatmap.
• GA4 enhanced measurement records a default scroll event the first time 90% of a page’s vertical depth becomes visible. It does not automatically record a full sequence of 25%, 50% and 75% milestones. See Google’s GA4 enhanced measurement documentation.
• Custom scroll or section-visibility events can provide more detail when configured and tested.
• Heatmap and session-recording tools can help inspect scrolling and interaction patterns, subject to their collection settings and coverage.

An absent GA4 scroll event does not tell you precisely where someone stopped. Reaching 90% does not establish that they read everything above it.

For a specific design question, measuring whether a particular section became visible may be more useful than measuring a percentage of the page. Page length, screen size and dynamically loaded content can change what a percentage represents.

Check the Measurement Before Moving Content

Before acting on a scroll pattern:

1. Verify collection. Confirm the intended events fire correctly and are not duplicated. Understand how consent settings and tracking coverage affect the sample.
2. Separate relevant audiences. Compare mobile and desktop visitors, traffic sources and comparable page versions.
3. Inspect the journey. Look for successful navigation or purchases that occur without reaching the bottom.
4. Gather supporting evidence. Use interviews, usability tests or recordings to investigate what visitors may be missing.
5. Define a testable change. State what you propose to change and which customer outcome it should improve.

Example: Should Product Reviews Move Higher?

Observation: Section-visibility tracking suggests that relatively few mobile visitors reach the reviews.

Hypothesis: Some prospective buyers may need reassurance about product quality earlier in the page.

Investigation: Check whether customers ask about quality, whether they can already access reviews near the product title and whether purchasers typically scroll to the review section.

Proposed test: Add a concise, accurately sourced review summary near the purchase information while keeping the detailed reviews accessible.

Success measure: Evaluate completed purchases as the primary outcome, with review interactions and add-to-cart behaviour as supporting measures. Check that the change does not obstruct product selection or harm page usability.

Where traffic supports it, use a properly configured randomized A/B test with a predefined duration and decision criteria. Otherwise, combine usability evidence with a monitored rollout and treat before-and-after results as less conclusive.

Prioritize changes that address a documented customer need and can be evaluated meaningfully. Use our Shopify conversion framework to connect those priorities with product-page structure, messaging and the wider purchasing experience.