As a child, I started folding origami before I learned to fold the laundry. I would fold anything I could get my hands on, including receipts, napkins, homework assignments, and even the laundry. Having honed my craft to the point where I could shamelessly leave my creations amongst others at an Airbnb in the heart of Kyoto (true story), I decided it was time to share my frustrations joy with the world. That meant opening a store of course.
- What was the biggest challenge you faced in creating your store?
- Content creation is always one of the biggest challenges, and such was the challenge I faced. As a small business with no inventory, I had difficulties sourcing product photos and descriptions without directly contacting the manufacturer.
- What worked really well when using our platform?
- Being able to save the forms without filling in every field was actually very satisfying, because it allowed me to get my shop (preview) up and running easily. It left a good impression because I could create something without being told I made 2847987246 form errors.
- What could be improved when using our platform?
- While creating my first product, I was not a fan of having to explicitly create a Collection before adding the product to it. It's a minor issue sure, but I wish I could have just entered a new collection name in the product details page to give a smoother experience. (The same way I can create a new blog while writing a blog post apparently.)
- How did this experience help you build empathy for our merchants?
- Before Shopify, I would have expected a lot more effort to get a store running with something like Magento. In contrast, the last few days gave me the impression that anyone can make a store with ease. This experience helped me to understand that relatively simple does not mean it's actually simple, and that merchants still have to tackle many different aspects beyond picking a product and waiting for sales.
- What is your biggest takeaway from this experience?
- In my Frontend Developer role, I think I will be more critical about UX decisions, which may very well impact our very large user base. Personally I found this experience lowered the barrier for creating my own store, something which I think many people have been considering amidst the pandemic.