Six-month window to rank in AI search before enterprises catch up—if your Shopify brand isn't showing up in ChatGPT or Perplexity product recommendations yet, this is your roadmap.

In this episode, Ivan Slobodin, Director of Product at Searchable.com, breaks down:

• Why the next 6-12 months offer a rare chance to rank alongside Nike and Sony in AI platforms before competition intensifies
• How automation runs hundreds of prompts daily across 9 AI platforms vs the 10-20 you'd do manually
• Why brands are seeing visibility results in 1 week instead of the 3-6 months traditional SEO requires

Whether you're doing $10K months or $10M years, this conversation delivers strategies you can test this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-446/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

DTC brands struggling in 2025: there's a $5.9 trillion wholesale opportunity you're missing while chasing the $1.3 trillion online market.

In this episode, Meghann Butcher, founder of RepSpark, breaks down:

• How 80,000+ retailers actively discover and order from emerging brands through B2B platforms
• The operational backbone that turns chaotic wholesale order management into automated fulfillment
• Why adding wholesale legitimizes DTC brands and opens revenue channels beyond paid acquisition

Whether you're doing $50K months or $5M years, this conversation delivers strategies you can test this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-445/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

Alibaba makes 90% of revenue from supplier advertising—meaning the factories you see first simply paid the most to rank there.

In this episode, discover:

• Why Alibaba's pay-to-rank model keeps premium suppliers (like those manufacturing for Lululemon and Calvin Klein) off directories, and how customs data from Vietnam, Mexico, India, and China reveals actual factory quality
• The compliance risk that cost brands hundreds of thousands: how US DNA testing on Xinjiang cotton caught unsuspecting brands, and why sanction screening prevents customs seizures
• SourceReady's AI workflow consolidating trend research, product redesign, supplier discovery, and quote automation—replacing weeks of email ping-pong with verified manufacturer data

Ricky Ho is founder of SourceReady and third-generation manufacturing family. He raised venture capital from Sequoia and GGV, earning Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia.

Whether you're doing $10K months or $1M months, this conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-444/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

Most Shopify stores are bleeding margin with generic discount codes that get scraped, shared, and abused—while missing the strategic segmentation that actually drives conversions.

In this episode, discover:

• How switching from "WELCOME10" to unique codes prevents coupon abuse while enabling targeted offers for new subscribers, win-back campaigns, and VIP segments—without the CFO panic about unlimited liability
• Why 46% of distributed codes expire unused (revealing hidden opportunities in your customer data) and how brands like Viore and Allbirds use this intelligence to optimize discount strategies across 20,000+ merchant benchmarks
• The personalization shift happening right now: moving from blanket discounts to behavior-based offers that make customers feel valued while protecting margins—especially critical after Shopify's 20x variant limit increase

Cara Marin is Product Owner for Bulk Discount Codebot at Seguno. Her team analyzed 162,000 discount code sets to create the industry's first comprehensive benchmarking report on strategic discounting.

Whether you're doing $10K months or $1M months, this conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-443/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

When Facebook shows 50 sales, Google Analytics shows 35, and Shopify shows 68 — which number do you trust to scale profitably?

In this episode, discover:

• How server-side tracking eliminates the 20-30% revenue gap plaguing most Shopify brands' analytics, bypassing Apple ITP and ad blockers to achieve 100% order relay from Shopify to your marketing channels
• Why Littledata's unified data layer synchronizes customer behavior, loyalty tiers, and product metafields across Meta, Google, and Klaviyo — enabling advanced segmentation without custom code or GTM configurations
• What changes immediately after installation: accurate conversion tracking that feeds real purchase data back into ad algorithms, even for orders from ChatGPT checkout and Shopify's Shop app

Edward Upton is CEO and Founder of Littledata, rebuilding e-commerce tracking infrastructure from the ground up to solve the data accuracy crisis affecting Shopify brands globally.

Whether you're doing $10K months or $1M months, this conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-442/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

Most Shopify sellers have no idea they're breaking tax laws until it's too late—and the penalties are brutal.

In this episode, discover:

• Four types of nexus that trigger tax obligations beyond economic thresholds: physical locations, affiliate commissions, click-through traffic, and even trade show attendance create instant compliance requirements
• Why Amazon FBA sellers get blindsided when launching Shopify stores—Amazon handles sales tax automatically while Shopify puts the burden entirely on you, creating massive compliance gaps
• 2025's aggressive tax changes: Illinois eliminating transaction thresholds, California charging $800 minimum just to store one product, and states adding new service taxes monthly

Reuben Mattinson is CEO of RJM Tax Exemption, serving 4,000+ e-commerce businesses as the #1 rated tax compliance firm on TrustPilot in the Shopify ecosystem.

Whether you're doing $10K months or $1M months, this conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-441/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

Most CRO agencies chase test velocity while your conversion problems go undiagnosed—here's the research framework that changes everything.

In this episode, discover:

• Why 80% of optimization work should happen before you launch a single test, using research to understand customer psychology instead of copying competitors
• The Intrasite Funnel diagnostic framework that reveals the four critical metrics Shopify's analytics completely miss (including the product discovery gap)
• How conversion rate is actually a vanity metric—95% influenced by ad spend and traffic source changes, not your button colors or layouts

Anthony Morgan is Founder and CEO of Enavi. He's built a reputation as a contrarian in the CRO space, pioneering "human-obsessed CRO" that prioritizes customer research over rapid-fire testing.

Whether you're doing $10K months or $1M months, this conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-440/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify

AI is reshaping customer discovery, and if you're not showing up in ChatGPT or Perplexity recommendations, you're invisible.

In this episode, discover:

• Why Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) matters now—AI recommendations convert 5x better than Google clicks while 56% of searches result in zero clicks
• The revenue optimization framework that helped brands scale past 8 figures: converting just 3 more customers per 100 visitors doubles your ability to buy market share
• How to diagnose revenue leaks through funnel metrics (add-to-cart → checkout → completion) rather than chasing vanity metrics like overall conversion rate

Matt Stafford is Managing Director at Build Grow Scale. He's optimized over $1 billion in cart transactions and specializes in helping DTC brands scale profitably through data-driven optimization.

Whether you're doing $10K months or $1M months, this conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement this week.

📝 Full show notes, strategic takeaways, and resources: https://ecommercefastlane.com/podcast/episode-439/

Connect with us:

🐦 Twitter: https://twitter.com/stevenhutt
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shutt/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thrivingwithshopify