Jonathan Kennedy

Founder, AppStoreResearch | User Research Recruitment for eCommerce Saas

Founder with proven track record in the eCommerce space. Still building. 

What I’m working on:

- Building shopexperts.com - a commission-free Shopify expert network to help Shopify brands find the best service providers to help grow their brands. 

- Connecting Shopify app teams with brand owners and operators for 1-1 user research and sales calls - appstoreresearch.com

- Pre-seed/seed angel investor and private credit for Shopify apps and services based businesses - Open to advisory roles w/ or w out equity points. Open to cold inbound. 

email: jon@shopexperts.com


Founder

Official Shopify experts since 2015. We help ambitious brands on Shopify and Shopify Plus scale up to 7-8 figures/year with fully managed design and dev operations. Fast turnarounds. 1/2 the cost of typical agency. 

I’m going to say that 90% of brand operators on Shopify (maybe more) don’t know and/or don’t care about the “Built for Shopify” badge or your agency partner tier. 

It’s just not what matters to them. 

They are both inventions by Shopify to get partners aligned. It’s good for other reasons, not bad, but your customers don’t care. 

Agree or disagree?

Founder, shopexperts.com & appstoreresearch.com

For most of my career I’ve been mostly a people pleaser. Giving people around me lots of time and chances to fit into my vision, work style, hoping for alignment when it was never going to be there, as my own vision and professional character also evolved. 

Now I want to unapologetically work and associate with people I like, or walk away. 

This is part of why I love Shopify - I like 75% of people in this industry who I meet and associate with. I think that’s pretty good. It mostly attracts ambitious, growth and community oriented people from every part of the world. 

Enthusiasm, alignment, sharpness, speed and bias for action, endless curiosity, hard chats with positive outcomes as a priority, people with a healthy balance of patience and impatience, general tact, self belief, self alignment, optimism, humility but with confidence. People who can be constructive minus whining or complaining. People who want to compete with me on who will offer the other more value in every interaction. Not default takers.

I want to work with, partner with, invest in, buy from and sell to people with these traits while I strive to be to be more like this myself. 

They give me more than just satisfaction with my work, these types of people add joy to my life. 

What do you look for in people you associate with? How do you curate for this as a founder (or human)?

- written for you without AI

My take on the Shopify Theme Marketplace in 2026

Shopify theme companies are increasingly frustrated with how the official marketplace has been managed and deprioritized. 

As growth slows and competition rises, the old “sell a premium theme and rely on marketplace traffic” playbook no longer works.

Key shifts:

	•	Marketplace validation is weaker. With hundreds of new themes and limited theme marketplace innovation from Shopify, being listed is no longer a strong quality signal. High-quality options now exist off-marketplace.

	•	Themes alone aren’t enough. Competing on design and features is commoditized. Brands now expect outcomes, not just templates - meaning theme companies must bundle services, customization, and possibly apps.

	•	Oversupply is real. With 1,000+ styles and cheaper custom builds, the market likely doesn’t need more themes. YoY declines across many theme businesses reflect this saturation.

	•	New entrants are more diversified. Recent theme companies launched knowing theme sales couldn’t be the sole revenue stream. Services and apps are core to their strategy.

	•	Founder-led teams have an edge. Many bigger theme companies have been acquired, and founder energy has been lost. Agile, founder-led brands have an opportunity to gain market share and partnerships.

	•	Brand matters now. Marketplace traffic once removed the need for strong branding. That’s changing. Building brand equity (beyond just the theme name) is critical. Truly Fine Pixels, Krown Themes, Brickspace Lab and Platter come to mind as founder-led theme companies investing in their brand. 

	•	Own your reviews. Theme marketplace reviews mainly serve Shopify’s ranking algorithm (same with apps). Theme companies should build independent review assets.

	•	Agencies and experts should bet on adaptable teams when choosing themes for their clients. Founder-led theme companies are more likely to adapt fast, evolve and deliver long-term value.

Bottom line: In 2026, successful theme companies won’t just sell themes - they’ll operate as outcome-driven, brand-led, service-enabled partners.

Agree or disagree? If you run an agency, how are you deciding which themes to recommend to brands?

#shopifythemes

Looking for top tier Shopify marketing agencies, freelancers, consultants and fractional talent in North America, Europe and South America to join the shopexperts network. (Edit: please respect these as criteria)

We’re a commission free, global Shopify services directory and community. Recently launched - our aim is to become the leading platform for brands on Shopify or who wish to migrate/launch in Shopify, to hire help for every imaginable service they might need. 

A few requirements:

- 100% focused on serving Shopify merchants 
- Clear and consistent digital footprint 
- The service business is your main thing (no sidequesters or moonlighters) 
- 5+ years experience delivering services
- Strong and specific positioning (not a generalist)
- Verifiable track record with brands (public case studies and reviews

Comment below. We will check your digital footprint and send the registration link. It’s not available on our website. 

Shopexperts.com

Open article: Hire the Best Shopify Experts, Agencies and Service Providers | shopexperts by shopexperts.com

Hire the Best Shopify Experts, Agencies and Service Providers | shopexperts

Best sources of Shopify app ideas 

- Any feature/function that Shopify invests in  - there’s opportunity for nimble, focused + entrepreneurial teams to dive deeper into problems and benefit from Shopify educating the market. Except for checkout stuff.. I’d stay away from what Shopify is world class at and where they make most of their revenue. 

- Any mid market app in the 10k-100k/month range that gets acquired. The acquisition often signals an exit of the founder, their energy, spirit and imminent degradation of support quality - 97% of the time. This presents very good opportunities to take market share as a new and entrepreneurial player. 

- AI Summaries of customer reviews of specific apps or across entire app categories, can raise hints and ideas for good feature ideas or differentiators in that category. 

- My favourite > actually meeting/interviewing  brand operators you’d love to be building for before you build - over the phone or in person. 

- Run an agency or freelance business and serve dozens, hundreds of brands to identify patterns and pain points that can be solved with apps. 

- I like the Whop app marketplace for innovative marketing app ideas that can be applied to the Shopify world. 

- Look beyond Shopify to other ecommerce app marketplaces that are in their early years - Klaviyo, Recharge, Triple Whale, Gorgias and Yotpo all have nascient app stores. You can build for them or map good app ideas back to the broader marketplace. 

Where did you get inspiration for your Shopify app idea? 

#shopify

Growing a hobby brand to 7 figures/month on Shopify! 

Edmond G. of Hobbiesville shares his brand founder story and his playbook for working with external teams:

Rather than outsourcing the business to agencies, they integrated best-in-class app partners for specific growth pillars like Smile.io, Reactiv, Klaviyo and Adoric. 

For many creative and marketing functions, keeping execution in-house or working with niche specialists proved more effective.

I’m honoured and fired up to share his founder story, and many other inspiring stories on the shopexperts blog. 

#shopify

For every outspoken founder on LinkedIn - there are dozens, sometimes hundreds, of dedicated, hyper skilled, but quiet team members in the background steering their operations. 

Hat tip to all the A-players behind these founders doing the work.

[The best side hustle in ecommerce]

We’re seeing some of the best new and break out Shopify apps come through app store research lately. 

Here’s what many Shopify brands miss until they join the network and have a few calls with app teams. 

The opportunity is not the incentive, though some brand operators are stacking +$1000/week in payouts for 4-5 calls. 

The real opportunities for brands are:

1. Discovery of new apps that can replace existing apps that are costing thousands a month with poor support. One brand in our network replaced an app costing them $5k/month with a comparable app (with a cool helpful founder) they hopped on a 90 day free trial +white glove onboarding/consulting. After 90 days it will be under $1k/month. Same functionality + better support + improved outcome.

2. The other big opportunity is not obvious. Discovering and implementing new apps ahead of competitors. Doing this once doesn’t have an impact but turning early discovery into a strategy will move the needle. The greater the revenue the greater the impact for the same effort. 

So.. get paid to save money 💰 and outsmart competitors. 👀 

If you’re a brand operator and want to join, DM me or comment below for the registration link or to book a call with me. 

If you’re a Shopify app struggling with cold outreach, we’ve flipped the switch completely - start today and book calls with brands that match your ICP by tomorrow. 

Screenshot of actual brand operator earnings. We’re closing in on $900k paid out in incentives to brands.

Most people underestimate or the potential of starting/running OR being a very engaged member in a private, high quality, curated professional community. 

The possibilities are boundless. The return on time could be immeasurable. 

One high quality connection or opportunity can literally change the course of your business or even your life. Just one. 

Start a private community with peers or pick one to go all-in on as a member this year.

Another inspiring brand founder story on the Brand Stories blog at shopexperts

From solving a rowing club kit problem to $180K/month: Building Rival Kit, a fast-growing custom sportswear brand on Shopify.

Ryan Morrison shares his story with us -  from spreadsheets and manual shipping labels in the early days, to going viral and how they choose and work with agencies and partners.

''Alignment matters more than credentials. When agencies or partners aren’t proactive – or when their vision doesn’t match the company’s direction – progress slows quickly.''

They use Klaviyo and Tidio for key parts of the business, and use app store research to discover new Shopify apps every month. 

Read the full story below! 

Submit your own brand story to get featured and find experts and agencies that align on the shopexperts global Shopify services directory. 

#shopify

Most founders are sitting on stories that could impact their trajectory, and very possibly someone else’s, in a good way. 

But they don’t share them because they are too shy, scared of looking dumb or vulnerable, competition stealing playbooks, think nobody cares, no time. 🥱 

Two reasons to share your startup story, wins and lessons with the world around you:

1. Nobody else will.

Don't wait for others to write testimonials. No one can tell your scrappy early days, the near-miss deal, the pivot that almost broke you or the moment that changed everything. 

2. You increase your surface area for luck.

Potential customers see it. 
Future hires or investors DM you. 
Word of mouth engines start with founders. 
Breakthroughs and partnerships happen because someone read one post.

Visibility compounds.

I grew a Shopify brand Facebook community to 100k members without a content schedule, no post scheduling, no AI generated hooks, no memes or news jacking, just by writing from the hip and heart when I felt like it..typos included. I told my story and helped others tell theirs. Writing and community were the foundation of two 7 figure businesses and an exit, life long friendships, and a great career. 

Find your medium (writing, video, audio) and share your story. If it's authentic, people will pay attention.

Three main reasons we choose not to take a commission on sales from leads we introduce to experts on shopexperts. 

1. Forever commissions force experts to inflate their pricing - 90% of the time (maybe more) the commission is being passed on to the brand/client via convoluted/vague project pricing. 

2. Commissions encourage and incentivize the pairing to disintermediate (go off platform) - this problem increases with scale. If the pair don't disintermediate, they begin to question the ongoing value of the platform with every subsequent project payment between them. Resentment sets in. The platform resorts to rigidity, penalties to maintain control, or exorbitant fees to take clients offline. ie. NO FUN

3. The business model is tired. There are dozens of other ways to better capture value as the match maker, which make work fun and profitable for experts and keep pricing fair for brands - in an already inflationary economy. 

Bonus: You can let listed experts showcase every bit of professional information they want to share about themselves on open portfolios, and this creates fair open competition and unstoppable content flywheels. 

Browse shopexperts listings for hundreds of examples. Four of my favourites shared in comments.

The industry talent we’re bringing together in the shopexperts community is impressive and inspiring. 

Agencies and freelancers across every service category and every little niche Shopify service you can imagine. Different business models for different market segments, but world class people - brought together to give brands ultimate transparency and context, choice and freedom on where to communicate, manage work and pay for expert help. No paywalls, no bloated pricing, fair market dynamics and reputation markers. 

We just launched a third listing type - App Services for Shopify app companies that offer hands-on implementation of their app and related services ie almost every new app hitting the app store in 2026.

Thanks to Celian Girost and Filippo Calenti at Measmerize, Sam Rotner at Patrol, Shia Mandel at Evereye, Muhammed Tüfekyapan at Growth Suite for being the first to publish their free app service listings on our directory. 

This isn’t a replacement of the official app listing, it’s something completely new that we’re inventing to highlight and promote the service side of Shopify app companies. 

If your Shopify app company offers hands on implementation services, you/your team are merchant-first, you’re willing to give us feedback on the listing features, and you have already have a good reputation in the market. Join us!

Drop your app link in comments and if it’s a fit I’ll send you the registration link. See listing examples in first comment. 

#shopify

Small wins compound in business - somewhere between year 2 and 10, things will take off for you, maybe. 😜

On good taste. 

If you're building or creating anything, Shopify apps, client work, images that support your brand or services, try not to downplay or ignore the value and impact of good taste (aesthetics, design, consistency) on successful outcomes. 

If you're technical, or your skill isn't design like me - you can hire for this, but you can also train your eye by spending hours just looking at good design online and offline, to bring this back into your work. Spending and losing lots of money on bad digital or physical design work can also train you for this. 

How to know when you or someone has good sense of design and taste?

If you walk into a room and notice crooked tiles, misaligned floor boards or picture frames and it really bothers you, you're there. There's a difference between things being misaligned by design vs misaligned in poor taste (or laziness).

I spend hours on behance, contra, dribbble to discover good taste - it's not only about colour palettes or high converting layouts - it's about calm and clever use of space, balance, fit, function and form. 

If you're not a designer, how do you think about the idea of ''good taste'' in your work or business?

If you're a good designer, what's your advice to non designers to sharpen one's sense of taste?

#design

- written for you without AI

I’ve never been so fired up 🔥 

Another epic 7-figure brand founder story to share. No fluff. Just grit and authenticity. 

Mark Collis at Skout Organic shares his story, lessons and wisdom around hiring agencies with us on the shopexperts blog. A must read for builders in the CPG category. 

Skio, Okendo, Triple Whale, ShipStation and Gorgias are core apps that support Mark and his brand.  

Mark is also part of the brand operator network at app store research. 

#shopify

Looking for Shopify apps that offer hands-on implementation of their app to join the shopexperts network. 

List your app and describe the service offering on a free listing, and join a community of 250 agencies, freelancers and other app teams.

Drop your link and describe briefly how you help brands achieve the promised outcome if they choose to use your app. I’ll send you the registration link if it’s a fit.

Big welcome to the new Shopify agencies, freelancers and app service teams who joined the shopexperts network last week. 

Every new expert who joins helps move our ecosystem away from outdated commission-based hiring models that inflate project costs for brands and limit the free dynamics of an open marketplace. 👀 

Agencies:

James Greenwood -  Strawberry  
Kévin Miguet 📈 Jolly Commerce 
Reema Singhal - Retain (Email and SMS Marketing for e-commerce and service businesses)  

Freelancers:

Till Taeubrich  
Karim Tarek  

App Services (apps that offer hands on implimentation):

Kaushik Mahorker - @wildcard.ai
Jesse Shimkovitz  - Boundless AI 

If you’re a brand looking for help with Ai implementation expertise or just good old custom dev, design, marketing or finance help to solve, build or untangle, browse our open Shopify services directory at shopexperts.com. No jumping over paywalls or gated forms to access talent profiles.

#shopify

In the last two years I’ve seen (and served) some of the best early stage Shopify apps as customers of app store research. 

Most have driven exceptional growth primarily by filling their calendars with 1-1 meetings with brands (or agencies) for discovery, research and sales - these calls have become core to their strategy. 

They know that Investing in a merchant conversation engine is as close to silver bullet as they’re going to get in this industry. 

DM me if you want to connect with top brand owners/operators on Shopify Plus. Drop the beggar energy and get brands to apply to speak with you at app store research.

There are so many “takers” in our industry and few “givers”.

A giver is someone who enters every interaction with optimism for positive outcomes all around, and who consciously tries to provide as much or more value to the other party in the interaction. 

Imagine this - you can even be a giver in a situation where you’re the paying customer or where you’re the authority (as a boss, bigger partner) 👀 

Your business model is often a reflection of which one you are more naturally as a founder. Is the upside for your customers outsized? Are you obsessed with paywalls and gatekeeping the next tier? Or do you get satisfaction (and also profit) from creating opportunities for bigger value deltas between what you’re paid and what you deliver?

Next time you interact with a customer, vendor, partner, investor or employee/contractor - or even spouse or friend - think about this. 

Takers get linear or negative returns on their time and money invested. 

Givers get exponential returns on their time and money invested. 

Are you a giver or a taker?

taplio

Jonathan Kennedy's Linkedin Analytics