Chlo?'s 3 Things #6: Noise / APIs / Shopify Summer Editions

Morning!

This week I have been mostly... getting ready for a big announcement next week.

Yes, the secret project is almost ready to be revealed ??

But I can't talk about that here, so what things I've been thinking about can I share with you...

Thing 1: Noise

A topic I keep coming back to over the years when I do training, or keynotes, is the bright shiny object.

Those ideas, things, software packages that appear out of nowhere and totally distract us from our plan.

Some bright shiny objects are awesome, some are awesome for X months time, and some should be ignored completely.

I frequently talk about BSOs because we are in a VERY noisy industry and all that noise frequently leads to merchants doing things they shouldn't do.

I'm also aware that I am a creator of noise, and thus a purveyor of BSOs - each week I put out at least 2 podcast episodes, one newsletter, and 5 LinkedIn posts.

Plus all the flim-flam that goes out promoting them, and I'm probably speaking at something, or hosting a panel somewhere.

To counter that I try to make my noise as low-hype, and practical as I can.

Noisy Things

I think the worst of it is when we (content creators, SaaS firms, marketing and web agencies) all jump on something without really assessing whether it SHOULD be part of our content plan.

Is it what our audience NEED to hear about?

That's when the full weight of noise leads our audience to get totally distracted, by something they don't need to know about.

This summer we've had a lot of them:

• Threads
• ChatGPT/AI everything
• Shopify Editions
• X.com

So what's the point of this thing?

1. Beware the BSO and filter accordingly
2. If you're creating content - stop and think, am I adding value to the discussion? Do my audience need to know about it?

Thing 2: This week I built an API thing, my first

I can't code.

I had no desire to learn API.

BUT this week I had a problem...

The task: I needed to migrate about 700 shortlinks from Rebrandly to BL.INK Smart Links & QR Codes

The problem: There's no export tool from Rebrandly.

Solution 1: Get my VA to copy and paste all the info to spreadsheet.

Not a fun task, and it was going to take her AGES.

Solution 2: Find a way to get the information via API.

Not how I wanted to spend 3 hours of my week, and arguably on an hourly rate basis it would have made more sense to make the VA do it...

BUT I got to make her week a lot more fun, and learnt a new skill.

WOW! APIs are cool!!

(totally my no. 1 BSO of the week!!)

When I get some time later this summer I will be looking at how they can be used for more things... fun techy day coming up.

How did I do it?

I installed Apipheny a no-code Google Sheets add on that I found on retailer-of-1,000s-of-BSOs - AppSumo - get the lifetime Apipheny deal here (affiliate link).

I spent about an hour trying to align the language used on Rebrandly's API documentation with the instructions in Apipheny. And could only get 25 records in.

Then I asked ChatGPT to tell me how to do it.

ChatGPT told me the wrong way.

So I told ChatGPT to try again - and they didn't get me the perfect answer, BUT they got me something that would work.

So rather than automate the pagination (get me and my API terminology), I did it manually which took about half an hour... because I also could work out how to filter out the shortlink URLs I didn't need.

Takeaways & Wins

• My process was far from perfect. But I now have all the data ??
• By yesterday afternoon all the links were set up and working in Blink (they have a LOVELY import from csv tool that even sets up the right Analytics tracking parameters) - a whole week before I thought we'd have that done.
• My VA is MUCH happier than she would have been.
• The data I've exported from Rebrandly is 100% accurate (no human error) which makes cleaning up the links easy to prioritise.
• I have resisted the urge to dive into APIs this week...

Thing 3: Shopify Summer Editions 2023

I've got slightly caught up in the noise - and we'll be doing a blog on it next week, but leveraging other people's opinions and not my own (find out more and contribute here).

The BEST blog on it is here by the excellent WeMakeWebsites .

Please think before you post about this - do you need to? where should you?

Even if you're a Shopify agency are you sure you should? SEO ranking is unlikely so wouldn't bother with a blog.

Instead I'd do a good email to my customers, use it as a way to have a call with them and drum up business, and do a few social posts.

Pick the right noise ?? for your objectives.

OK that's the 3 for this week... expect the secret to be revealed next week.

(which will be a massive relief!!)

Have a great weekend.

PS if you want to be a part of our Shopify Editions opinions blog post submit here