Sam Shares #6: Awaited Shopify feature, podcasts and throwback to when I tried to save a ski resort

Welcome all to the 6th edition of my newsletter. In between travelling and focus time, I've found some time to gather updates and thoughts worth sharing with you guys.

In this edition:

1. An epic feature Shopify released last week
2. How the Acquired podcast opens eyes I didn't know I had
3. Podcast launch #46: My talk with RUMvision
4. FUX vs UX: Understanding user experiences
5. Throwback to when I tried to save a skiing resort

1. Live per April 2024: 2000 product variants

It was already announced in the latest Winter Edition, but since this week the full the GraphQLProduct APIs supports up to 2000 variants. In my last webinar, I already spoke about Shopify laying the foundations to cater bigger and better brands, and the variants upgrade being a step in that direction.

• Why is 2000 variants instead of 100 huge?
• Why is Shopify rebuilding their product data model from scratch?
• What does this mean for customers?
• What does this mean for merchants?

Check it out below!

2. The Acquired podcast about Renaissance Technologies

A lot of times we look to fiction for stories that blow our minds. But from time to time, you come across a real story that feels even more "out of this world" than you can imagine. I was listening to the latest episode of the Acquired podcast about Renaissance Technologies . RenTech is the best performing investment firm of all time.

$1000 invested in 1988, when the fund started, has compounded to $46.5 Billion today. The underlying principle is quite simple: create an unimaginable amount of clean data and apply machine learning to it. In this case to outperform the public stock markets. Now, in and off itself that's actually not interesting, because it's impossible to invest in the fund. But still, this story blew my mind.

Why? Because tech companies are working incredibly hard to bring the kinds of systems that Renaissance Technologies uses to the masses. Just imagine if these kinds of systems can be applied to all the different niches in the world! This is like thinking about the endless universe for me.

I just want to say: listen to the Acquired podcast, you'll not regret it for a second. It expanded my view on the world. And I'm so thankful that people make this kind of content and put it out there, for free. It's hard not to connect everything you hear to the things that you spend most of your time thinking about.

In my case this is e-commerce, Shopify and Odoo. If you think about it, Renaissance became incredibly good at uncovering patterns that we might never even think to look for. Imagine what kinds of data Shopify is amassing in the world of commerce. The amount of value that they'll be able to give merchants - in terms of how to upsell, what to cross sell, how to personalise, what merchandise to create - will be huge.

3. Podcast launch: My conversation with Roderik Derksen, founder of RUMvision

From one world class podcast to another. ?? We launched our 46th episode this week, but it's the first launch under our new name: Decoding Commerce. A new look, a new name and a slightly different format.

As of now, there are 2 types of episodes: In the first place we have 'deep-dives' hosted by myself, where we focus on the technical side of things. In the second place, we have 'talks' with John-Morgan Galeyn , where we unravel the history, philosophy and strategy of exciting people and brands.?

In this episode, we're taking a deep-dive into Core Web Vitals, the importance of Real User Monitoring and the course Shopify is taking in all this.

Definitely worth the listen if you're in any type of way interested in web performance and how to measure it!

4. First user experience (FUX) vs user experience (UX) and why the difference matters

To stay in the world of RUM, CWVs and website performance, let's talk about the difference between FUX and UX.

???????? ????????????????????: Google has pushed forward a set of metrics in which it tries to measure the user experience of people browsing the web. These metrics are referred to as the Core Web Vitals (CWV). Today I want to discuss the difference between the First User Experience (FUX) and User Experience (UX), as it’s essential to understand when looking at Real User Monitoring (RUM).

?????? ???? ???? ??????????????????? Imagine you get a lot of traffic from ads → a lot of unique visitors →?the FUX becomes a crucial metric. It's possible that your returning customers have a rather good User Experience but that first time visitors don't.If you're spending a lot of money to drive new customers to your website, it makes sense to have a sense on the first interaction people have with your brand. F.e. you have to take into account geographical differences. → What if you are targeting a new geography where average internet is worse? F.e. The median connection speed for Mobile in the Netherlands ???? is 108,33 Mbit/s. While the median for Spain ???? is 34,26 Mbit/s.→ What if you are targeting a new area where average device memory is worse?

???????????? ?????? ????'?? ??????????????????: However, one of the biggest reasons that FUX and UX can be different is caching! When you load a site for the first time a lot of things are saved in cache which means that when you visit it next time these files don’t need to be downloaded again and thus make sure things speed up for the subsequent visit. Next to this the template of the landing page that people typically coming from ads score worse on CWV compared to other templates on your store. You might miss this insight if you don’t separate out FUX vs UX.

Wondering if this is a common practice, or this something that's often overlooked... Let me know!

5. Throwback to when I tried to save a skiing resort

Almost 10 years ago, an unspoilt skiing resort I loved for adventurous, free-ride skiing was in danger of falling into the hands of big project developers or commercial ski resorts.

The cable car’s operating license was about to expire, and everyone was worried some big ski company would come in, smooth everything out, and strip away the raw, untamed essence we all loved.

So, we launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise €45,000, aiming to keep La Grave as wild and free as it always was. The goal was to ensure we could still ski through those forests and untouched snow, keeping the soul of the place alive. It was awesome to see the support roll in from wild skiers worldwide, and we quickly raised €75,000.

I got in the New York Times, all Belgian papers and on Belgian television with the project, but in the end we weren't allowed to pitch. We used the money for a hydraulic pump to generate energy from a dam to support the locals.

Amazing experience to dig up after my skiing trip from last week.

Thank you for sticking with me until the end!

Definitely let me know if you questions or remarks, always open for a conversation.

Until the next one,

Sam