Shopify App Store Ads

Use App Store ads to test qualified merchant acquisition, not to buy superficial installs. Treat the Shopify Partner Dashboard and current Shopify documentation as the authority for eligibility, available placements, bid behavior, billing, and reporting.

Ground Rules

1. Verify that the app is publicly published and eligible before proposing launch. An active development version is not evidence of a public App Store listing or advertising eligibility.
2. Research live platform rules before acting. Start with Shopify's App Store ads documentation, then verify the visible Partner Dashboard controls for the specific app.
3. Use community sources (Reddit, reviews, founder posts) to form keyword, pain-point, and creative hypotheses. Label them as anecdotal; do not present them as Shopify policy or benchmark data.
4. Never create, enable, or materially raise a paid campaign without the user's explicit confirmation of the currency, daily cap, total test cap, and stop date. Do not infer approval from a request to "run ads."
5. Never call a campaign live from an API response, draft state, or local configuration alone. Confirm its visible dashboard status, targeting, budget, billing readiness, and landing/listing preview.
6. Do not promise customers or return on ad spend before enough cohort time has passed. Distinguish clicks, installs, trials, activated merchants, and paid customers.

Readiness Gate

Collect these facts before recommending spend: