I opened my shop on the 13th July 2026 and the day after that I received countless DMs on both Facebook and Instagram as well as some emails from people claiming to be Shopify sales traffic experts. When I looked a bit further into these accounts, I could see that they had only been made a month or less prior to sending me a message, often had AI generated or stock photos and had accounts based in Nigeria. I even got one message from ‘Michael Johnson’ who when I looked up the name on google, I found he the was the corporate secretary of Shopify. He didn’t do a good job of impersonating him though, since he used some AI generated stock photo that looked nothing like the real Mike Johnson.
I google reversed image searched two of the sales experts that contacted me and I found my stock/AI image predictions to be true. If you are weary of someone who has contacted you regarding these topics, this is a good way to find out that they are scammers - a legitimate person would not use an AI generated stock image to portray their profiles.
Just wanted to leave a post on here just in case anyone else is experiencing the same problem and to be careful. I found I started receiving lots of these messages after posting an Instagram post that tagged Shopify which led me to think that these types of accounts scroll through Shopify’s followers and tagged posts to find freshly launched small businesses. I would recommend removing these guys from your follow list so your account doesn’t pop into the feed of similar Shopify sales advice accounts. If any of these guys contact you, always look deeper into their account or just simply ignore them.
I am just happy that all my time watching scam baiting videos actually helped me identify these accounts when they contacted me. Stay safe out there and I hope your website grows!
Yes there are bots that scan Shopify’s network to find newly registered domains, and scrape publicly available contact information. Your social media experience could just be a small part of that network of spammers, but not necessarily the whole thing. A merchant who does nothing can still get flooded with similar emails.
The ones you should look out for especially are the ones who claim to be from Shopify itself. They will use shopify in their email address, they’ll make the email address super long to hide the gmail, and they’ll use scare tactics to convince you to click on their links.
Thanks for sharing your experience. It helps keep the community safe and those are some good tips! Make sure you report the emails and move them to spam/junk. This can mark their accounts and hopefully help with future filtering.
Unfortunately, that’s the game of the internet. Send out millions of emails and hope for a hit. Social Media is the same: create x amount of posts, hope 1 goes viral, get millions of views and hope for a hit… Sorry, for the digression.
You’ll probably start seeing some ai responses here too.
Thanks for sharing this. It’s a helpful reminder especially for new store owners who may not realize how quickly scammers target newly launched businesses.
Verifying profiles, being cautious of unsolicited messages and avoiding anyone who pressures you into purchasing services without a trusted reputation are all good practices. Hopefully this helps others avoid falling for these scams.
It really is refreshing to see someone who takes a second and, like you said “When I looked a bit further into these accounts,” as it is important to be cautious. I bet not a single one of those experts has a website, proper address, or phone.
And here in the community, there were a lot of examples of scams hen sender is claiming to be official Shopify, but the email comes from GMail Note that ther are some scams that spoof real Shopify email but from the content and any link you can suspect it is a scam. And there were a lot of different scams, asking for a licence for free theme, web accessibility and performance issues (that can appear but usually not on new stores)… But there is always a sense of urgency: “we will close your store,” " you will lose sales," that makes you stop thinking.
Thank you for sharing, and good to see that scam baiting videos really help
I hadn’t heard of that super long email trick before. All the email spammers I came across used gmails with a lot of their names not matching the name in the gmail.
Reported all the ones that snuck into my emails and DMs and screenshot the chats which I might send over to a scam baiting channel I like to watch. Thank you for your kind words!
Hi there @MadeByMia
Thanks for sharing this. New Shopify stores tend to get spam messages from people who say they can increase sales or fix stores, unfortunately. It’s all very wise: Check profile history, reverse image search photos, fact check claims before you engage. Limiting your contact information when you can, adjusting your privacy setings on your social profiles, and ignoring unsolicited offers can also help limit the messages you receive. Hopefully this will help other new merchants steer clear of scams and grow their business securely.
Note that ther are some scams that spoof real Shopify email but from the content and any link you can suspect it is a scam. And there were a lot of different scams, asking for a licence for free theme, web accessibility and performance issues (that can appear but usually not on new stores)… But there is always a sense of urgency: “we will close your store,” " you will lose sales," that makes you stop thinking.