I think Shopify should consider adding a checkbox that allows app developers to choose whether development stores and transferred stores can see their ads or not.
I’m currently running ads for my app, but competitors are clicking on my ads, which is costing me a lot of money.
This also creates a potential risk to the conversion rate, since these clicks don’t come from genuine customers who are actually interested in using the app.
When competitors intentionally click on ads just to waste an app developer’s budget, it doesn’t feel like a fair playing field.
Hey, @Nileva
Hope you are doing great!
This is a valid concern. Development stores and transferred stores behaves differently from genuine merchant prospects, so giving app developers more control over ad visibility could help reduce wasted spend and improve campaign quality.
Hi there @Nileva
I do get that, especially for developers who are paying for acquisition. Limiting the ad to development and transferred stores could filter out low intent traffic and provide a better representation of the campaign data. In the meantime, I suggest keeping an eye on your campaign targeting and performance data regularly, and removing any audiences or placemnts you are seeing clicks from that aren’t leading to meaningful engagement. More clear cut regulations on dev stores would definitely be welcomed in the shopify ecosystem.
Development stores are normally created using the developer’s own country or the US, as these locations provide access to the widest range of features and permissions. Since the US is also our main market, targeting customers based on location alone doesn’t really solve the problem.
As you suggested, there isn’t currently any setting available when running ads that allows us to specifically exclude development stores or transferred stores, apart from targeting by geographic region.