Hey, Scott Austin here.

In this episode I'm going to tell you about the new app that we at JadePuma have launched in the Shopify App store.

As any regular listener of this podcast will already know, I love using the Flex theme, which is a popular Shopify theme.  I've used it in every store that I've built in the past 4 years.  I stick with one theme as it allows me and the rest of the JadePuma team to become well-versed in it.  We know how to do just about anything within Flex.  And using one theme, allows us to easily copy and paste between stores saving money for our clients.  We've built up an entire library of sections optimized for the Flex theme that use with our clients to extend the functionality beyond the sections that come with the theme.

So our app packages up this library of our custom sections and makes them available for any user of the Flex theme.  The app is called Flex Theme Sections.The Shopify app store already has several apps that can add sections to your theme.  What's different about ours is that it is optimized for the Flex theme.  In fact it will only work with the Flex theme.  We did this to improve the performance of the site and provide a higher level of consistency in the customer experience.  Our app's sections use the same styling and functionality as the Flex theme.  So we don't need to load an entire framework of CSS and Javascript like other section app dos.  When you set a color or font in your Flex theme settings, those settings also get applied to the sections in our app.  

Let me tell you a couple of things about my approach to Shopify apps.

First is that I believe an app should have a robust, always free level.  The free features should provide good value to Shopify stores.  That way, when the customer does bump up against the pay wall, they will have trust and confidence in the app and be more likely to subscribe to it.

Second is that I believe an app should have a reasonable price for the value that it provides.  If the price is reasonable, then that also helps the customer make the decision to subscribe.

So here's how this approach pans out in the Flex Theme Sections app.

Always Free Level

The app's always free level includes all sections and tools that designed to help the store staff manage the store.  We've got these 5 sections:

1. Article Images Tool - This tool shows the article images for a blog and checks if they have the correct shape and size. Store staff can set a target aspect ratio for all images and the tool will highlight which images do not comply with the standard.
2. Blank Product Metafields Tool - This tool shows which products are missing important information stored in a specific metafield.
3. Brand Guidelines Tool - This tool gives store staff the ability to document and share your store's brand guidelines including fonts, colors, logos and graphics.
4. Collection Image Review Tool - This tool shows the featured image for all collections and highlights the ones that do not comply with the specified aspect ratio.
5. Product Image Review Tool - This tool shows all of the product images for each image and highlights the ones that do not conform with the specified aspect ratio.

We've also got some store staff tools in the queue to be added to the app in the near future.  All future tools will also be included in our Always Free level.

Reasonable Price 

The price for the app is only $5 per month or $50 for a year.  Not many apps are that reasonable given the value that they provide.

Now the paid level of the app unlocks the features that enhance the shopping experience for your customers.  All of these sections were first created for a JadePuma client and then re-used across many clients, so we know that they work.  We've got over a dozen sections in the app and have a backlog of 20 more that we're quickly adding. 

Here's some examples the customer facing sections:

1. The Flex theme comes with a Rich Text section.  But I'm not a fan of it as you have to specify the font and font size for the heading and text, which makes for 4 settings, every time you use the section.  So our Rich Text section removes those settings and instead uses the theme's defaults which reduces the number of settings you have to set.
2. We have a Free Gift with Purchase section for the cart that promotes your chosen free gift if the customer exceeds the purchase amount threshold.
3. There's a section that displays your Klaviyo embed forms on a page. 
4. There's a section that promotes editorially selected blog articles on a page or product.  One example of how you might use this is on a Halloween landing page.  You could use this section to display your Halloween related blog articles.
5. And there's plenty more sections available and more on the way.

In this podcast, I'm constantly encouraging you to create content, especially video.  I'm following that best practice with this app.  We have a robust demo store that not only demos the features but gives you detailed instructions for every section.  Each section has it's own tutorial video that goes through how to set up and use the section step by step.

At JadePuma, we now add this app to every store build or redesign that we do.  It's saving tons of money for our clients.

If you are using the Flex theme today, I highly encourage you to install our app today, there's a link to it in the show notes.  The always free level will give the store staff some handy tools.

Remember this app is optimized for the Flex theme.  It uses the Flex theme's CSS and Javascript, keeping your store performant.  And the new sections map perfectly to the Flex theme's design.

If you do install the app, I'd love your feedback on it usefulness for your brand.  There's a feedback form right inside the app.

Also, we've got some more Shopify apps in our pipeline for you.  And they all follow our approach of a rich, always free level and a reasonable price.  I look forward to sharing them with you as they become available in the app store.

Thanks for listening.