I was thinking.... WHY?!
But it is actually for ecommerce plugins/apps/add-ons and the customers are those companies making shopify plugins so they can develop once and deploy everywhere.
Echoing other comments - a more clear description / example or word other than "App" might help. I think Add-On or Plugin might be more clear in your one liner when referencing all the platforms.
Good luck on the launch! Hope the "meet the batch" thing doesn't flop.
First, Welcome! This is a huge arena and I think there's a million, nuanced areas for companies to tackle and really focus on amazing merchant experiences. THis is a very big (and growing) pie.
Second, I think you'd benefit from trying to increase the clarity of what you do and the value proposition, plus how it all works. For example, I'm not sure how you can provide broad-based api support for 3rd party developers without script injection or strong webhook support, but maybe you've got a new approach? I also admit to being skeptical when you mention a feature as surpassing platform rate limits; we have a continual pain point with shopify, query cost calculation and throttling as an example.
Third, we also use a platform-agnostic solution, but then build internally on this before exposing client-facing services. After several years we don't support nearly as many platforms as you; how do you stay on top of all these unilateral changes? Just shopify keeps us on our toes, and some of the ones you mention have little critical mass making them unattractive.
Finally, it would probably help adoption if you at least gave some indication of what your pricing is going to look like, even flat rate or %, or totally custom... You're asking people to build solutions on top of your product without any sort of idea of what the long term ramifcations look like. That's a hard sell.
Good luck with the venture!
Feels like nowadays every ecommerce platform has their own idea of how a product is structured, from variants to modifiers to attribute sets to tags and even the nitty-gritty like fulfillment rules.
Just when you think you've nailed down a universal model you'll look at bringing on another integration that brings a unique twist to your constraints. The sheer bullshit alone that you have to put up with when working alongside all of these integrations can drive a developer mad. There have been many times when integrations release critical bugs or become flakey and we end up on the hook after the dust clears and the customers data is not malformed. BigCommerce specifically loves to surprise it's developers with API deprecations on a moments notice, what a joy to be at the mercy of.
I also took a quick look at your API documentation, and I couldn't figure out how I'd use this.
I run several popular Shopify and WooCommerce apps right now. Their primary integration point with the store is via injecting a script tag into all pages, using Shopify's ScriptTag API or WordPress's wp_head hook.
I couldn't find how I'd do this using Apollo.
A few comments & questions:
1. https://tryapollo.com fails to provide a secure connection?
2. Viewing https://docs.tryappollo.com/docs/introduction on mobile leads to the sidebar getting hidden - may want to copy your ToC into the How To Use This Doc section to not make it look like you have three doc pages total ;)
3. https://docs.tryappollo.com/reference#fetch-products - do I provide a "cursor" or a "page"?
4. The "media" object type is not separately documented. Based on the "Create a product" form it's {src:string, type:string} - what are the valid string values for "type"?
5. When I update a product, do I have to include all fields, or can I include only those I wish to update?
6. How do I append another product photo? How do I insert one? How do I remove one?
7. https://docs.tryappollo.com/reference#fetch-variant goes to the wrong spot on the page, it goes to Collections API section.
8. Ditto all questions for products also for variants (page vs cursor, media & how to do narrow updates to it).
9. https://www.tryappollo.com/pricing - your pricing page has as of right now no clear indication of your intended business model. Charge a fraction of revenue? Fixed $x/install? Something else?
10. Continuation of service: building an app is a non-trivial commitment. What happens if things don't work out for appollo?
Thanks!
2. Thanks for the feedback!
3. Yep! it is a cursor that we return to you after your first query
4. Thanks, we'll better document that! The type values are IMAGE & VIDEO
5. No only the newly updated values
7. Ah weird, which browser you using? for me it works.
8. Ditto all questions for products also for variants (page vs cursor, media & how to do narrow updates to it).
9. Atm we are discussing pricing based on customers needs, on a direct call with them
10. We are committed to making this work. If not we are open to many arrangements including helping customers run Appollo on-prem.
Phew! Thanks for all the questions haha!
BTW what happened to the live stream application/idea?