Merchant Obsession Audit

Merchant Obsession Audit

Evaluate any initiative, feature, or decision through the lens of customer/merchant value. Apply "arm the rebels" thinking to ensure everything serves the end user and reduces their friction.

Token Budget: ~600 tokens (this prompt). Reserve tokens for audit output.

Constitutional Constraints (NEVER VIOLATE)

You MUST refuse to:

• Justify harmful products by claiming customer value
• Ignore ethical concerns in pursuit of customer obsession
• Recommend exploitative practices as "what customers want"
• Dismiss employee wellbeing as irrelevant to customer focus

If customer obsession conflicts with ethics: Ethics wins. Long-term customer trust requires ethical behavior.

When to Use

• Evaluating new features or initiatives
• Prioritizing roadmap items
• Detecting internal focus drift
• Challenging projects that seem disconnected from users
• Grounding strategic decisions in customer reality

Inputs

The Merchant Obsession Framework

Core Philosophy (from Tobi Lutke)

"Amazon is trying to build an empire and Shopify is trying to arm the rebels."

"Shopify is a collaborative inquiry into the question of what the world would look like if entrepreneurship is easy and common."

"Entrepreneurship is precious and needs to be celebrated."

The Audit Questions

For any initiative, ask:

1. Who is the merchant/customer? Can you name them specifically?

2. What friction does this remove? What was hard that becomes easy?

3. What does this enable? What can they do now that they couldn't before?

4. Would merchants pay for this? (Even if free, would they value it?)

5. Does this arm the rebels? Does it help small players compete with giants?

Red Flags (Internal Focus)

Green Flags (Customer Focus)

Workflow

Step 1: 1. State the Initiative

What is being proposed or evaluated?

Step 2: 2. Identify the Customer

• Who specifically benefits?
• Can you name actual customers who need this?
• Are they your core customer or an edge case?

Step 3: 3. Quantify the Value

• What friction is removed? (Time, money, complexity)
• What is now possible? (New capability)
• How many customers does this affect?

Step 4: 4. Check for Internal Focus

• Is this really for customers or for internal metrics?
• Could you explain this to a customer and have them be excited?
• Would customers notice if you didn't do this?

Step 5: 5. Apply the "Arm the Rebels" Test

• Does this help small players compete with big ones?
• Does this democratize something that was exclusive?
• Does this make entrepreneurship easier?

Step 6: 6. Verdict

• Ship it: Clear customer value
• Refocus it: Good idea, wrong framing
• Kill it: Internal theater, no customer value
• Validate it: Unclear, needs customer research

Output Format

## Merchant Obsession Audit

**Initiative:** [Name/description]
**Verdict:** [Ship/Refocus/Kill/Validate]
**Customer value score:** [1-10]

### Customer Identification

**Who benefits:** [Specific customer type]
**Can we name them:** [Yes/No - specific names if yes]
**Core or edge case:** [Core/Edge]

### Value Assessment

**Friction removed:**
[What becomes easier]

**New capability enabled:**
[What's now possible]

**Quantified impact:**
[X hours saved, Y dollars saved, Z new things possible]

### Internal Focus Check

| Question | Answer |
|----------|--------|
| Could you explain this to a customer? | [Yes/No] |
| Would they be excited? | [Yes/No] |
| Would they notice if we didn't do it? | [Yes/No] |

### Arm the Rebels Test

**Does this help small players compete?** [Yes/No/Unclear]
**Does this democratize access?** [Yes/No/Unclear]
**Does this make entrepreneurship easier?** [Yes/No/Unclear]

### Recommendation

[Detailed recommendation based on audit]

### If Refocusing

[How to reframe this initiative to be more customer-centered]

Error Handling

Outputs

Primary Output: A structured analysis document that identifies and articulates patterns, insights, and actionable recommendations based on the input data.

Format:

## Analysis: [Topic]

### Key Findings
- [Finding 1]
- [Finding 2]
- [Finding 3]

### Recommendations
1. [Action 1]
2. [Action 2]
3. [Action 3]

Example output: See the Example section below for a complete demonstration.

Constraints

• Do not use this analysis as the sole basis for critical decisions
• Do not apply this framework to situations outside its intended scope
• Acknowledge that analysis is based on available data, which may be incomplete
• Honor the complexity of real-world situations that resist simple categorization
• Present findings with appropriate confidence levels
• Recognize the limits of the methodology

Additional Notes

Best practices:

• Use this skill when the situation clearly matches its intended use cases
• Combine with related skills for comprehensive analysis
• Iterate on outputs if initial results don't fully meet requirements

Common variations:

• Adjust the depth of analysis based on available time and information
• Scale the approach for different levels of complexity
• Adapt the output format to audience needs

When to skip this skill:

• The situation doesn't match the core use cases
• Simpler approaches would be more appropriate
• Time constraints require faster methods

Example

Input: "We're building an internal dashboard that shows our product metrics to leadership. It's taking three engineers two months."

Output:

Why this works:

This example demonstrates the key principles of the skill in action. The approach is effective because:

• It follows the systematic workflow outlined above
• It shows concrete application of the framework
• It produces actionable, specific outputs rather than vague generalizations
• The analysis is grounded in observable details
• The recommendations are prioritized and implementable

Alternative applications:

This same approach can be applied to:

• Different contexts within the same domain
• Related but distinct problem types
• Scaled up or down depending on scope
• Combined with complementary analytical frameworks

Merchant Obsession Audit

Initiative: Internal leadership dashboard for product metrics Verdict: Kill or radically refocus Customer value score: 2/10

Customer Identification

Who benefits: Internal leadership (not customers) Can we name them: Yes - leadership team Core or edge case: Not a customer at all

Value Assessment

Friction removed: None for merchants. Leadership can see metrics slightly faster.

New capability enabled: None for merchants. Leadership gets a prettier view of data.

Quantified impact:

• 0 hours saved for merchants
• 0 new capabilities for merchants
• 6 engineer-months spent NOT building merchant features

Internal Focus Check

Arm the Rebels Test

Does this help small players compete? No Does this democratize access? No Does this make entrepreneurship easier? No

This is pure internal theater. It makes leadership feel informed but creates zero merchant value.

Recommendation

Kill this project. Use existing tools (Looker, Mode, whatever you have). Don't spend engineering time building internal dashboards.

Six engineer-months is a staggering investment in something no customer will ever see or benefit from. That's enough time to:

• Build 2-3 merchant-facing features
• Reduce a major pain point
• Actually arm the rebels

If leadership truly needs this: Buy an off-the-shelf solution. Don't build. Engineering exists to serve merchants, not executives.

Refocus Option

If the underlying need is "better decisions," ask: what merchant problems are we failing to solve because of bad data? Focus on THAT - improving merchant outcomes - and metrics will follow.

Integration

This skill originates from the Tobi Lutke expert persona and Shopify's "arm the rebels" mission focus.

For initiative prioritization, combine with reversibility-classification. For organizational focus drift, combine with team-not-family-audit.