Lately, it seems like every other day, Shopify has a new feature or announcement that will change the way agencies work with their customers, and it can be hard to keep up.

As the platform continues to grow and mature, there's pressure for agencies to go beyond solely offering services like theme development and store setup. With over 13,000 apps currently available in the Shopify App Store (and nearly 4,000 of those apps launching since 2020), there is a healthy opportunity to improve upon the core Shopify platform, even as the company continues to release improvements.

But this shift isn't just about following market trends – it's about creating sustainable business growth. While crafting growth strategies, designing themes, and managing store setup remain essential services, the project-based nature of that work can often mean revenue fluctuations — once a store is live or a project wraps up, there's the age-old challenge of client retention.

We're here to propose the (perhaps daunting) solution of custom app development. 

Custom Shopify apps offer a path to more predictable revenue streams and allow agencies to build for clients throughout their growth with tailored solutions that will meet whatever needs arise.

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Finding where app development fits

Shopify partners: Technology vs services

Shopify has two primary partner streams: service partners and technology partners, but with all of the recent improvements, why not be both?

There are many common challenges with a service-only model. Project-based revenue can be unpredictable, making planning for growth and maintaining staffing levels difficult. Client dependency issues arise when your business relies heavily on winning new projects rather than building lasting technological relationships.

More importantly, market demand for custom solutions continues to grow. While the Shopify App Store offers thousands of options, merchants often find that one-size-fits-all solutions don't address their specific needs. This is an opportunity for agencies to go above and beyond to meet client needs through custom app development.

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Why custom app development is worth the trouble

Building custom Shopify apps for clients is no longer a question of whether or not you should — it's when to start.

Custom apps provide recurring revenue opportunities through ongoing maintenance and feature development. Unlike project work that ends after launch, custom apps require continued support and updates, providing predictable income streams.

Offering custom solutions to clients also allows for scalability without linear resource growth. on/Sight, a Shopify Plus agency, is a great example of how providing new services can mean more revenue without adding costly resources. They were able to triple their development capacity when they started using Gadget for app development, which meant they could support more clients without proportionally increasing their team size.

Third, it builds valuable intellectual property. Each custom app you develop becomes an asset that can be repurposed or expanded for other clients. Zyber, for example, saved their clients over $100,000 by optimizing their custom app development process with Gadget, which strengthened their relationships with clients and improved their (already high) retention rates.

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Building custom apps: Where to start

Assess current resources

Before diving into app development, take some time to evaluate your team's capabilities. To keep everything running smoothly, traditional app development requires expertise across multiple domains, including backend development, frontend interfaces, infrastructure management, and overall DevOps. 

When building Shopify apps specifically, there's the added complexity of dealing with webhook subscriptions, App Bridge, and OAuth. If you want to lower the time it takes to get your first custom app up and running, there are modern development platforms that will reduce these requirements by handling much of the technical complexity.

You don't need to build everything from scratch. Gadget provides built-in Shopify connections, auto-generated APIs, and managed infrastructure, allowing your team to focus on solving client problems rather than wrestling with technical implementation details.

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Validate the idea

When identifying app opportunities, clients won't always see the opportunity for a custom solution, so it's your job as their Shopify expert to find inefficiencies. Analyze their current workflows and pain points to propose solutions they might not have considered. Look at how existing public apps solve similar problems and consider how a custom solution could better serve your clients' specific needs. If they're paying for any expensive public apps, it might be cost-effective to move to a custom app that will reduce their costs over time.

The team behind CartShare, for example, was able to build an MVP of their app at no cost using Gadget. Once they built their app, they began showcasing it to potential customers and expanded features based on feedback from early adopters. This iterative approach allowed them to build a product that would fit client needs early on, rather than requiring the team to change direction later on, which minimized the initial investment costs.

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Handling the technical parts

The most significant risk with custom app development is cost, and it comes in two forms: infrastructure and time.

There are a lot of different components that go into building custom apps. At the bare minimum, you'll need foundational pieces such as a backend, frontend, database, API, and all the developer tooling to go with it. Tooling like AWS or Google Cloud can make managing all of that easy, but costs can add up quickly. 

Even once you've got everything set up, there's the question of time. Developer hours are expensive, and the amount of time they spend on any given project is a cost that can be quickly passed on to clients. The longer an app takes to build, the harder it is to sell the idea to your client. Then there's also the consideration of ongoing maintenance. You could build everything yourself, but that means more work down the road to upkeep anything you launch.

Ultimately, you should aim to find ways to minimize the amount of time or tooling you use while balancing what your client needs. Some modern development platforms have simplified the app development process to handle much of the setup and ongoing maintenance. Rather than spending months building basic infrastructure, teams can consolidate some of their tech stack to save time on setup and even accelerate development — all of which will lower the overall costs.

Radikal is a great example of this. They eliminated 70% of the code they had to write — and maintain — so now they can ship projects up to 5x faster. They're not bogged down by old work because the platform their apps are built on can scale with their client needs. As a result, they can build more projects for existing clients and take on new clients without increasing their team size until they're ready.  

If you charge clients on a project basis, the less time and running costs you can spend on any given app will mean better revenue margins in the long run.

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Making the switch to custom app development

The transition to offering custom app development doesn't happen overnight. Start by identifying a client with a specific need that could benefit from a custom app. Ideally, this is a client you already have a strong relationship with. By starting small, you can begin testing your development process with minimal risk and build expertise gradually. You'll have a better idea of what to expect when building for other clients, and you can use previous projects as evidence that custom apps are worth the time and effort.

Make sure to communicate the value of building custom apps to your clients since they may be unsure whether custom apps are worth the investment. You can always explain that with custom apps, they get tailored solutions that can be modified and expanded as needs evolve. With off-the-shelf alternatives, on the other hand, your client may need to sacrifice functionality or complicate existing workflows and operations.

Beyond the obvious ROI on your own time investment, there are key success indicators to keep an eye on as you build your portfolio of custom Shopify apps. The most crucial success metric is the impact for your client. 

Find ways to track ROI from the client perspective — whether that's how much time you save them on operations, increasing AOV, reducing churn, or overall customer satisfaction. Monitoring these will help validate the cost to your client, and you can use those success stories to pitch your new Shopify app development services to future clients.

Success in custom app development often looks different from traditional project-based work. However, focusing on long-term client value rather than just initial project completion can pay off.

The shift from pure services to including custom app development represents a significant opportunity for Shopify agencies. Transitioning can mean a lot of careful planning and managing resources, but the potential benefits – including more predictable revenue, stronger client relationships, and scalable growth – make it worth considering.

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If you want to explore custom app development for your agency, you can start building with Gadget for free, or join our Discord community to connect with other Shopify agencies and app developers.