Lead Out Gear

A traditional Shopify store ties the storefront and the commerce back end together in one theme. That is quick to set up, but it limits how much control you have over speed and structure. Going headless separates the two. Shopify keeps running the cart, checkout, stock and payments, while the pages customers actually browse become a separate application we build and control.

We built that front end with Gatsby, a framework based on React. Gatsby prepares pages ahead of time rather than building them fresh on every visit, so they can load quickly. For a shop where people move through several pages before buying, that speed affects both the experience and how many visits turn into orders.

To move product, pricing and cart data between Shopify and the Gatsby front end, we used Shopify's GraphQL APIs, which let us request exactly the data each page needs.

Improving SEO was one of the two reasons for the rebuild, so it shaped how we put the front end together. A headless Gatsby build gives us direct control over page speed, how content is structured and how each page is marked up for search engines. Faster, cleaner pages give a store a better chance of ranking well and holding a visitor's attention once they land.

We also connected the tools the client uses to track sales and reach customers. Elevar handles conversion tracking and passes accurate data to the client's analytics and advertising platforms, which needs deliberate setup on a headless build because standard Shopify tracking does not carry over automatically. Klaviyo runs email and customer messaging, so the store can send order updates and campaigns based on what shoppers actually do.