Shopify-led shops win the brief on merchandising, conversion, and storefront craft. AgencyRelay slots underneath as the custom engineering and ongoing-support layer — carrying apps, integrations, and headless builds without changing who owns the merchant relationship.
These are the four moments most Shopify-led agencies hit at least twice a year. AgencyRelay is built for exactly these — without you having to keep a specialist app and integration bench on payroll between launches.
The theme work is straightforward until the brief becomes a private app, admin extension, or workflow that has to live inside Shopify rather than on the surface of the storefront. The project shifts from theme craft to product engineering overnight.
The merchant wants Shopify as the commerce engine but not as the full presentation layer. Now the SOW includes Hydrogen, Next.js, custom content systems, or a hybrid architecture that most storefront-focused teams do not ship every week.
The deal stops being about theme sections and starts being about systems. Search, recommendations, subscriptions, order orchestration, returns workflows, and operational data all need to connect cleanly without breaking checkout or merchant trust.
App updates, theme regressions, feed issues, and the long tail of merchant support tickets are quietly eating strategist and director time that should be on the next account — not on production triage.
Most Shopify agencies start in Overflow Pods when a merchant lands with urgent custom work, then move into Invisible Delivery Team when the engineering surface becomes steady. Capability Expansion shows up when the agency wants to carry headless, app, or AI commerce work under its own brand.
Short-cycle burst capacity for the quarter where three merchant projects land at once. Right-size the pod for app work, integrations, or post-launch cleanup, run for one to four weeks, hand back the work.
Engineering and ongoing-support pods that ship under your brand across the merchant stack. The storefront relationship stays with you — we sit behind it as the app, integration, and systems layer at a steady weekly rhythm.
Carry a whole service line — headless commerce, AI commerce overlays, or complex systems integration — under your brand without staffing the entire specialty in-house first. A named capability lead, paired with the delivery layer behind it.
These three carry the bulk of Shopify-agency engagements. The full bench is broader — see the capability hub for AI, QA, frontend, and app depth.
Production storefront builds and headless commerce implementations on Shopify, Hydrogen, Next.js, and adjacent CMS layers — with performance and conversion baselines built in.
APIs, webhooks, data models, queues, and the systems glue behind custom apps, subscriptions, OMS connections, and operational commerce workflows.
Post-launch pods that absorb app updates, theme regressions, merchant support issues, and the operational fixes that keep a commerce retainer healthy after the launch month.
Most Shopify-agency engagements settle into a weekly cadence by week three. The first two weeks are deliberately slow — we'd rather get the merchant boundaries, access model, and systems map right than ship fast and have to unwind bad assumptions later.
60 minutes with the founder. We pull apart the agency model, the commerce work you sell, and the kind of engineering surface AgencyRelay would carry. Mutual NDA before any merchant-specific brief is shared.
One MSA with Salt Technologies, Inc. covers the relationship. The first SOW scopes a single engagement — usually one Overflow Pods burst for urgent merchant work or one Invisible Delivery Team pod when the commerce roadmap is already clear.
Named delivery lead, named developer pair, store access, repos, app credentials, and your project channel. Communication boundaries — including who ever speaks to the merchant, if anyone — are agreed in writing before the first ticket moves.
Weekly check-ins with the delivery lead, founder review at agreed cadence, the same people on the engagement month-on-month. Capacity flexes up or down by SOW amendment, not by negotiation.
The most common shape for a Shopify agency is one Overflow Pods burst to absorb urgent app or integration work, rolling into one Invisible Delivery Team pod for the longer commerce roadmap. Both prices are public on the pricing page; the SOW is sized to the actual engagement.
Every engagement is contracted through Salt Technologies, Inc. The same operating principles apply across solutions and across the relationship.
We don't email your merchant, join their calls, or appear in the proposal — unless you explicitly white-list us in the SOW.
We don't approach your team and we don't accept introductions to your merchant off the back of an engagement.
Merchant-specific app code, workflows, and systems built inside an engagement transfer to you on payment, per the SOW. We don't reuse merchant-specific logic elsewhere.
MSA, NDA, and SOWs are issued by Salt Technologies, Inc. — a 13+ year delivery company and the legal entity behind AgencyRelay.
The same operating principles apply across every solution and every engagement — including the burst and steady-state delivery models most Shopify agencies start with.
Operational resources written for the same situations Shopify agencies face — scoping technical commerce work, defending delivery estimates, and selling more implementation-heavy projects without over-hiring.
The internal playbook for triaging a wobbly proposal — what to ask, what to flag, how to defend the technical estimate when the merchant asks for apps, integrations, or headless commerce.
A reusable structure for the technical section of a Shopify-agency proposal — assumptions, risks, architecture, estimate range — for custom apps, integrations, and hybrid storefront builds.
Why technical proposals lose late, and the moves commerce-led founders use to make app, integration, and systems scope defensible at the bid stage.
Direct answers to the questions that come up on almost every first call with a commerce-led agency.
Not by default. Every engagement is white-label safe — we sit behind your team and the merchant only sees your brand. If you want a named technical lead joining a merchant call, we can do that, but it has to be explicitly white-listed in the SOW.
No. Storefront strategy, merchandising, CRO, and the merchant relationship all stay on your side. AgencyRelay carries the app, integration, and systems engineering underneath so your team can stay focused on the commerce experience.
Yes. Custom apps, admin extensions, and systems-heavy commerce work are common shapes inside the Invisible Delivery Team and Overflow Pods solutions. When the agency wants to make that a repeatable service line, Capability Expansion is the model that supports it.
Yes. Headless and hybrid commerce builds are a strong fit when the merchant wants Shopify as the commerce engine but not as the entire presentation layer. Those usually sit inside Invisible Delivery Team or Capability Expansion, depending on whether it's a single engagement or a new service line you want to carry repeatedly.
Yes. That's a common reason Shopify agencies bring us in. Backend Development and Support & Maintenance cover the systems work behind subscriptions, order orchestration, inventory sync, search, recommendations, and operational workflows that sit beyond theme scope.
Overflow Pods are sized one to four weeks. The Solo Specialist pod inside Invisible Delivery Team starts on a weekly basis with no minimum number of weeks. Capability Expansion is a monthly retainer when you're ready to add a new service line.
Once the partner call is done and the first SOW is signed, an Overflow Pods cycle typically starts within 5–7 business days. If the access model is already clean and the merchant deadline is tight, we can usually move faster than that.
Mutual NDA before any merchant-specific brief is shared. Founder-led on every engagement. A clean read on whether the work is a fit — and which solution fits best — within the first call.
