Support Hero — AI Helpdesk & Unified Inbox for Shopify
An AI helpdesk that consolidates Gmail and custom email accounts into one Shopify-native ticketing inbox. The AI is trained on the merchant's own SOPs through a knowledge base, then either drafts replies for review or resolves repetitive tickets unattended in Autopilot mode. Live shop integration gives it real order and product context, so it can handle returns and partial refunds rather than just answering FAQs. Three screens: KPI analytics, unified inbox, and Autopilot/SOP configuration. Six languages, free tier plus $29 and $79/month. Launched 28 May 2026.
Support Hero — AI Helpdesk & Unified Inbox for Shopify
An AI helpdesk that consolidates Gmail and custom email accounts into one Shopify-native ticketing inbox. The AI is trained on the merchant's own SOPs through a knowledge base, then either drafts replies for review or resolves repetitive tickets unattended in Autopilot mode. Live shop integration gives it real order and product context, so it can handle returns and partial refunds rather than just answering FAQs. Three screens: KPI analytics, unified inbox, and Autopilot/SOP configuration. Six languages, free tier plus $29 and $79/month. Launched 28 May 2026.
The brief
The challenge, and how we approached it
01
The challenge
Generic AI support bots fail on ecommerce because they answer from a knowledge base but can't see the order. The questions that actually flood a merchant's inbox — where is it, can I return this, why was I charged twice — need live shop data and the merchant's own refund rules, not a plausible paragraph. And once you let AI send unattended, a wrong answer becomes a refund liability.
02
Our approach
Ground the AI in two things it can't hallucinate: the merchant's documented SOPs, ingested as a trainable knowledge base, and live Shopify order and product data pulled at response time. That combination is what lets it act — issuing returns and partial refunds within stated rules — rather than only replying. Autonomy is a graduated choice, not a switch: draft-for-review by default, with Autopilot enabled per ticket type once the merchant trusts the rules, and Autopilot deliberately gated behind the paid tier so it isn't a first-run default. Multi-account email sync (Gmail plus custom) puts every channel in one queue. Six-language support targets European merchants specifically — the marketing creative is German-first. Pricing scales on knowledge-base size and seats, with API access and custom branding at the top tier.
What we built
Six capabilities shipped for Dana's Bakery
Each one solves a specific part of the brief above.
ZIP-gated shipping
Real-time validation prevents invalid ZIP purchases from entering cart
Drop architecture
Pre-staged inventory with countdown, sold-out gates, and waitlist
Gifting flow
Message cards, recipient addressing, scheduled delivery, gift wrap
Perishable inventory
Daily inventory sync with cold-chain capacity constraints
Drop-day performance
Theme architecture handles 20× traffic spikes without latency
Recurring orders
Holiday subscription flow for repeat gifters
How it ran
10 weeks build, in four stages
Every engagement runs the same four stages, so you always know what happens next and what you owe us at each one.
Stage 1
Audit and scope
We review the current theme, apps and analytics, then write a fixed-scope SOW with named deliverables and a date.
Stage 2
Design and build
Work happens in a dev store on a Git-backed workflow. You get a preview link from week one, not a reveal at the end.
Stage 3
QA and launch
Cross-browser and device QA, redirect map, analytics verification, then a launch window agreed with you rather than dropped on you.
Stage 4
Hypercare
Fourteen to sixty days of included post-launch support while real traffic finds the edge cases.
The outcome
Where Dana's Bakery landed
Conversion is up 2.1× after the PDP rebuild, AOV is up 34% year-over-year thanks to gifting upsells, and drop days are now smooth — zero downtime across 12 drops in the past year.
“
★
★
★
★
★
Every drop day was a stress event before. Now they're just a Tuesday. The team built us infrastructure we can actually grow on.
FounderSupportHero
Tech stack
What this project runs on
The exact platform, services and integrations behind the build.
Commerce platform
Shopify Plus
Launchpad
Shopify Functions
Online Store 2.0
Engineering
Custom ZIP validator
Growth and operations
Klaviyo
ShipBob
More case studies
Other work worth reading
Long-form studies from the same team, with the numbers behind them.
Drop your details and we’ll send back an 8-min Loom with 5 prioritized growth opportunities: no commitment, no sales pitch.
✓
Got it. We’re on it!
Thanks for reaching out. A senior strategist will reply within 24 hours with next steps and (if you opted for an audit) a Loom walkthrough within 48 hours.
