I'm getting ready to list my online store (home goods niche, ~$40k/mo revenue) and buyers keep asking for proof of conversion rates. I track everything through Shopify analytics and Google Analytics 4, but how do they actually verify the numbers I report? Do they want screenshots, read-only access, or something else? I don't want to look clueless when I get on calls with brokers.
eCommerce
How do online store buyers verify my monthly website conversion rates?
Read-only access to GA4 and Shopify is pretty standard. Screenshots are useless—anyone can Photoshop those.
I've bought two stores. I always ask for a live screen share where they pull up the analytics dashboard and then click into a few specific date ranges. That way I can see the URL and they can't swap tabs. Also, I compare the traffic source breakdown against their ad spend reports. If organic traffic looks suspiciously high relative to their content output, that's a red flag.
That makes sense. What about historical data? My store has been around 4 years. Do they typically go back that far or just fo cus on the last 12 months?
last 12 months is usually enough but if your traffic spiked 6 monthS ago and you're claiming it's all organic, they'll dig deeper. just fyi.
I sold my store last year. The buyer's due diligence team wanted read-only GA access plus Shopify collaborator access with limited permissions. They also asked me to export a CSV of the conversion rate by month. It felt invasive but it's normal I guess. They found a discrepancy in my sessions because of a bot filter I'd forgotten to turn on. Almost killed the deal lol.
Yikes. How did you resolve that?
Just showed them the unfiltered vs filtered view and explained when I caught the bot traffic. They were fine after that. Just be upfront about any tracking quirks you know of.
Why not just give them a temporary lojgin? That's what I did. They poked around for a week and then I revoked it. Less hand-holding than screen sharing
Temp logins are fine but I still like a quick screen share to see exactly which view they're looking at. Otherwise they might default to 'All Users' vs 'Users' and get confused.
Just tell them your conversion rate is 3% and then when they ask for proof, say 'I converted three people to buy my store—it's a joke.' Works every time.
Ha, I'll keep that one in reserve. Thanks all—this gives me a much better idea of what to prepare.