Prompts & Best Practices
Get the most out of Shopigent by using the right prompts, safety patterns, and workflows.
Key principles
1. Dry-run before write
Every write tool supports dryRun: true. Always preview the mutation before it touches your live store:
Dry-run: update the price of "Approach Under Glove" to €39.99.
The agent returns the exact GraphQL mutation it would execute. Only when you approve does it run live.
2. Use categories explicitly
Shopigent has 8 tool categories (Products, Orders, Customers, Discounts, Content, Themes, Inventory, Fulfillments). Mention the category for faster tool routing:
Use products tools: find all products with no description in Italian.
vs.
What products need Italian descriptions?
3. Chain operations, don't guess
Instead of asking for everything at once, chain:
1. List my products tagged "clearance".
2. For each, update the price to 40% off current.
3. Show me the total discount value.
The agent resolves each step separately, triggering confirmation only when a write tool is used.
4. Confirmation gate pattern
Destructive writes (delete, refund, publish theme) require confirmed: true. Use this pattern:
Delete product with ID gid://shopify/Product/12345.
→ Returns confirmation_pending with a token.
Confirm: yes, with the same token.
→ Executes the delete and logs it.
An agent can propose destructive actions autonomously — nothing executes until you approve.
Prompts by role
Store owner
I'm going on holiday. Check my inventory: what needs reordering,
are there any stuck fulfillments, and do I have active discounts
that expire while I'm away?
List all products with 0 inventory and no reorder point set.
Developer
I need to rename "Trail Beanie" to "Trail Beanie 2.0" across all
languages. Dry-run a translation update for each language the product
has, then execute.
Export my theme's schema.json and check if there are Liquid errors
in the templates.
Marketing
Draft a 15% discount code for email subscribers. The code should
be single-use per customer, valid for 48 hours, and exclude sale items.
Find products with less than 2 inventory — these are running out
and need promotion before they're gone.
Tool priorities by task
| If you want to… | Use… |
|---|---|
| Discover what's in stock | list_products with inventory filters |
| Edit a product | update_product (dry-run first) |
| Check revenue | list_orders (date range filter) |
| Run a promotion | create_discount |
| Fix customer details | get_customer → update_customer |
| Manage content | create_blog_post, update_page |
| Edit the design | update_theme_content (Pro) |
| Translate the store | set_translations (Pro) |
Rate limits by plan
| Plan | Tool calls / day | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Free | 25 | Exploring, read-only queries |
| Growth | 500 | Daily operations with writes |
| Pro | Unlimited | Power use + custom tools + translations |
Use dry-run preview to avoid wasting call allowance on failed writes.
Pro tips
- Name your operations — agents follow steps better when you say "Step 1… Step 2…"
- Use filters —
list_productswithquery: "status:ACTIVE"returns useful subsets - Check the audit log — every call is recorded. Review what your agent did.
- Least privilege scopes — enable only the categories your agent needs
- Trial the Pro plan — unlock theme editing, translations, and unlimited calls