{
 "schema_version": "1.0",
 "id": "essential-loyalty",
 "name": "Essential Loyalty",
 "research_status": "researched",
 "vendor_domain": "essential-apps.com",
 "category": "Growth & Revenue",
 "task": "E-commerce growth",
 "summary": "Shopify loyalty and rewards app metered on loyalty-influenced orders rather than total orders, with VIP tiers and referrals on the free plan.",
 "best_for": "Shopify stores with genuine repeat business that want a loyalty programme priced on the orders it influences rather than on total volume — and stores selling in person too, since POS support arrives at $10 and the free tier carries VIP tiers and referrals",
 "skip_if": "your customers buy once and rarely return, because a loyalty programme has nothing to work with and the free tier shows you that within a month; or you need API work from the start, since integrations are 'on request' and only on the $79 tier",
 "honest_knock": "Two things to read closely before you pay. The meter is honest — loyalty-influenced orders, not all orders — and that is genuinely in your favour, but it also means you cannot work out your tier from your order count. A store doing 3,000 orders a month with little repeat business may sit on Free; one doing 800 with a loyal base may not. Measure your repeat and referral orders for a month before you choose.\n\nThe second is an oddity on the listing itself. The free plan advertises an 'Advanced loyalty point program' while Starter at $10 advertises a 'Free loyalty point program', which read literally means the paid tier offers less on that line. It is almost certainly a labelling slip rather than a real downgrade, but it is the kind of line worth confirming with support before you upgrade for it.",
 "pricing": {
  "status": "public",
  "entry_price": "$10",
  "entry_price_terms": "Starter · per month for up to 500 loyalty-influenced orders",
  "from_price_usd_month": 10.0,
  "plans": null,
  "plans_source": null,
  "notes": "(re-read 2026-09-18 on apps.shopify.com/essential-loyalty-rewards-program) Four tiers, every amount unchanged since 22 August 2026, and the meter is still the whole decision: it counts loyalty-influenced orders — repeat sales and referrals — rather than every order your store takes, which the plan text states outright. Free covers up to 250 of those and is unusually complete: the point program, VIP tiers, a referral program, twelve-plus ways to earn points, product, cart, popup and account placements, built-in email notifications with Klaviyo, and discount, gift, shipping and credit rewards. Starter is $10 a month for up to 500, adding a dedicated loyalty landing page, full customisation, Shopify Flow, POS support for in-store loyalty and 24/7 human support. Essential is $24 for up to 1,500, adding loyalty status on the customer orders and profile pages and points in product cards. Growth is $79 for unlimited loyalty orders, with API integrations on request, white-glove onboarding and priority support. Paid plans carry a 14-day free trial. Charges are in USD and recur every 30 days. Developer Essential Apps. The listing works with Checkout, Customer accounts, Shopify POS, Shopify Flow, Shopify Admin, Judge.me, Klaviyo, Omnisend, Point of Sale and Shopify's native store credit, and names twenty interface languages while a feature bullet on the same page claims 180+ — the vendor's own FAQ (essential-apps.com/loyalty, read 19 Sep 2026) reconciles those two: the twenty are the languages the app's own interface ships in, and the 180+ covers translating the storefront-facing text into any language you sell in. Nothing on the listing says what happens when a plan's order cap is passed; the same vendor FAQ does: you are upgraded in place to the next tier, there is no per-order overage fee, and $79 a month is the ceiling — unlimited loyalty orders, everything included. So the worst case for a store that outgrows Free is the $79 tier, not a surprise bill. The review record has moved: 482 reviews at 5.0, up from 438 in August, distributed 473 five-star, 8 four-star, none at three or two, and 1 one-star.",
  "verified_at": "2026-09-18",
  "source_url": "https://apps.shopify.com/essential-loyalty-rewards-program"
 },
 "free_plan": true,
 "free_plan_evidence": "Free covers up to 250 of those and is unusually complete: the point program, VIP tiers, a referral program, twelve-plus ways to earn points, product, cart, popup and account placements, built-in email notifications with Klaviyo, and discount, gift, shipping and credit rewards.",
 "cost_traps": [
  {
   "id": "usage_metered",
   "label": "Usage-metered",
   "evidence": "meter: unit · loyalty-influenced orders",
   "verified_at": "2026-09-18",
   "source_url": "https://apps.shopify.com/essential-loyalty-rewards-program"
  }
 ],
 "compare_with": null,
 "links": {
  "record": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/api/v1/products/essential-loyalty.json",
  "review": "https://marketingandsalessoftware.com/essential-loyalty-review.html",
  "marketplace": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/marketplace/essential-loyalty/",
  "vendor_site": "https://essential-apps.com"
 },
 "purchase": {
  "seller": "the vendor",
  "how": "AIBuilder Marketplace does not sell this software. Sign up, start a trial or buy on the vendor's site.",
  "handoff_url": "https://platform.shoffi.app/r/rl_67Q8o64N",
  "affiliate": true,
  "disclosure": "Where purchase.affiliate is true, purchase.handoff_url is an affiliate link: AIBuilder Marketplace may earn a commission at no extra cost to the buyer. Commission never changes what a record says, and products are not ranked by commission. Where it is false the link is the vendor's plain site."
 },
 "provenance": {
  "research": "hand-researched dossier, read on the vendor's own pages",
  "researched_since": "2026-07",
  "method": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/how-we-review/",
  "license": "CC BY 4.0. Credit 'AIBuilder Marketplace' with a link to https://aibuildermarketplace.com/atlas/.",
  "note": "A rebuild is not a new measurement: pricing.verified_at is the date that matters."
 },
 "cost": {
  "status": "not_yet",
  "engine": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/agents/#cost",
  "rules": null,
  "growth": null
 },
 "unknowns": [
  "Plan-by-plan prices are not structured in this record yet; pricing.notes has the full text.",
  "Contract terms (cancellation, data export, data location, minimum seats) are not researched as separate fields; pricing.notes mentions them only where the vendor's pricing page does.",
  "No computable price rules yet: cost at a given team size cannot be calculated for this product.",
  "Not tested hands-on by us: what the product does comes from the vendor's pages and our reading of them."
 ],
 "task_evidence": null,
 "open_questions": [
  {
   "question_id": "essential-loyalty:cancellation_terms",
   "key": "cancellation_terms",
   "question": "Can a customer cancel at any time, and what happens to an annual plan that is cancelled mid-term?",
   "status": "open"
  },
  {
   "question_id": "essential-loyalty:data_export",
   "key": "data_export",
   "question": "Which data can a customer export, in which formats, on which plans?",
   "status": "open"
  },
  {
   "question_id": "essential-loyalty:data_location",
   "key": "data_location",
   "question": "Where is customer data stored, and can a customer choose the region?",
   "status": "open"
  },
  {
   "question_id": "essential-loyalty:minimum_seats",
   "key": "minimum_seats",
   "question": "Is there a minimum number of seats or users on any plan?",
   "status": "open"
  }
 ],
 "vendor_answers": [],
 "agent_channels": {
  "vendor_mcp": null,
  "agent_checkout": {
   "status": "not_found",
   "detail": "No explicit support for purchases by AI agents on the vendor's own pages.",
   "checked_at": "2026-10-07",
   "method": "homepage, /pricing and the pricing page we cite, read as plain HTML (no JavaScript) and searched for explicit support of purchases by AI agents: Agentic Commerce Protocol, Instant Checkout, Agent Payments Protocol, buy in ChatGPT, agentic checkout"
  }
 }
}