Episode 9 - Robyn Larsen, International Growth and Marketing at Shopify

The International Expansion Podcast with Ramsey Pryor

Robyn Larsen is an International Growth and Marketing UX leader at Shopify. She’s a front-end developer, entrepreneur, and speaker, and advises numerous startups across multiple industries and frequently mentors women in tech and STEM. In addition to the work she does at Shopify, she teaches Zero to Launch workshops for entrepreneurs through Embrk. Shopify powers over 1.7 million businesses in more than 175 countries, and in this interview, I had the chance to ask Robyn all about her learnings after spending the last 4+ years localizing Shopify's experience for markets all across the world. Below are the topics we discuss:

• Shopify's current international presence and state of localization
• Things a tech founder should know about what it takes to make technology resonate in global markets in a first-class way
• The capabilities she recommends building in house, and the things that are ok or even better to buy or outsource
• How to choose where to start, and which regions and languages should be top of the list for localization
• The companies are doing the best job of localization, and what they do they do differently
• The mistakes Robyn made, and advice that could save someone else from making the same mistakes
• Pseudolocalization - what it is, and how it can help your localization team
• UX experiences that many learn the hard way