Hi, we are a partner store from india that has just developed an app after putting in lot of resources for over 4 months. Now the app went live and we are told by shopify that for an Indian partner shopify ads are not allowed… how is that possible to inform us now basis attached support pages that clearly dont mention anything on this? any solution around this besides using 3rd parties would be great.
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Hi @Moby_Ads 
, thanks for reaching out here. At the moment, you are correct that as long as your business address and banking information are registered in India, you wouldn’t be able to purchase App Store Ads.
At the moment, while we are working towards a resolution, there is currently no set timeline in place to have this fixed, but I do understand how this isn’t ideal, particular as you mentioned you didn’t see this notice included in our documentation.
Right now, the only workaround for this issue is to change the credit card on file to one without an India-based billing address if possible, but again I do realize how that’s not ideal.
On my end, I’m going to share your feedback internally and make a note to update our documentation to see if we can include this information for other folks in the future. I’d be happy to share some potential external resources you could look into for marketing as well if that’s helpful and if you’re not already looking into those (social media resources/SEO, etc).
Thanks again for flagging this, it’s really appreciated.
Hi Alan,
the plan was to have a long business relationship with shopify basis the ability to get our app out there…. which is now cumbersome as this was a vital pc of info that should have been there. Anyhow, now
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for your internal tech team - there are very easy ways to include this over a short time, ie with UPI (allows reoccuring credit) and the fact that you operate in india, this should be a 1 days task.
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do share any external sources that we could consider using…. Shopify clicks are very expensive + adding commission and expected talent of a 3rd party again is not the most comfortable approach, but we have no choice.
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is there any chance we could get some exemptions on the requirements for BFS ( built for shopify ) like the ones for 5 reviews & X no. of installs could be relaxed, this would allow us to propose our app for BFS status, which we are confident of achieving, and that might compensate for the inability to advertise. look forward to this as a real part solution.
….. else its a catch 22 with no installs + reviews and no BFS = no visibility.
there 100s of offers from store managers to install our app for their clients for a cost etc, but we believe that may be seen as fraudlent activity, so avoiding all that, but need some help from Shopify here.
Brgds
Mohit Gill
Hey Mohit, thanks for reaching back out here. I can’t guarantee anything when it comes to rollout/implementation, but I do understand where you’re coming from in regards to UPI integration.
I’m going to add that feedback to the notes I’ve passed along to our product team here. When it comes to those install/review offers you mentioned, you are likely making the best decision not to agree to those, as there may be limitations on incentivizing reviews, installs, etc (more info here in our Partner Terms and Conditions).
In terms of external resources, I did a bit of digging, and I know one route some of our third party developer partners take is listing on Capterra or G2 to reach a wider audience range.
We do also have a marketing guide here internally that might help with optimization if you wanted to take a look at that.
There is also our Partner Slack server if you’d like to join that, which I know lots of partners use for collaborations and networking with each other, so this might be useful in case folks there have some ideas in terms of how to promote your app given the limitations for sure.
When it comes to Built for Shopify, generally we can’t make any exceptions to the eligibility requirements, but to discuss your specific case, I’d say the best option would be to reach out to support directly through help.shopify.com - they may be able to get in touch with our BFS team to confirm eligibility requirements or if they can make an exeption.
Hope this helps a little bit at least. 