Set up Paceloop and get your first plan
Last updated: 1 August 2026
Install Paceloop, and it reads your last 90 days of store history. You set one cycle goal, Paceloop pressure-tests it against your real numbers, then you pick 1–3 vital behaviors — plus a list of things to stop doing — and activate. At the end you have an active cycle with a goal you can defend and a plan small enough to actually run. Setup takes about 10 minutes.
One honest prerequisite: the analysis is built on roughly 90 days of trading history. If your store is younger, Paceloop tells you the data is thin instead of guessing — every projection is labeled low-confidence, and anything it cannot read is shown as unreadable, never estimated.
The whole setup is free: the audit, activation, and your first two weekly check-ins cost nothing.
Install Paceloop
Install Paceloop from the Shopify App Store — it's free to install. When you open the app, the home page shows the "Setup guide": four steps, starting with "Activate your first cycle". This article walks you through that first step; the rest follow from it.
Set the cycle goal
Click through to start a cycle. The wizard's first screen is "Step 1 of 3 — Set the cycle goal": cycle name, the metric to grow, your target, start date, and cycle length.
If you already set targets in Shopify, they appear under "Targets already set in Shopify Analytics" — pick one and the form pre-fills, marked "Seeded from your Shopify target". You don't have to invent a number here; start from what you already aimed at.
Read the pressure-test
Paceloop projects your last 90 days forward and grades your target against that trend. The verdict comes first — from "Realistic" to "Not realistic in one cycle" — followed by the honest read: what lift the target actually requires, and whether any single lever plausibly delivers it.
If your target gets flagged, that's the product working, not an error — see why Paceloop flags a target as unrealistic. You are never blocked: "Keep this target — find my constraint" moves you forward with the number you chose.
Below the verdict sits "Your last 90 days (what Paceloop sees)" — the exact numbers the analysis used, with a data-confidence badge. Anything Paceloop can't read from your store says "Not readable" instead of showing a made-up value.
Pick your vital behaviors and activate
The plan step is deliberately small: "Vital behaviors — pick 1 to 3". Each behavior is a weekly action aimed at your diagnosed constraint, and next to them sits "Cut from this cycle (recommended)" — the things to stop doing so the plan fits in a real week. Three behaviors is the hard cap; there is no option to pick five.
Click "Activate this plan". Two things happen:
- Your cycle goes live — the cycle page becomes your pace scoreboard for the next few weeks.
- If you opted in, your goal is mirrored as a growth target in Shopify Analytics, so the number you committed to shows up where you already look. As the app puts it: "Targets Paceloop creates stay in Shopify even if the cycle ends."
What happens next
Once a week, Paceloop meets you for a check-in: what ran, what didn't, and whether your pace still supports the goal. As the in-app banner puts it: "Goal pressure-test, constraint diagnosis, plan preview and activation are free, and so are your first two weekly check-ins. From check-in 3 the loop needs the Growth plan ($29/month)."
The free part is the complete audit plus two real weeks of the loop — enough to feel the weekly rhythm before paying anything. Billing runs through Shopify; see what's free and what Growth unlocks.
From here the weekly routine takes over: how to do your weekly check-in, how to read your pace scoreboard, and eventually how to close or abandon a cycle.
Curious why the loop is built this way — one goal, one constraint, weekly cadence? That's the method.